I guess I should consider going easier on McCain as it's starting to look like come November I'll be voting for him...

But, for now, here's an important point to make regarding John McCain's Clintonesque revision of what Romney said of Iraq and timetables last year, brought to you by George Willl .

St. John of Arizona's crooked-talk claim in Florida that Mitt Romney wanted to "surrender and wave a white flag, like Senator Clinton wants to do" in Iraq because Romney "wanted to set a date for withdrawal that would have meant disaster."

Imitation being the sincerest form of flattery, the Clintons should bask in the glow of John McCain's Clintonian gloss on this fact: Ten months ago Romney said that President Bush and Iraqi Prime Minister Maliki should discuss, privately, "a series of timetables and milestones." That unremarkable thought was twisted by McCain, whose distortions are notably clumsy, as when Romney said, accurately, that he alone among the candidates has had extensive experience in private-sector business. That truth was subjected to McCain's sophistry, and he charged that Romney had said "you haven't had a real job" if you had a military career. If, this autumn, voters must choose between Clinton and McCain, they will face, at least stylistically, an echo, not a choice.
Ouch babe.

Labels: 2008, Clinton, Iraq, mccain, romney

On many key policies by Congress, John McCain has partnered up with some very disconcerting bedfellows. Summary by Investors Business Daily:

Consider Michigan, home of the beleaguered American auto industry. McCain, together with Democrat John Kerry, were initial co-sponsors of the 35-mpg Corporate Average Fuel Economy mandate that just passed Congress. Estimates are that it will cost the domestic auto industry $85 billion over a decade and imperil thousands of jobs.

McCain's campaign says he has never voted to increase taxes. Yet General Motors Vice Chairman Bob Lutz says the bill will add an average of $6,000 to the price of a new car, in effect a 21.4% tax hike on current average car prices.

It gets worse. McCain supports an energy tax in the form of a bill co-sponsored with Joe Lieberman that would cap the amount of carbon dioxide that energy-producing companies could emit. It is essentially an energy-rationing scheme not unlike Bill Clinton's infamous BTU tax.

Companies wishing to increase energy production above the cap would have to purchase unused emission credits from other companies. In a letter to McCain in July 2007, the EPA estimated that the "tax" would amount to 26 cents per gallon by 2010 and 68 cents by 2050. The EPA says the McCain energy tax would increase electric bills by 22% in 2030. This is hardly the way to avoid a recession.

It gets worse. In April 2002, McCain joined John Edwards and Hillary Clinton in defeating a measure to open an area the size of Washington-Dulles Airport in the frozen tundra of ANWR to energy production.

He has voted against drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge no fewer than four times. In expressing his opposition, McCain equated ANWR with the Grand Canyon, a national monument. But as we have said repeatedly, the drilling area is in fact what hell would look like if it froze over.

Aside from supporting higher taxes and energy dependence, McCain shares the disdain of Democrats for America's pharmaceutical industry. Never mind the miracles it has produced.

In ABC's New Hampshire debate. McCain asked: "Why shouldn't we be able to re-import drugs from Canada?" He blamed high drug costs not on regulation and litigation, but on "the power of the pharmaceutical companies." When Mitt Romney argued that they weren't "the big bad guys," McCain replied, "Well, they are."

McCain has joined forces with Ted Kennedy to support amnesty for illegal aliens and with Russ Feingold to restrict political speech. He also backed the Sarbanes-Oxley monstrosity that makes American business less productive and competitive.

"John McCain was not only against us, but leading the charge on the other side," former Sen. Rick Santorum noted recently. "There's nothing worse than having a Democratic Congress and a Republican president who would act like a Democrat in matters that are important to conservatives." And to all Americans.

McCain supporters say he's the only one who could beat Hillary Clinton, but that might be a distinction without a difference.
Yeah, that's not good, is it.

I suppose McCain could surprise us once elected. None of these guys are that exciting, really. It's just -- as most career Senators/Congressmen -- McCain has a long history to scrutinize.

Along those lines, Rich Karlgaard, managing editor of Forbes.com, was on Bill Bennett's radio show this morning and said something I can relate to: "My head tells me to vote for Romney but my heart can't get behind him." He added that there's just something "too calculating" and "not genuine" about him, much in the same way people feel Hillary Clinton is not genuine.

Karlgaard actually had some pretty interesting takes regarding the election, and for conservatives most of the scenarios, at least from an economic standpoint, are pretty encouraging, even if it's Romney.

He acknowledged that people are hesitant on McCain, but countered that he has several true-blue conservatives serving as his advisors, including Phil Gramm and Jack Kemp -- these guys are some of the founding fathers of supply-side Reaganomics. He said that Giuliani comes from the Steve Forbes thought of business and economics, which is also good and supply-side driven. Karlgaard added that all of the republicans have run "flawed campaigns," and found it bizarre that none of them have said anything supportive of the small-business community, a huge traditionally-conservative voting block.

He brought up the flak from Obama's citation of Reagan, among other things, and wondered if Obama might not be as liberal as the left expected.

So, really the worst things for us (us being those who aren't nanny-state liberals) would be John Edwards, or, of course, Hillary Clinton. Karlgaard expects Clinton to slowly knock Obama out of the race, but I'm not so sure. People just don't like her, even people prone towards liberalism. Even a conservative has to acknowledge that Obama just has a charisma that Edwards (swarmy) and Clinton do not have.

Labels: 2008, Clinton, john edwards, mccain, Obama, romney