So what happened to McCain?

[AAAhmed46]

I put this theory forth earlier.

John McCain has served our country for decades, an honest, upright man. However, since his defeat and abuse in the 2000 presidential election, something snapped within him and recently he turned uber-Machiavellian. He reversed his positions on Abortion, Torture, Tax Cuts, et cetera. He employed the very man who dragged his daughter's name and his wife's name in the dirt during the 2000 election to do the same thing to Barack Obama and Joe Biden. Perhaps worst of all, he allowed Sarah Palin: An inexperienced, blundering supporter of holy war, alaskan zionism, Mr. Pib, Cheesenips and plumbers to become his V.P. running-mate.

Essentially, McCain snapped after he lost something he wanted and deserved.

He went from this:



to this:



I therefore ask that we do what Batman did: help everyone remember a fallen (ideologically and morally) hero as he was; not what twisted circumstance and repeated ill-fortune and failure made him become.

Meanwhile, McCain will recuperate in Gotham Asylum (the U.S. Senate) and Will help the world again someday, after he regains his lost half.

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Honestly,. I really did like him.

He was savaged by the Rove/GOP/Neocon machine and passed over in favor of a truly undeserving puppet. It was dispicable what was done to McCain, and through out that primary campagin he was the god damn man; he didn't stoop to their level, he didn't flail around like a chicken with his head cut off, he did everything right.

While it didn't seem to get to him at the time, obviously what happened in 2000 affected him- "affected" perhaps not being quite strong enough a phrase "##### up" is more like that.

The man that ran in 2008 was not the same man that ran 8 years ago, and that's a shame.



Barrack Obama:

MR FLIP FLOPPER.

Remember how he would pull out all troops from iraq?

Oh wait, now it's a time table, and we'll put them in afganistan and pakistan.

hey, lets negotiate.

Oh wait, it's negotiate from a position fo power.


seriously, what kind of choices do you guys have?


This is why, the republicans and democrats now need to dismantle their parties, simply so people can vote for more then two parties.

I know there are more parties then republicans and democrats.

But no one will take them seriously.

If the republicans and democrates get dismantled, there will be far more choice.


It'll never happen, yeah i know.

[mhosea]

I think McCain's campaign was too much about why not to vote for Obama and not enough about why people should vote for him. It seemed like facing multiple opponents was somehow better for McCain than being able fixate on just one.

Having said that, however, the credit crisis has to rank higher than any other factor, and anybody who blames the Palin pick without putting the credit crisis higher is living in I-hate-Palin la la land. McCain seemed rattled and confused, unable even to formulate a specific plan and also unable to formulate the argument that liberal ideas and actions had had anything to do with the problem. Yes, conservative ideas were part of that perfect storm, too, but McCain never got to dealing with that. Instead his campaign all but ceded that it was due to the failure of conservative policies and preferred instead to change the subject to Obama's past associations. It seemed like they decided that they couldn't win about a month ago and just started to throw "Hail Marys". They may have been right. I've been saying to my friends ever since the stock market slide that McCain couldn't win now, least of all with these tactics.

[Bill Glasheen]

It's the economy, stupid!

(See my other thread...)

The house blew up on Bush's watch. Never mind the cause. The party in power gets the blame. The voters are pi$$ed. They have spoken.

Same thing happened at the end of the Eisenhower, Carter, and Bush Sr. administrations.

- Bill

[Glenn]

Well one view of this is that the economy tends to blow up under the Republican watch and the people then vote for the Democrats to fix it. Then when the economy is OK again people turn back to the Republicans for other reasons, who then tank the economy again. Carter was just confused about what his role was supposed to be.

The reality of course is that blowing up the largest economy in the world is rarely the result of short-term events or single administrations...it takes the collective screw-ups of successive administrations.

I have noticed however that since WWII there seems to be a difference in the successes of Republican presidents and Democratic presidents. Republican presidents have generally had more success in foreign affairs at the detriment of the national economy, while Democratic presidents have generally had more success on the home economic front at the detriment of foreign affairs. Those same differences were highlighted in this election as well. The ideal would be to find a complete candidate with strengths in both areas, but that has not been happening.

[Glenn]

Having said that, however, the credit crisis has to rank higher than any other factor, and anybody who blames the Palin pick without putting the credit crisis higher is living in I-hate-Palin la la land.

The economy and being a republican definitely did McCain in, but picking Palin didn't help. I think McCain knew he couldn't win in the current economic and public-opinion situation, and chose Palin over more qualified potential running-mates so the party would have a scapegoat to blame the loss on as well as to not drag anyone down who might have a shot in 2012.

[Bill Glasheen]

I have noticed however that since WWII there seems to be a difference in the successes of Republican presidents and Democratic presidents. Republican presidents have generally had more success in foreign affairs at the detriment of the national economy, while Democratic presidents have generally had more success on the home economic front at the detriment of foreign affairs.

Ronald Reagan bucked that trend. He got us out of stagflation, smacked OPEC around until they squealed, and presided over the fall of the Berlin Wall. Oh and it's worth mentioning that Reagan presided over the fall of the Soviet Union because our ECONOMY beat their's. The USSR collapsed from the inside.

