+
Sign up for
The Upworthiest
Our top stories of the day delivered straight to your inbox.
More

John McCain's emotional, career-encompassing speech will live on for generations to come.

Looking back on a long career, John McCain lands on an important lesson about life.

Months after being diagnosed with brain cancer, John McCain delivered one of the best speeches of his long political career.

The 81-year-old Arizona senator was this year's recipient of the Constitution Center's Liberty Medal, an award given annually to an individual who exemplifies "courage and conviction" and strives "to secure the blessings of liberty to people around the globe." Recent past recipients include Rep. John Lewis, the Dalai Lama, Malala Yousafzai, and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

After being introduced by former Vice President Joe Biden, McCain gave a speech that really needs to be heard by people across the political spectrum.

McCain called on lawmakers to find common ground and reject the hyper-partisanship that's infected Washington in recent years.

While he and Biden didn't always agree on policy during their time as colleagues in the U.S. Senate, McCain noted, they never doubted that the other had the best interests of the country in mind. Politics, McCain suggests, used to be more than just a game of power.

"We believed in the institution we were privileged to serve in," McCain said of his working relationship with the former VP. "We believed in our mutual responsibility to help make the place work and to cooperate in finding solutions to our country’s problems. We believed in our country and in our country’s indispensability to international peace and stability and to the progress of humanity. And through it all, whether we argued or agreed, Joe was good company."

[rebelmouse-image 19529740 dam="1" original_size="500x281" caption=""We believed in our mutual responsibility to ... cooperate in finding solutions to our country's problems." GIF from CNN/YouTube." expand=1]"We believed in our mutual responsibility to ... cooperate in finding solutions to our country's problems." GIF from CNN/YouTube.

The most headline-grabbing portion of McCain's speech was a call to reject fear and embrace the obligations the U.S. has made to the international community.

Nationalism and "America First" attitudes didn't make America great; our commitment to the outside world did. It's at this point in his speech where the war hero begins to get a bit choked up, reflecting on the country as it is and as it should be.

He asked those around him to reject "half-baked, spurious nationalism cooked up by people who would rather find scapegoats than solve problems," calling that attitude and those policies unpatriotic.

[rebelmouse-image 19529741 dam="1" original_size="500x281" caption=""We live in a land made of ideals, not blood and soil. We are the custodians of those ideals at home and their champion abroad." GIF from CNN/YouTube." expand=1]"We live in a land made of ideals, not blood and soil. We are the custodians of those ideals at home and their champion abroad." GIF from CNN/YouTube.

The common thread between those two points — finding common ground with those we disagree with and rejecting isolationism — is empathy.

To be sure, McCain's positions haven't always reflected an empathetic worldview. With hawkish positions on foreign policy and his past pushes to gut the Affordable Care Act, he's certainly an imperfect messenger of an important lesson. In this speech, though, as he reflected on some of the brightest moments in his career, it is the basic bond of human empathy as a motivating factor that stands out the most.

"I’ve seen Americans make sacrifices for our country and her causes and for people who were strangers to them but for our common humanity, sacrifices that were much harder than the service asked of me," he said, his voice wavering ever so slightly, tinged with emotion. "And I’ve seen the good they have done, the lives they freed from tyranny and injustice, the hope they encouraged, the dreams they made achievable."

Watch John McCain deliver his powerful, thoughtful retrospective on life as a public servant below.

Family

Help is on the way for a desperate mom who couldn't find size 23 shoes for her teenage son

Her son Eric Kilburn Jr. is a 6'10" freshman in high school.

via GoFundMe

A size 21 Nike shoe made for Tacko Fall.

A local reporter at Hometown Life shared a unique and heartfelt story on March 16 about a mother struggling to find shoes that fit her 14-year-old son. The story resonated with parents everywhere; now, her son is getting the help he desperately needs. It's a wonderful example of people helping a family that thought they had nowhere to turn.

When Eric Kilburn Jr. was born, his mother, Rebecca’s OBGYN, told her that he had the “biggest feet I’ve ever seen in my life. Do not go out and buy baby shoes because they’re not gonna fit,’” Rebecca told Today.com. Fourteen years later, it’s almost impossible to find shoes that fit the 6’10” freshman—he needs a size 23.

