Month: August 2008

Cokie’s World

By Batocchio

(King Louis XVI and courtiers at Versailles in Ridicule, 1996.)

Has anyone heard yet whether Cokie Roberts approves of the stadium venue for Obama’s acceptance speech? Has Colorado been deemed sufficiently “American”? Has she “summered” there? Inquiring minds want to know!

Cokie does have her moments, I suppose. But she deserved all the criticism she received and more over her Hawaii comments. Meanwhile, if you’ve missed them, you may want to check out Eric Alterman’s 2002 piece on Cokie Roberts (via TBogg), and Bob Somerby on Cokie’s speaking fees and the television pundit gravy train. (And boy, has Howard Kurtz changed!)

Cokie’s world, the Beltway Village, Versailles on the Potomac, can’t be fully understood in “reality-based” terms, or notions of what constitutes good journalism. Those are valid forms of criticism, but they don’t get to the heart of what ails these supposedly smart and often highly-educated people. Wisdom sadly doesn’t always accompany knowledge, but the problem is more one of social customs. It’s sometimes really amazing to see, but for many Village pundits, what’s right, and sometimes truth itself, is entirely socially determined. They’re a pretty anti-empirical, unreflective lot. They often possess a blithe authoritarianism, or at least an obsession with prestige. Social norms can be very good– but the Beltway conventional “wisdom” can be awfully dumb.

Richard Cohen may be too easy an example, but he really is the Village attitude and approach laid bare. He’s provided plenty of fodder for the liberal blogosphere (and maybe high school debate classes) with column after column featuring some glaring disconnect or shoddy argument. Before the McCain campaign’s POW rollout this month, Cohen may have invoked McCain’s POW status even more than McCain himself. Cohen’s POW defense of McCain earlier this year was widely ridiculed, and for good reason. He’s written several columns where he’s basically stated, ‘I prefer John McCain because I know him and like him.’ That’s fine, I guess, but it’d be nice if he came out and said just that, admitting his criteria were fundamentally social in nature, rather than trying to justify his personal preferences with other arguments, and consistently ignoring obvious relevant facts in the process. Cohen doesn’t really analyze anything substantially, doesn’t learn from his core mistakes, and rarely seems to think things through. Instead, he represents a set of attitudes, and is mostly obsessed with propriety over morality.

Similarly, “centrist” David Broder always seems to come up with novel reasons why you shouldn’t vote for a Democrat, such as pushing executive experience as the most meaningful standard. Executive experience is a valid concern, of course, but Broder never seems very concerned about significant policy differences between candidates, has a funny sense of bipartisanship, and somehow seems to believe, despite the past eight years, that policies have no important consequences. Probably, Broder’s view of the political game ossified years ago, and he’s just never bothered to update his diagnosis nor his prescription to accommodate any pesky new facts (similar to Reagan and Bush the younger, come to think of it). Taken as a whole, the Village makes for one hell of a study in cognitive dissonance. “Surely the Vice President would never lie to us about a matter of such importance!” “Surely the administration must have the nation’s best interests at heart!” “Surely having an enjoyable beer with someone is a more important gauge than competency for one of the hardest jobs in the world!” Despite warnings before each and every disaster, the Bush administration has proceeded undeterred, often taking extremely radical steps in secret, and at times lying to their own allies. These are people of neither good faith nor good judgment, and it would be hard to overstate their arrogance. Yet in the world of the Village, George W. Bush has made bad decisions because he simply wasn’t counseled, or wasn’t counseled politely enough – or he hasn’t made bad decisions at all. The commercial angle of Beltway “wisdom” shouldn’t be overlooked either – these people all gotta make copy, or fill air time. And a system that rewards bad reporting and disastrous punditry tends to keep reproducing exactly that. Consider what Jonathan Schwarz often says: “Reporters don’t have a choice. Repeating stupid right-wing claims is their job.”

