There is something not quite right about John McCain. Before he became the Republican nominee for president, some who knew him well, or at least worked with him closely, raised questions about his “temperament.”
Temperament was a polite was of saying that the curious blend of emotion and intellect that makes each human unique makes McCain uniquely unsuitable for the White House. In the early days of this very long election, it was easy to dismiss such talk as “loose” or “unfounded.” Rivals, after all, will say or do just about anything to make their opponents look bad or to sow doubts about them.
Still, it is unfortunate that Republican voters did not pay more attention to those warnings, because it looks as if the United States now has about a 50-50 chance of electing as president someone who is clearly not all there. Every president does things that some, even many, think are crazy. But in its colorful history, the United States has yet to knowingly elect a chief executive who is himself unbalanced.
Watching McCain over the past several weeks, it is hard to escape the conclusion that he is unhinged: regularly forgetful, alternating between aggressive bluster and smug self-satisfaction, and lying with wild abandon.
Considered in isolation, any one of these tendencies might not be cause for alarm. We all forget things. Perfectly able 72 year olds will concede that their memories are not what they used to be. The close combat of a national election certainly calls for a sort of manic energy. So what if McCain runs a little too hot? And lying . . . well, that is a staple in politics.
Maybe.
Then again, maybe not.
McCain lies with an intensity that would make President George W. Bush blush. Bush’s lie about Saddam Hussein having weapons of mass destruction may have caught up with him, but so big was that lie that it took a year or two for the truth to come out. And even when Bush’s rationale for invading Iraq was revealed as a fraud, he was able to seek solace among true believers by suggesting it was dependent upon one’s interpretation. We know the horribly costly consequences of that lie.
McCain, on the other hand, lies about things that can be quickly disproved and are not subject to any interpretation. McCain said that, as governor of Alaska, vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin opposed the so-called Bridge to Nowhere. It took about 72 hours for that whopper to be shot down. McCain said that he favored regulation that would have prevented the financial crisis that now threatens the American — and the world — economy. The record shows the opposite to be true. We’ll accept the uncomfortable proposition that it is not crazy to lie in politics. But does it make sense to tell crazy lies?
Perhaps it is merely a matter of bad judgment. If picking Palin as vice-president is any indication, then few — aside from the dangerously uninformed and crazies who bite the heads off snakes in their churches — will accuse McCain of being judicious. If Katie Couric’s CBS interviews did not convince voters that Palin is at best clueless and at worst ignorant, then maybe the reservations of conservative eggheads, such David Brooks of the New York Times and George Will of the Washington Post, will carry more weight. Pat Buchanan, a champion of stone-age political views, has found Palin charming but wanting. And David Frum, a former speechwriter for our current leader, says that comparing Palin with former vice-president Dan Quayle belittles Quayle. That is about as savage an indictment of Palin — and of McCain’s judgment — as exists.
And then there is the truly bizarre and deeply disturbing matter of McCain’s “suspension” of his campaign so that he could sweep into Washington and rescue the nation from an impotent president and an incompetent Congress. The situation, he said, was so serious that the first presidential debate ought to have been cancelled. When Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama called his bluff, McCain, as the nation knows, showed up and debated. And McCain’s rush to the rescue failed to move even Republican House members to vote yes and save the nation from impotence and incompetence.
The fact of the matter is that McCain was hard-pressed to explain what he really thought of the Wall Street rescue plan. That, however, did not stop him from claiming credit for the bailout’s passage in the hours before it went down to defeat. That will register as one of America’s more interesting political moments.
McCain may bounce back if Palin, by whatever frighteningly minimal standard she is held to, performs well or credibly in her debate with her Democratic opponent, Senator Joe Biden. After all, the nation can expect only so much from a depressed geezer who can not keep his lies straight and has succumbed to his savior complex. (Or is it a martyr complex?)
His eagerness to sacrifice himself to save us all might have been admirable if it showed results. But it did not.