Keep ReadingShow less
parents
Family

Dad found out his son bullied a kid at school and came up with a brilliant teaching moment

"I told him that we have the opportunity to make things right."

@thehalfdeaddad/TikTok

Dad on TikTok shared how he addressed his son's bullying.

What do you do when you find out your kid bullied someone? For many parents, the first step is forcing an apology. While this response is of course warranted, is it really effective? Some might argue that there are more constructive ways of handling the situation that teach a kid not only what they did wrong, but how to make things right again.

Single dadPatrick Forseth recently shared how he made a truly teachable moment out of his son, Lincoln, getting into trouble for bullying. Rather than forcing an apology, Forseth made sure his son was actively part of a solution.


The thought process behind his decision, which he explained in a now-viral TikTok video, is both simple and somewhat racial compared to how many parents have been encouraged to handle similar situations.
Keep ReadingShow less
fatherhood
Education

Former teacher shares the funny 'secret code' she used when talking to parents

“Your son is going to make a great lawyer" is code for: "Your kid won’t stop arguing with me."

via Bored Teachers/TikTok

Miss Smith shares the "secret code" teachers use in emails to parents.

There are many things that teachers think but cannot say aloud. Teachers have to have a certain sense of decorum and often have strict rules about the things they can or can’t say about children, especially to their parents.

Plus, it’s a teacher’s job to educate, not judge. So, they find ways to kindly say what’s on their minds without having to resort to name-calling or talking disparagingly of a student.

Keep ReadingShow less
teachers
Education

Florida principal forced to resign after showing Michelangelo's 'David' to students

“It saddens me that my time here had to end this way."

Photo by Igor Ferreira on Unsplash

Florida principal fired after showing statue of "David."

If you ask most teachers why they went into education, they'll share that it had nothing to do with the money and everything to do with their passion for teaching. Even with rapid changes in curriculum and policies, teachers who remain in the classroom are lovers of education and are doing their best to help kids learn.

Hope Carrasquilla, the former principal of Florida's Tallahassee Classical School, was one of those teachers who simply enjoyed teaching. As the principal, Carrasquilla was required to teach two classes. During her sixth grade lesson about Renaissance art, which is also a requirement of the school, Carrasquilla showed a picture of Michelangelo's "David" statue.

According to the Tallahassee Democrat, three parents complained about their children being shown the picture. Two of those parents were mostly upset that there wasn't sufficient notice given before the photo of the sculpture was shown. The third parent reportedly complained that the statue of the Biblical figure was pornographic.

Keep ReadingShow less
art education
Pop Culture

Heads up! That call from a panicky relative may be a scammer voice clone.

The FTC is warning people to look out for the latest scam trend.

via Pexels

A man makes a phone call from prison.

One of the oldest frauds in the book is the “your loved one is in trouble” scam. Scammers call posing as a grandchild or loved one in distress who claims they’ve been kidnapped or are in jail. The scammer may also impersonate a nurse, police officer, lawyer or other authority figure representing the loved one.

The scammer claims that the loved one needs money wired to the fraudster immediately to bring them to safety.

The scam is effective because the victim is under pressure to get them money quickly, so they don’t have time to consider the fact that it may be a scam. All the while, they imagine the torment the loved one is going through. The urgency of the scam makes it much more likely that the victim will hand over the money.

Keep ReadingShow less
scams
Democracy

Afroman made a brilliant music video from clips of Ohio police's misguided raid of his home

This might be the greatest musical comeback ever.

via Wikimedia Commons

Afroman ready for the 2024 United States Presidential Election

Joseph Foreman, better known to music fans as rapper Afroman, had his Ohio home raided by Adams County Sheriff's deputies last August. The deputies were acting on a warrant claiming probable cause that drugs, drug paraphernalia, and evidence of drug trafficking and kidnapping would be found on his property.

Afroman wasn't home at the time of the raid, but his wife captured footage of it on her phone.

The deputies found nothing, confiscated over $5,000 worth of Afroman’s hard-earned money, bashed in his front door, broke his front gate and destroyed his home security camera system. No charges were filed after the raid. The money was later returned to the "Because I Got High" rapper.

“They come up here with AR-15, traumatize my kids, destroyed my property, kick in my door, rip up and destroy my camera system,” he said in August, according to Fox 19.

Keep ReadingShow less
police
Trending Stories