Cohen (WaPo): The Ugly New McCain

[regnaD kciN]

This editorial will apparently come out in tomorrow's print edition, not today's:

Following his loss to George W. Bush in the 2000 South Carolina primary, John McCain did something extraordinary: He confessed to lying about how he felt about the Confederate battle flag, which he actually abhorred. "I broke my promise to always tell the truth," McCain said. Now he has broken that promise so completely that the John McCain of old is unrecognizable. He has become the sort of politician he once despised.

(...)

I am one of the journalists accused over the years of being in the tank for McCain. Guilty. Those doing the accusing usually attributed my feelings to McCain being accessible. This is the journalist-as-puppy school of thought: Give us a treat, and we will leap into a politician's lap. Not so. What impressed me most about McCain was the effect he had on his audiences, particularly young people. When he talked about service to a cause greater than oneself, he struck a chord. He expressed his message in words, but he packaged it in the McCain story -- that man, beaten to a pulp, who chose honor over freedom. This had nothing to do with access. It had to do with integrity.

McCain has soiled all that. His opportunistic and irresponsible choice of Sarah Palin as his political heir -- the person in whose hands he would leave the country -- is a form of personal treason, a betrayal of all he once stood for. Palin, no matter what her other attributes, is shockingly unprepared to become president. McCain knows that. He means to win, which is all right; he means to win at all costs, which is not.

(...)

And so McCain lied about his lying and maybe thinks that if he wins the election, he can -- as he did in South Carolina -- renounce who he was and what he did and resume his old persona. It won't work. Karl Marx got one thing right -- what he said about history repeating itself. Once is tragedy, a second time is farce. John McCain is both.

More here.

:spank:

Talk about throwing your former favorite under the bus! The "McCain as compulsive liar, willing to throw away his integrity" meme is building up to tsunami status...

[Earth Bound Misfit]

1. K & R

Looks like the fallout from Ms. Apocalipstick Now's CHALLENGE to the "Washington elite" is gaining momentum. I remember thinking at the time she made the following comments in "her" speech to the RNC: Probably NOT A GOOD IDEA to PISS-OFF people who buy ink by the TRUCKLOAD in your FIRST address to America

... I've learned quickly these last few days that, if you're not a member in good standing of the Washington elite, then some in the media consider a candidate unqualified for that reason alone.

(AUDIENCE BOOS)

PALIN: But -- now, here's a little newsflash. Here's a little newsflash for those reporters and commentators: I'm not going to Washington to seek their good opinion. I'm going to Washington to serve the people of this great country.

[XanaDUer]

2. Ms. Apocalipstick

:rofl: !!!!!!!!!!!!!

[NoFederales]

3. "McCain as compulsive liar, willing to throw away his integrity"--So true. nt

NoFederales