McCain
I won’t vote for McCain because of Sarah Palin.
Ok, I probably wouldn’t have voted for McCain even if he picked Lion-O as his VP. But my point is, McCain always seemed to have some credibility as a maverick. I never did buy the whole Washington outsider role, but he certainly stayed his guns when movements became unpopular and passed the decent McCain-Feingold bill.
This election has gotten so nasty, so quickly, that it seems to be mimicking the 2000/2004 Bush/Cheney elections.
- Assault on rational thought? Check
- Disregard for real issues? Check
- Emphasis on a “gee-willikers” persona? Check
- Wicked attack ads, using fuzzy logic and the occasional outright lie? Check
Now, dear conservative friends (do I have any conservative friends?), you might want to look away. I’m going to link to a Thomas Friedman article. Fair warning – HERE IT IS.
Like he often does, Friedman encapsulates most of what I think into one column that probably earned him more than I make in 16 months. John McCain has abandoned all of his hard-earned credibility in one massive cultural attack.
The problem with Obama, the McCain camp often said, is that he is a rock-star, all glitz and leather pants, and no substance. Needless to say, there wasn’t a chance in hell they could ever stand their old war vet against such youthful flash and they knew it. So they picked a fairly attractive lady whose face could easily be photoshopped onto bikini-clad bodies. It’s like an episode of The Real World, except it actually matters what these two do.
Regardless of how this election ends, I will be very interested to see who is running this McCain campaign. Even though I was 15 at the time, I remember McCain getting crushed in the South Carolina primaries because he didn’t run a dirty campaign. Could he really be abandoning all of his scruples for a shot at the White House?
Damn the issues, full speed ahead!