The Left: Anybody But McCain

Interesting editorial by Robert Kuttner – The John McCain charade. It’s not just conservatives in favor of secure borders and people who despise the terrorist rights wing of the Republican party who don’t like McCain. Kuttner is decidedly on the left. McCain must be a uniter, not a divider.

But wait. There’s John McCain! Isn’t he the Republican who challenged Bush on Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo? Didn’t he fearlessly investigate the corrupt Republican lobbyist Jack Abramoff? Didn’t he resist the right’s immigrant-bashing? Didn’t he cross the aisle to work with Democrats John Kerry on Vietnam POWs and MIAs, and Russ Feingold on the (worse than useless) McCain-Feingold campaign finance reform act?

What a guy! You can just imagine the truly revolting columns by gullible Washington pundits on McCain as just the kind of bipartisan that the republic needs.

In fact, McCain votes 90 percent of the time as an ordinary far-right conservative, and when push comes to shove, he gives the administration what it wants. The morning line used to be that the fundamentalist GOP base would never go for McCain, but that was last year. This year, McCain has made highly publicized appearances genuflecting to religious-right icons.

Despite an abiding mutual distaste, he and Karl Rove have kissed and made up, because they need each other — McCain to get elected president, Rove to continue the regime. If we are taken in by this act, we will face a permanent right-wing takeover of our democracy.

I don’t mind that he’s unabashedly partisan, after all, it’s an editorial. But Kuttner’s an idiot and his article has a few, um, inaccurate statements, doubtless by accident. But then, the mainstream media’s fact checker has been on the fritz for some time. Paul Krugman is the most egregious of many examples.

What’s really interesting about this drivel is that it’s an example of why someone on the far left can’t stand McCain. McCain may vote along party lines “90% of the time.” I rather doubt it, given Kuttner’s “command” of other facts, but I don’t care enough to check. Still, he’s no Lincoln Chaffee. And fiscally he’s very good. He would put the earmarking porkers to shame, if they had any. But where he’s wrong, he’s so very wrong that it overwhelms the areas where he’s good. His election “reform” bill did more to attack free speech than anything I’m aware of since the republic was founded. His support of granting the enemy additional rights is not just an embarrassment, but dangerous to our national security. And I’m sick of his headline-grabbing “maverick” ways that undermine the party. He can be depended on to take the holier-than-thou position every time.

Considering the far left and the medium to far right’s strong opinions about him, McCain might as well just hang up his gloves right now, because he’s not a contender in 2008.