You can however argue the particulars...

Personally (as a libertarian), I'm a BIG fan of divided government. That's what scared the schit out of me in this last election. Those coattails were downright scary. Fortunately the Democrats can't avoid a filibuster if they start spending like drunken sailors.

If Obama makes it to a 2nd term (we have NO idea what he actually will DO), then the natural tendency for voters to create a divided government would bring things to a better place. IMO of course...

- Bill

[Glenn]

Ronald Reagan bucked that trend. He got us out of stagflation, smacked OPEC around until they squealed, and presided over the fall of the Berlin Wall. Oh and it's worth mentioning that Reagan presided over the fall of the Soviet Union because our ECONOMY beat their's. The USSR collapsed from the inside.

I don't know, even in this Republican state (Nebraska) Reaganomics is a dirty word. Too many people hurt by the Farm Crisis and double-digit loan interest rates at the time. Reagonomics is ultimately viewed as contributing to the economic issues that defeated the senior Bush, part of that multi-administration factor I mentioned. I include Reagan as having more success internationally than domestically.

Personally (as a libertarian),

Speaking of which, why haven't you been touting the Libertarian candidate? I don't recall seeing anything about him here.

[TSDguy]

I touted him (Barr) a bit. I strongly preferred Paul, but strongly disliked Paul's recommendation (Baldwin) after he lost. I believe a lot of libertarian minded folk were in the same boat and the parties votes were spread over about 6 different candidates.

Anywho, I know Bill knows enough about correlation and causality to know Reagan had nothing to do with the USSR collapsing, but I saw an interesting theory on the History Channel the other day. Some Reagan advisors were on there saying "Reagan came up with this ridiculous concept of SDI without talking to anyone, just sort of announced we were doing it. The Soviet Union though we actually COULD and they just didn't have the resources to take the fight to space, thus hastening their 'surrender'."

[mhosea]

I think McCain knew he couldn't win in the current economic and public-opinion situation, and chose Palin over more qualified potential running-mates so the party would have a scapegoat to blame the loss on as well as to not drag anyone down who might have a shot in 2012.

Interesting speculation, but I'm not buying it. It was a tight race in the polls until the economy tanked. Then it was never close. I do blame McCain for using Palin as an attack dog. She wasn't writing her own speeches, and the expectation of the VP candidate is to tow the line. She was saying what McCain wanted her to say, and McCain was saying the same things. From that standpoint and taking a longer view, I don't think that Palin hurt McCain, rather vice versa, but time will tell. So, I guess in that limited sense you may be right. McCain's sins are being piled upon Palin.

[Bill Glasheen]

Anywho, I know Bill knows enough about correlation and causality to know Reagan had nothing to do with the USSR collapsing, but I saw an interesting theory on the History Channel the other day. Some Reagan advisors were on there saying "Reagan came up with this ridiculous concept of SDI without talking to anyone, just sort of announced we were doing it. The Soviet Union though we actually COULD and they just didn't have the resources to take the fight to space, thus hastening their 'surrender'."

I don't know about the History Channel theory.

I DO however believe that the economic boom of the Reagan years - the longest economic expansion in modern times - had a LOT to do with the Soviet collapse. They spent themselves silly trying to keep up with us militarily. I visited Russia after the collapse. You could see that nothing advanced there (socially) after the 1960s. Reagan was a big-a$$ed straw that broke the camel's back.

- Bill

[Glenn]

I will always give Reagan high marks for rebuilding the military and strengthening the U.S. position internationally, after the decline of both in the post-Vietnam 1970s. I believe a lot of the current capabilities of our military are due to the development that resulted from Reagan's strong advocacy.

[Bill Glasheen]

On Glenn's Palin theory...

Anyone want to place bets on this theory? Mitt Romney said "Thanks but no thanks" to McCain's VP position. He did so thinking that he might not win as VP in 2008, but could run a "clean slate" campaign (as the Republican nominee for president) against Obama in 2012.

I have family in the banking industry. A certain family member is in the management of a major bank that survived the recent collapse quite nicely. Her bank saw the writing on the wall on the "subprime loans" market, and diversified away from it. They had repeated offers to take companies and/or their junk loans for pennies on the dollar, and refused. They survived; well-known financial institutions bit it big time.

They saw it coming. Romney's a smart businessman. He may have as well.

It'll be tough putting Humpty together again in 4 years...

- Bill

[TSDguy]

Here's a look 'behind the scenes'.

http://www.newsweek.com/id/167581/page/1

[cxt]

Lets also give credit where credit is due....Obama's team was simply better than McCains.......they steered him in some seriously wrong directions and didn't let him do what he thought he should do.

For one thing they convienced him not to show that temper he is infamous for....until it was too late for his passion to matter.

Its a team event and Obama's team was simply better....love him or hate him......I gotta give credit where credit is due.

Beating Hillery then beating McCain......its not an accident.

[TSDguy]

I think the Newsweek article and cxt both got that right. I liked McCain back when he acted like a moderate republican. His Bush-era advisors just... mangled him and he let them do it.