Years ago in an anthropology class, I read a fascinating essay about kinship ties in Washington, D.C. written by Professor Jack Weatherford of Macalester College. It was a class favorite. Here’s an excerpt from what looks like a slightly earlier version, “Tribal Politics in Washington,” 1993:

In 1990 when the editors of Spy magazine decided to make a diagram of the American political universe, they did not place the President of the United States at the center, nor the leaders of Congress, nor the richest person in the country, nor the strongest lobbyists. They selected radio and television reporter Cokie Roberts who serves as a political reporter for ABC News as well as for National Public Radio. As a reporter, Cokie Roberts certainly is not the best known personality in the country, but her selection by Spy reveal an inside look of how Washington works. To understand why they named her as the focal point, we need to examine where she fits into the system.

Cokie Roberts is the daughter of Congresswoman Lindy Boggs of Louisiana’s second district from 1972 until 1990. Cokie Roberts’ father Hale Boggs represented the same New Orleans district until his death in an Alaska plane crash in 1972, and he had served as the House Majority leader. Cokie Roberts’ brother is Tom Boggs, a major Washington lobbyist who once ran but lost an election for representative from Maryland. Cokie Roberts’ sister is Barbara Boggs Sigmund who ran for the Senate from New Jersey and later became mayor of Princeton, New Jersey.

On her mother’s side Cokie Roberts is related to Rhode Island’s Senator Claiborne Pell; Cokie’s full name is Mary Martha Corinne Morrison Clairborne Boggs Roberts. Senator Pell is the ranking Democrat on the Foreign Affairs Committee and the senator for whom the Pell Grants were named. His father, Representative Herbert Pell, served in the House, representing New York. Other political members of Cokie’s family through the Clairborne and Pell connections include former Senators William Clairborne and George Dallas. The ties even stretch back well before the founding of the country to John Pell, who served as a minister in the British Court of Oliver Cromwell in the seventeenth century and whom history credits with introducing the mathematical notation for the division sign to the English-speaking world.

Growing up as a member of the congressional kids club on Capitol Hill, Cokie Roberts knew the other kids in the club such as young Al Gore, Jr., the son of Senator Al Gore, Senior of Tennessee and young Chris Dodd Jr., son of Christopher Dodd, senior of Connecticut. While Cokie Roberts pursued career in broadcasting, these other kids grew up to follow their fathers into political careers.

Cokie Roberts is married to Steven V. Roberts, senior editor of U.S. News & World Report. While Cokie Roberts serves as a commentator on ABC’s This Week With David Brinkley, her husband appears on NPR’s Washington Week in Review. In her capacity as a reporter for public television, Cokie Roberts worked under Sharon Percy Rockefeller, who chaired the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. Sharon Rockefeller, the daughter of former Senator Charles Percy of Illinois, was married to Senator and former West Virginia Governor Jay Rockefeller.

With all of her connections through kinship, marriage and other intimate networks, Cokie Roberts is truly the center of the political universe of Washington, D.C.

Daughter Rebecca Roberts is now a reporter as well. Now granted, the essay is from 1993, but it still gives a useful glimpse into Beltway culture. The Democrats have the Kennedys, of course. Certainly George W. Bush benefited from his kinship ties, and is probably the ultimate example of promoting pedigree over merit. Among the conservative punditry, there’s quite the wingnut welfare system, and sometimes it even creeps into more legitimate publications. I guess Gore’s ties didn’t help him much back in 1999-2000, but perhaps that was because the press was “going to make him jump through the hoops” until he condemned Bill Clinton over Lewinsky, and they didn’t see “anything wrong with that.” Remember, protocol must be observed, lest you be ridiculed. Trashing the Constitution is fine, especially if you hide most of the violence behind closed doors; just don’t try to come in and trash the Village if it’s not your place.

I imagine some enterprising anthropologist or student would have a wealth of material for further studying Village mores. But in any case, even if Cokie is no longer the reigning queen, surely she’s still a duchess or something. So I say: Move over, Matt Drudge! It’s not your world after all! It’s Cokie’s world, it’s her America, and the rest of us just live in it!

