The Devil and John McCain

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

The McCain campaign late last week began airing an Internet ad (again specifically designed for consumption by the McMedia), in which the campaign mocked Obama as "The One."  (The over-the-top bit with Charlton Heston as Moses may actually help Obama with Jewish voters and NRA members).

But the real story of the past week was John McCain’s Faustian deal with "The Fallen One," Karl Rove and his minions (aka Beelzebub and the winged monkeys who flew out his ass), like Steve Schmidt (pictured at right), a veteran of Bush’s 2004 campaign who is managing the McCain campaign.

John McCain, of his own free will, chose to trade his soul in exchange for his last chance to realize his life-long ambition of becoming president of the United States.  McCain lie prostate before The Fallen One and supplicated himself with the entreaty "Oh, Fallen One, I freely give to you my soul in exchange for your help to realize my life-long ambition of becoming president.  Do what you must, do whatever it takes.  I will be your obedient servant, oh lord and master."

And so it came to pass that the mythical "straight talking independent maverick" of 2000 was no more.  The mythical McCain died and has departed us.  His memory will live on only as a footnote in the history books.

OK, this version of what happened may be a bit overstated – or not.  The fact is that McCain version 2.0 has destroyed his brand name of the "straight talking independent maverick."  The McCain that is being peddled to the American people by his campaign today is the real McCain who always existed inside the mythical "straight talking independent maverick" but was seldom permitted to be seen by anyone but his closest associates.

The fraud that the McCain campaign is perpetrating upon the American people reminds me of the movie Weekend at Bernie’s, in which a couple of wise-guys try to convince everyone around them that Bernie, who is dead, is actually still alive for their own benefit and enrichment.  (Hat tip to StopThinkVote.com for the photoshop).

The truth is that the mythical "straight talking independent maverick" was entirely fabricated out of whole cloth by the McMedia.  He never really existed.  It was a lie perpetrated on the American people.

McCain has always been a political opportunist, a chameleon who is constantly reinventing himself to appear as someone that he believed the American people wanted to see. 

A hat tip to Billmon at the Daily Kos for his excellent summary of McCain’s career. Daily Kos: The Great White Hope (a must read):

[A]nyone who’s studied McCain’s career with any intellectual detachment at all (as opposed to the hagiographic tendencies of his media cheerleading claque) could have told you: The truth about John McCain is that he’ll do just about anything and say just about anything to win. He always has. He’s just been more clever (and cynical) than most in how he goes about it.

McCain’s primary talent has always been his ability persuade simple-minded people (i.e. his media cheerleading claque) that he is flipping or flopping as a matter of great personal principle and at great possible cost to his political career – even as he has used his various flips and flops to climb the greased pole and become the presidential nominee of his party.

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But McCain and his new team of Rovian handlers now realize they won’t have a prayer in November unless they can motivate the conservative base and (to use Lee Atwater’s charming phrase) "strip the bark" off Obama. And they have to do it NOW, so McCain can pivot back to a softer, more upbeat message in September.

So that’s exactly what McCain is doing – instantly, unapologetically, without shame or embarrassment. His enormous cynicism about the political process and his contempt for the voters – not to mention his vast sense of self-entitlement – have led McCain to take exactly the same low road as the Bush family and its various henchmen (Atwater, Rove): Whatever works; whatever it takes.

And so it’s finally dawning, even on some members of his media "base" (ever the hapless clowns in our political theater of the absurd ) that McCain isn’t quite the straight-talking, straight-shooting military man of honor they thought he was.  The White Knight has morphed into the Great White Hope – the GOP machine’s last, desperate chance to avoid the mortal humiliation of being defeated not just by a Democrat, not just by a liberal, but by a liberal Democratic black man.