John McCain's Having a Bad Month

First off, he never expected that the White House would actually go through with his plan to add troops to the war zone in Baghdad. He was the first politician to call for an extra 20,000 troops. Then, when it seemed that the President would actually go through with it, he upped the ante to even more than that initial recommendation, giving himself some higher ground to say "they lost the war because they didn't listen to MEEEEE."

Mr. McCain embarked on a high-profile television tour announcing his support for Mr. Bush’s move. In an interview, he said he would have preferred that the White House send in even more troops, and noted that he had pressed this position on the White House, unsuccessfully until now, for more than two years.

McCain's desperately trying to remove himself from responsibility for this war, because he knows it means death for his Presidential chances. He wants to be the wise old man who wasn't listened to, not the wise old man whose advice the President took, and inevitably failed with.

Meanwhile the oppo research is starting to pile up on him.

Get out your flux capacitor and go back to 1990. Here is what John McCain had to say then, regarding using U.S. troops in the Gulf War. You could call it startling.

"If you get involved in a major ground war in the Saudi desert, I think support will erode significantly. Nor should it be supported. We cannot even contemplate, in my view, trading American blood for Iraqi blood." [New York Times Aug 19, 1990]

Ahh, there's nothing so refeshing as the sweet melody of straight talk.

Ok, so let's break this down. During a war that was far from perfect, but where we had allies from around the world sending troops (inlcuding Syria and Egypt), was largely bankrolled by Japan and Saudi Arabia, was an actual response to Iraqi aggression and saw an American leader not stupid enough to go into Baghdad, Sir McCain thought that American casualties in Iraq were not acceptable, support at home among members of Congress and the people would erode and it would actually matter and perhaps most importantly, US ground troops should simply not be a part of the equation.

Quite an amazing transformation, isn't it (he was also in favor of pulling out of Beirut in 1983 and skeptical of using force in Somalia and Bosnia initially)? It couldn't have anything to do with electoral politics could it?

AND, the religious right is trying to put the ki-bosh on his nomination.

A prominent Christian leader whose radio and magazine outreaches are solidly in support of biblically-based marriages – and keeps in touch with millions of constituents daily – says he cannot consider Arizona Sen. John McCain a viable candidate for president.

"Speaking as a private individual, I would not vote for John McCain under any circumstances," said James Dobson, founder of the Colorado Springs-based Focus on the Family as well as the Focus Action cultural action organization set up specifically to provide a platform for informing and rallying constituents [...]

"Dr. Dobson, would you be comfortable with someone like John McCain as the … conservative or Republican candidate for president?" Johnson asked.

"Well, let me say that I am not in the office. I'm in the little condo so I can speak for myself and not for Focus on the Family," Dobson said in rejecting McCain's leadership.

He noted that legislation he'd just been discussing on the program, regarding an attempt by Democrat leaders in Congress to create obstacles for ministries such as Focus to reach constituents with action messages about pending legislation, is being supported by McCain, too.

"That came from McCain, and the McCain Feingold Bill kept us from telling the truth right before elections … and there are a lot of other things. He's not in favor of traditional marriage, and I pray that we won't get stuck with him," Dobson said.

And the bad news just keeps on coming for McCain. He's yoked himself to a disastrous war, he's got major consistency problems on foreign policy, and his hardcore right flank hates him.

And this is the GOP front-runner for 2008.

I'm telling you, add two more years of George Bush into the mix and we won't even have to campaign. Vote your conscience, Democrats, this is a once-in-a-lifetime chance to get someone in the White House who best represents common values.