Well, unless you’re from Hawaii.

(Ridicule, 1996)

(Update: Fixed some typos.)
 

This is not a blog post
by Dover Bitch

Another day, another McCain advisor thrown under the bus for accidentally telling the truth about his candidate’s indifference to the struggles of ordinary Americans. John Goodman “said anyone with access to an emergency room effectively has insurance.”

“So I have a solution. And it will cost not one thin dime,” Mr. Goodman said. “The next president of the United States should sign an executive order requiring the Census Bureau to cease and desist from describing any American — even illegal aliens — as uninsured. Instead, the bureau should categorize people according to the likely source of payment should they need care.

“So, there you have it. Voila! Problem solved.”

This is nothing new, of course. Just a year ago, Bush made the same argument:

The immediate goal is to make sure there are more people on private insurance plans. I mean, people have access to health care in America. After all, you just go to an emergency room.

Ronald Reagan pioneered this art when he justified his lack of decent funding for school lunches by redefining ketchup as a vegetable.

Still, before Bush became president, the idea you could solve problems simply by calling them victories was a concept reserved for satirists. Or something only a governor would get away with.

George Bush and his sidekick, John McCain, have really taken it to a new level. They redefined “hunger” as “very low food security” in order to salvage their domestic record. They redefined squirting guacamole at Taco Bell as a “manufacturing job” to salvage their jobs record. They are trying to redefine contraception as abortion.

They redefined what a stream is in order to open them up to the coal industry. They’ve tried to redefine carbon dioxide in order to allow more pollution. They redefined “privacy.” They redefined “overtime.” They tried to redefine toxic sludge to justify defunding Superfund. They redefined the Vice President as a fourth branch of government. They redefined “organic.” They redefined “torture” and the Geneva Conventions.

They prevented NASA from talking about global warming or even mentioning the Big Bang. They don’t want irradiated food labelled. They even fought to prevent meatpackers from testing their own cattle for Mad Cow disease.

And I haven’t even started on all the people who were kicked to the curb for predicting the costs of the Iraq War would be tremendous. Or the way they hid the real costs of the GOP’s health care bill.

That’s how they solve problems. Two plus two equals four? No problem! “Two plus [redacted] equals five!”

McCain’s plan is to deliver the exact same prescriptions for the “whiners” in a “mental recession:” Out of sight, out of mind.

I’m sure you all may be getting speeched out this week (with so many more to come), but if you get a chance and you haven’t read it before, check out Mark Danner’s 2007 commencement address to a group of Department of Rhetoric graduates at UC Berkely.

Big Dog

by digby

For you Bill Clinton fans out there (Gloria) here’s a treat from Michael Shaw and Alan Chin from the floor last night:

(Images © Alan Chin. Denver. 2008)

Michael quotes my post from last night and adds this:

Clinton’s eagerness and electricity radiates right through the battery of secret service. Shots 3, 4 and 5, however, really reveals the full spectrum of Clinton’s political personality. In the third shot, we see his characteristic finger. But it’s instructive rather than admonishing. In the next frame, we see a side of Clinton that has been painfully absent (and almost forgotten) since Lewinsky — that gregariousness and playfulness.

In the last shot, though, Bill’s expression is one that can’t really be acted. And, it’s is the image the Democrats and Obama really needed from Clinton last night: simply the look of joy.

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Waiting For The One

by digby

FWIW, John Judis has a comprehensive take of the state of the campaign that I think is worth reading. It doesn’t take the good TV moments at this convention into account (or his speech tonight) but his overview of the campaign thus far and his observation that the ground game must be targeted to be effective is worth considering.

Finally, if anyone is seriously telling Obama to change his speaking style, I certainly hope nobody in the campaign listens. As Judis says, at this point, if there is a problem it’s message not style. Obama is a gifted orator and he should not try to change that. It would be like telling Bush to stop being a dumbass in 2004— it’s the thing that people love the most about him. Let Obama be Obama — it got him this far and it will take him all the way.

