Posted on 07/24/2008 7:54:00 AM PDT by flyfree
John McCain will step off the campaign trail tomorrow to sit down with the Dalai Lama.
McCain will meet with the Tibetan spirtual leader and international icon in Aspen, Colorado, according to a McCain aide.
The Dalai Lama is there as part of a three-day Aspen Institute conference billed as "A Celebration of Tibetan Culture."
The Arizona senator was already scheduled to be in the state to speak to a military gathering in Denver.
McCain has been outspoken about the Chinese crackdown in the Tibetan region, issuing a statement earlier this year praising the The Dalai Lama and urging the Beijing to begin a "genuine dialogue" with the spiritual leader.
"I urge the Chinese authorities to ensure peaceful protest is not met with violence, to release monks and others detained for peacefully expressing their views and to allow full outside access to Tibet," McCain said in March.
His plans today to visit a Gulf Coast oil rig foiled by the weather, McCain is trying valiantly to secure a slice of news media attention during Barack Obama's week abroad. The GOP nominee will appear with famed cyclist Lance Armstrong at a town hall meeting tonight in Ohio focused on cancer.
Do you know what the Lama says? “Gunga galunga. Gunga, gunga galunga.” So we finish the eighteenth and he’s gonna stiff me. And I say, “Hey, Lama, hey, how about a little something, you know, for the effort, you know?” And he says, “Oh, there won’t be any money, but when you die, on your deathbed, you will receive total consciousness.” So I got that goin’ for me. Which is nice.
Sorry about all the pings, but I couldn’t let this one go. Looks like McCain is beating Obama to the punch on the Dali Lama! LMAO
"WTF?!"- Dalai Lama
Meeting with the Dalai Lama should blow Obama’s world tour right out of the water!
Has this man (and false "gxd," btw) ever done anything to oppose Communism anywhere?
Also.......while America’s future is deep jeporady and he is getting his behind kicked, McCain is playing nicey-nice and footsy with the spiritual leader of Richard Gere. He is bad need of some input and suggestions for his campaign.
You called it! Good strategery, Kittie. ;)
This should boost his Hippy vote by at least 2 or 3 votes.
JMO, but I’ve never seen any conservative admiration of the Dali Lama, usually that comes from the left. Either last week or the week before there was an article posted about how he called the 9/11 terrorists “mischievous.” There was no adoration for him on that thread at all.
There are a couple Buddhist freepers that I’ve run across and neither have expressed any sort of adoration for him. One called him a crappy leader. I wish I could remember his screen name, but I am drawing a blank. I think it had “tiger” in it?
Leni
Ping to our “new” ChiCom FReepers
McCain standing up for freedom.
I can just see it:
“Hello, Dalai! Heh heh heh heh.”
Ping
I don’t admire the Dalai Lama but absolutely DETEST the barbarian ChiComs and their running dog lackeys (incl. the ones that post on this forum).
Maybe he's found his VP!!! ;^)
I admire the Dalai Lama. Look into his history and then tell me you don’t.
So pushing for peace is a “hippy” thing????
The Dalai Lama’s teachings are somehow not to be admired?
Some of the posts on this site are the most ludicrous things ever read.
Are you on crack?
I can't figure out what annoys me more, FR threads like this, or FR threads where yahoos cheer on the Chi-Coms cracking down on Muslim minorities. I hate cognitive dissonance.
I’m a Buddhist FReeper, Tibetan Buddhist too, with Tiger in my handle and I didn’t say it. I don’t view him as my spiritual leader but he’s a nice guy. Some of his statements are difficult to understand without knowing a deeper context of his life, teachings and responsibilities. Such as his remarks about Marxism. Many fail to take him at his word when he describes himself as “a simple monk.” In great measure that is very true and not just a self deprecating remark.
For what it's worth, I am not a fan of McCain at all and may not vote for him, but something like this makes me more likely to do so.
I don’t know but Al Gore seemed to get some reelection $$’s from Monks. Maybe the Dolly Lameo fled Tibet with mucho dinaro stuck up his butt! Oh and I do admire the DL managing to keep his cult alive even as the Chinese have all but wiped out his former country. He’s definitely a propect for the Noble Prize, even a UN post and maybe a starring role in some big budget Hollywood drama.
I am familiar with the Dalai Lama’s history. JMO, people generally admire his attempts to hold off the communists in Tibet and early history. BUT, it’s things like the cavorting with celebs, calling himself a “half-Buddhist, half-Marxist”, and referring to the 9/11 terrorists as “mischievous” that put people off.
Tibetan Buddhism is a small branch of Buddhism, but from all the coverage he receives, people think it’s the largest.
Hmmm...maybe I am merging two freepers into one, your handle but someone else’s comment? I don’t think this person was a Tibetan Buddhist. I think they were Mahayana.
I don’t know. Tibetan Buddhism is often called Mahayana (and it does start with that) although it is primarily Vajrayana.
LOL... How did you remember that!?
I happened to meet the Dalai Lama once in Santa Cruz when I was a news director maybe 20 years ago. He is not christian, but this does not mean he is not a man of god. I was struck by his his simplistic air and yet there was something ethereal about him. A very deep and moving experience. I am not a follow of Tibetan Buddhism, nor plan to be, but I do not regard the 14th incarnation of the Dalai Lama to be a charlatan. He is, in my opinion, a representation of a mystery that is beyond my simple understanding.
Posts like these make you look like a liar and a thug. I won't address such slander any further. If you won't deal in facts, if you won't comment honestly on the various arguements I've made, then it's of no use to engage you further.
That is a very interesting way to put it. I have never met the Dalai Lama but I have met some very realized lamas and they can definitely blow your mind.
Did you ask him why Mao let him escape and why the Lama did not lift a finger to oppose him? The Panchen Lama was repeatedly denounced by Mao and the Chicoms for opposing the regime.
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