Crusader Mike is profoundly, deeply cynical about human nature. Perhaps that is due to my own feet of clay, that come to mid-waist -- still, I get convinced at times that someone is at least what they seem; and then I am disappointed. Sadly, I think that is happening with John McCain.
Ariana Huffington considers the McCain conundrum this week and I think she is right on target. He's convinced that the only way he can be president and cause the changes he believes we need to make is to soften his stance toward things that dismay and disgust him. Referring to Bush's recent speeches as "fairly eloquent" is a really telling example. When McCain embraced Bush in 2004 over Kerry, he looked pained and disgusted every time Bush touched him. Given the Bush inability to craft a coherent sentence, McCain's "fairly eloquent" is not damning with faint praise; it's damn near Steven Colbert Level Presidential Worship given where he started from.
His brief appearance on The Daily Show where Jon Stewart went after his rapprochement with Jerry Falwell was possibly hopeful. When Stewart asked him if he was "freakin' out on us and going into crazy base world," McCain smiled and said yes. Now, McCain offered to invite Jon to Liberty University for the commencement speech so that he could sit next to Falwell as McCain spoke to the students. If I were Stewart, I'd call him on it. And, take a camera crew...
I am reminded of the line from A Man for All Seasons, where Thomas More learns that his friend and former protege Richard Rich has turned informer and betrayed him in return for appointment as governor of Wales. "Why Richard, it profits a man nothing to give his soul for the whole world... but for Wales?"