Meanwhile, if McNasty picks him for VP, I’m looking forward to seeing Lieberman give his big conversion to the pro-life cause speech. I would expect hair shirts and self flagellation. And I don’t honestly see why it wouldn’t work on the Christian Right. Holy Joe didn’t get his nickname because of his undarned socks. He’s a longtime social conservative. (And hey, if CW favorite Flip Flop Romney can get away with it, why not Joe?)

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My New Cause

by digby

I think this could be the slam dunk post-partisan issue we’ve been looking for:

more information on the grassroots political campaign that’s already threatening to eclipse both Ron Paul and Ralph Nader. What we got back was a manifesto that could easily be folded into the Democratic Party platform, and probably should, because honestly the convention is already so HARSH, what with all the talk of war and economic depression and sexism and so forth. Also, this Crystal Pepsi thing, along with (OK OK) the other street protests, is probably the closest the convention comes to actual political dialog. Escape the pageantry for the moment and think about important issues, after the jump.

The time for change is now, and the choice is clear, crystal clear. CRYSTAL PEPSI! It’s like drinking hope. For us, Crystal Pepsi is freedom in a can. Our platform is based on peace, love, and Crystal Pespi. Down with war, up with Crystal Pepsi. For us it’s not about politics, it’s only about Crystal Pepsi. This is a movement that we can all get behind, it unifies us to our very core, Crystal Pepsi. The foundation of America is Crystal Pespi.

In all honesty, for me, it’s kind of nice to lighten the mood a little bit. Everybody is down there, protesting, screaming about a cause, yelling at one another about how the other person is wrong. It can be kind of a tense situation. It’s nice to walk away putting a smile on someone’s face, getting a high five, and hearing someone say we represent a movement we can all get on board with. People initially hear the “protest” coming, you can see the look on their face, “Great, what are these people marching and carrying on about?” When they discover our cause is Crystal Pepsi, there is an overwhelming feeling of relief, followed by immediate support.

I was running down the street carrying about 50 pounds of laptop and extraneous accessories in 90 degree heat when these guys came toward me chanting “Crystal Pepsi stands for Hope!” I have to say, it made me stop and laugh out loud, even in my misery.

I think the street protests and demonstrations are great (although the anti-abortion people are some scary zombies.) But there is a bit of “earnest” overload sometimes at a thing like this and these guys, with their message of “freedom in a can” was pretty perfect. It’s not mean, but it’s … right.

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Twittering The Convention

by dday

The best and really the only way to liveblog the events at Invesco tonight is through my cell phone, so you can follow along at www.twitter.com/ddayen.

Whoa

by digby

Get a load of this. McNasty turns on the press, big time. I just wonder if people reading the article will think he’s nuts or like him better for it.

I also wonder if the press will respond by being even more sycophantic and obsequious. That’s what they did with Junior for many years when he treated them like lackeys.

McCain POW Bingo

By Batocchio

Even if you didn’t see John McCain’s interview this week with Jay Leno, you may have read about this exchange:

LENO: For a million dollars, how many houses do you have?

McCAIN: Could I just mention to you, Jay, that, in a moment of seriousness, I spent five-and-a-half years in a prison cell. I didn’t have a house. I didn’t have a kitchen table. I didn’t have a table. I didn’t have a chair. And I spent those five-and-a-half years because, not because I wanted to get a house when I got out.

Oh yes, he went there, and he had that answer prepared. Crooks and Liars has the video of this section, and a great clip of Rachel Maddow critiquing McCain. (NBC has short fluffy snippets, and for now has the full Monday August 25th episode posted, with the interview starting about 19 minutes in.)

