Matt Taibbi: “Requiem for a Maverick”
Another great one from Taibbi:
Palin is exactly the kind of all-or-nothing fundamentalist to whom the career of John McCain had long existed as a kind of sneering counterargument. Up until this year, McCain had firmly rejected the emotional imperatives implicit in Bush-Rove-Gingrich conservatism, in which the relentless demonizing of liberals and liberalism was even more important than policy. While other Republicans were crusading against gay marriage in 2004, McCain bashed a proposed anti-gay-marriage amendment, calling it “antithetical in every way to the core philosophy of Republicans.” While the president and other Republicans wrapped their arms around the Falwells of the world, McCain blasted those preachers as “agents of intolerance.” He talked of seeing the hand of God when he hiked in the Grand Canyon, but insisted loudly that he believed in evolution. He even, for Christ’s sake, supported a ban on commercial whaling. If there’s anything that a decent Republican knows without being told, it’s that whales are a liberal constituency.
But McCain didn’t care. Back then, his political survival didn’t depend on keeping voters artificially geeked up on fear and hatred for Mexicans or biology teachers or other such subversives. He was, after all, a war hero, and Sharon Stone’s cousin.
In short, McCain entered this election season being the worst thing that anyone can be, in the eyes of the Rove-school Republicans: Different. Independent. His own man. He exited the campaign on his knees, all his dignity gone, having handed the White House to the hated liberals after spending the last months of the race with numb-nuts Sarah Palin on his arm and Karl Rove’s cock in his mouth. Even if you wanted to vote for him, you didn’t know who you were voting for. The old McCain? The new McCain? Neither? Both?
Exactly. Of all of the Republican candidates, the only one I feared was McCain. The “maverick” of 2000 (or even 2004) would have been pretty difficult to beat, regardless of who the Dem pick was. But for all of Palin’s loud pronouncements that she was a “maverick,” too, no one ever really bought it (it was a bridge to nowhere) and in the end she became McCain’s Kryptonite, hung around his neck and sapping what little strength he had left out of him. While I thought she looked pretty good on paper prior to her selection, I knew from the moment I saw her smug froth-inducing speech at the Republican convention that it was all uphill for him going forward, regardless of the quick bump her arrival gave the ticket. He was officially boxed-in by the wingnut mouth-breathers, the same cretins who used to howl for his RINO head, and, in the end, they finally (and unknowingly) exacted their revenge.
The luster is gone. The maverick is dead. And now McCain will always be remembered, first and foremost, as a loser. In 2008, the Republican base can lay claim to that one small victory.
[via Balloon Juice]
Posted by Kevin K. on 12/02/08 at 10:44 AM • Permalink
Categories: Politics • Election '08 • St. McSame • Editorials • Nutters • Sarah Palin •
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