McCain generally does extremely well in these formats, presenting an amiable, jocular persona. It helps sell those claims that Obama is the most liberal senator (not so), and that Biden is the third-most. Leno did ask McCain about his negative ads, but in that apologetic-for-asking-a-real-question-and-I’ll-won’t-press-you-on-your-bullshit-response way of his. McCain answered he thought the ads were funny, but that they also pointed out differences in their positions (on the importance of Paris Hilton, I guess). The reluctantly negative warrior then segued into roughly the same spiel David Broder swallowed, that McCain wouldn’t have gone negative – excuse me, that the rough tone of the campaigns might not have happened, McCain is not responsible — if only Obama would have appeared with him in town hall meetings.

It was quite the performance. The thing is, while I don’t like McCain’s policies, I’ve had sympathy for McCain over the fact he was tortured. I have sympathy and respect for any POW, or any innocent imprisoned, especially for years on end. It comes with being a bleeding heart liberal, I suppose. But I know I’m far from alone. And that makes the increasingly frequent, exploitative mentions of his POW experience more galling.

It bears mentioning that McCain’s never been that reluctant to talk about his POW experiences, it’s just that he typically prefaces his stories with saying he is, and the press has dutifully repeated that (see the Daily Howler archives). That doesn’t preclude all sympathy for him, but his positions haven’t always matched his persona, either. Back during the Republican primary debates, Fox News tossed up a softball question, a ticking time bomb scenario more ludicrous than many 24 plots, to allow the candidates to engage in competitive machismo about “interrogation” (Stephen Colbert has a good recap of all the “Double Guantanamo” madness). Unlike other candidates, McCain talked about how torture was wrong and a violation of American values. It was a more adult response, which naturally didn’t go over well with the base. However, McCain later backed Bush administration efforts to legalize torture. Contradicting an earlier stance, he’s also backed many Bush administration positions on Guantanamo prisoners. Given numerous reports that many prisoners are innocent and have been mistreated, and McCain’s own experience, his stance is particularly appalling – and to some people who liked him, disappointing. Billmon’s sharp piece on McCain draws a portrait of a politician who’s always traded mainly on his image. Regardless of one’s former or current feelings toward McCain, his POW experience has gone far from being part of his personal charm offensive to an active tool of rebuttal and attack.

And plenty more POW references could be on the way! Via Steve Benen, here’s MSNBC’s First Read from Sunday (emphasis mine):

[McCain] advisors say if Obama gets “nastier” on that issue that opens the door for them. Advisors say the “Rezko deal stinks to the high heavens.” They will be prepared to show McCain’s “home” in Hanoi by using images of his cell. They claim they have not overused the POW element and insist they have “underused it.” They say Americans think most people in presidential politics are wealthy and will point out that Obama “made himself a multi-millionaire after he entered public life.”

Yikes. “A Noun, A Verb and POW” is right – we could be heading to all POW, all the time, 24/7. Perhaps Steve Benen can (spare one of the many clones that help him blog to) track McCain campaign POW references from now on. I’m also not exactly overwhelmed by the argument that making one’s fortune by writing two pretty well-written, well-received books is somehow disreputable, while getting wealthy by marrying a rich beer heiress after dumping one’s first wife in, um, rather deplorable circumstances, is somehow the height of honor. Does McCain really want to open that door? Does his campaign really want to continue to toss away deniability on the “respectful campaign” front? Plus, the “scandals” conservatives are trying to tag on Obama are little more than guilt by association, whereas the Keating Five scandal is something McCain himself actually did. That’s not to say the McCain approach won’t be effective, since we’ve seen it can be. But it is riskier. Despite his pleas for town hall meetings, McCain has not taken a particularly serious policy approach to his campaign. His much-maligned speech on June 4th focused mainly on Obama, and his submission to the NYT on Iraq was rejected because it offered no actual plan, mostly just criticism of Obama. Given Bush’s unpopularity and McCain’s actual positions, McCain’s best chance is to sell his persona and to try to make the election a “referendum on Obama.” But to quote John Cole on the POW thing, “At what point does this become a joke in the larger culture, rather than just the blogospheric subculture?”

A fine question. And to help achieve that cultural contribution, I’ve taken a first stab at McCain Bingo. It ain’t as good as the Get Out of Gaffe Free Card, but here’s card #95, in honor of McCain’s high percentage on voting the Bush line. Feel free to make suggestions for other square entries, or to make your own cards. My friends, you owe it to this great nation.

(Click the picture for a larger image.)
 

There’s A Storm Brewin’

by dday

Well this could be just awful.

Energy companies on Wednesday braced for the worst storm to threaten the U.S. Gulf of Mexico oilpatch since 2005’s devastating hurricanes as Tropical Storm Gustav churned toward the heart of U.S. offshore production.

No company had reported output cuts as they began evacuating staff from offshore oil and natural gas platforms, but Shell Oil Co, which has the largest offshore operations, said it may begin shutting output as early as Thursday while it works to evacuate all of its 1,300 Gulf workers by Saturday.

Gustav is expected to morph into a powerful hurricane as it gains strength from the Gulf’s warm waters, and about 85 percent of U.S. offshore oil and gas production could be in its path.

By midday Wednesday, weather forecasters were saying the storm could, as did Katrina and Rita, become a catastrophic category 5 hurricane with winds over 155 mph (249 kph) as it crosses the Gulf, which provides a quarter of U.S. crude oil production and 15 percent of the nation’s natural gas output.

“We do believe Gustav is going to emerge into the Gulf as a major hurricane, category 3 or better,” said AccuWeather Inc Forecasting Director Ken Reeves. “It has a chance for a brief period to be a category 5.”

“Whether or not it can produce the same amount of damage as Katrina or Rita remains to be seen,” Reeves said.

In addition to devastating the Louisiana coast, including the city of New Orleans, Katrina and Rita shut 25 percent of U.S. oil and fuel production. Gulf energy companies needed months to restore operations close to their full capacity.

This was a business article so the focus was on the oil offshore (hey, I thought Republicans told us that not a drop of oil was spilled during Katrina?), but it’s already hitting Jamaica and could be on the way toward New Orleans. Word is it could hit on Day 1 of the RNC.

If anything the federal government is even more tattered and incompetent now than in 2005, if only because of a massive case of senioritis. It ought to be recalled where John McCain spent his birthday that year, on the very day that Katrina hit.

But for now, light a candle for the residents of the Gulf Coast.

Update: From digby.

Just a little reminder of what was happening five years ago today:

2AM CDT — KATRINA UPGRADED TO CATEGORY 4 HURRICANE [CNN] 7AM CDT — KATRINA UPGRADED TO CATEGORY 5 HURRICANE [CNN] MORNING — LOUISIANA NEWSPAPER SIGNALS LEVEES MAY GIVE: “Forecasters Fear Levees Won’t Hold Katrina”: “Forecasters feared Sunday afternoon that storm driven waters will lap over the New Orleans levees when monster Hurricane Katrina pushes past the Crescent City tomorrow.” [Lafayette Daily Advertiser] 9:30 AM CDT — MAYOR NAGIN ISSUES FIRST EVER MANDATORY EVACUATION OF NEW ORLEANS: “We’re facing the storm most of us have feared,” said Nagin. “This is going to be an unprecedented event.” [Times-Picayune] AFTERNOON — BUSH, BROWN, CHERTOFF WARNED OF LEVEE FAILURE BY NATIONAL HURRICANE CENTER DIRECTOR: Dr. Max Mayfield, director of the National Hurricane Center: “‘We were briefing them way before landfall. … It’s not like this was a surprise. We had in the advisories that the levee could be topped.’” [Times-Picayune; St. Petersburg Times] 4PM CDT — NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE ISSUES SPECIAL HURRICANE WARNING: In the event of a category 4 or 5 hit, “Most of the area will be uninhabitable for weeks, perhaps longer. … At least one-half of well-constructed homes will have roof and wall failure. All gabled roofs will fail, leaving those homes severely damaged or destroyed. … Power outages will last for weeks. … Water shortages will make human suffering incredible by modern standards.” [National Weather Service] LATE PM — REPORTS OF WATER TOPPLING OVER LEVEE: “Waves crashed atop the exercise path on the Lake Pontchartrain levee in Kenner early Monday as Katrina churned closer.” [Times-Picayune] APPROXIMATELY 30,000 EVACUEES GATHER AT SUPERDOME WITH ROUGHLY 36 HOURS WORTH OF FOOD [Times-Picayune] LOUISIANA NATIONAL GUARD REQUESTS 700 BUSES FROM FEMA FOR EVACUATIONS: FEMA sends only 100 buses. [Boston Globe]

Massive
by Dover Bitch

The McCain team is ready for their close up.

DENVER (CNN) – John McCain has decided on his running mate and will officially reveal his pick on Friday in Ohio, multiple sources tell CNN.

A knowledgeable Republican source says there the matter was settled at a major meeting of McCain’s advisers Wednesday.

The Arizona senator’s choice has not yet been told of the decision, but the plan is to call tomorrow. A handful of names of dominated VP speculation in recent days, including former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney, independent Senator Joe Lieberman, and Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty.

The presumptive Republican nominee will appear with his prospective running mate at a massive rally on August 29, the day after Barack Obama formally accepts the Democratic presidential nomination.

The McCain campaign is hoping to have 15,000 people at the Ohio rally — roughly five times the size of his largest crowd to date.

That massive rally is sure going to look daunting after Barack Obama electrifies a capacity crowd at Invesco Field tonight. Of course, you know this will probably be leaked today to change the subject away from Obama’s big speech. That’s the card you play when you simply cannot compete on the same playing field (literally). Oh, but I forgot… McCain’s inability to draw big crowds is simply a reflection of his vast experience.

When you think about it, Obama actually has more experience than McCain. Sure, a guy named “John McCain” has been in the Senate since 1987, but he’s not the Republican nominee.

There was a guy by that name who supported Roe v. Wade, but the new John McCain replaced him two years ago.

There was a guy by that name who called Jerry Falwell an “agent of intolerance”, but the new John McCain replaced him two years ago.

There was a guy by that name who proposed comprehensive immigration reform, but the new John McCain replaced him in February.

There was a guy by that name who was against waterboarding, but the new John McCain replaced him in February.

There was a guy by that name who was willing to talk to Hamas, but the new John McCain replaced him in May.

There was a guy by that name who was against offshore drilling, but the new John McCain replaced him in June.

There was a guy by that name who supported affirmative action, but the new John McCain replaced him in July.

The new John McCain running for president has only really existed for a couple years, max. Parts of his brain have been replaced as recently as this summer. Really, the list of his reversals is staggering. We’re going to hear a lot next week about his huge advantage on experience, but they’re really not going to be talking about the same person they nominated. What happened to that guy? Where did the world’s oldest freshman come from and how did he get keys to all of John McCain’s houses?

They’re also going to throw around their favorite tired zingers, like “Blame America First.” This from the crowd that nominated a guy who reacted to 9/11 by leading the Blame Iraq First brigade. This from a guy who abandoned his principles to cozy up to the extremists who really did Blame America First, while real Americans, the majority of Americans, were coming together, united, the way we have defeated every threat in our history.

It’s certainly useful for Obama that people are starting to notice that John McCain is playing the POW card with increasing frequency. I find that it never justifies the mistake he’s trying to excuse with it or the position he’s claiming he supports because of it. But the repetition honestly doesn’t diminish, in my mind, the sacrifice he made years ago.

However, there is a vast — you might say “massive” — difference between the images of honor in his biography and the undignified campaigner he has chosen to become, the bottom-feeders with whom he has associated himself and the swiftness with which he has dispatched so many of the principled positions he has taken previously. The more he describes what a big man he was in the past, the smaller he looks today.

If he weren’t perilously close to running the country, it would be just another tragedy of Washington D.C. that I’d just as soon forget.