More of the Same

One of the reasons our democracy has survived 232 years is that our Constitution explicitly lays out a division of power. This system of checks and balances prevents a single party or individual from taking our country in horribly wrong directions. Every four years we get to evaluate the performance of the party and individual in the white house, thus providing the ultimate check: our vote.

The problem is that politicians lie and too many voters don't see through it.

After 8 years of using our Constitution to wipe Dick Cheney's butt, George W Bush will finally leave the oval office. Not by choice, not by voter decree, but by term limits. Thank goodness we had the foresight to legislate that rule into place. Why? Because at this point in the 2008 presidential election, I am not convinced the American people would be smart enough to vote against Bush. We know Bush's presidential play book, and we know it involves preemptive war, lowering taxes on the rich, and letting Wall Street screw our economy. One would think that this would make him unelectable.

But then came along George...I mean John McSame.

John McCain has voted with Bush and the congressional republicans more than 90% of the time. John McCain supports a preemptive strike against Iran if they develop nuclear weapons. John McCain supports making the Bush tax cuts permanent. John McCain admits not understanding the economy all to well. By the looks of it, John McCain thinks GW Bush was a great president and we should have another 4 years of more of the same.

But here is what really scares the crap out of me: I don't think John McCain is even telling the truth about his positions on all of these issues.

All politicians make campaign promises, and then fail to reach their lofty goals when they get mired in the gridlock of Washington. Barack Obama will probably struggle to give us Universal Healthcare in 4 years. He will probably fail to wean us off of oil by 2020. He may even have to raise taxes in order to save social security or pay down Bush's war debt. But these are just slight variations on his lofty campaign promises. If he even takes steps in the right direction on these issues he will have made progress.

John McCain on the other hand is the worst type politician. He is stubborn to the core, does not have an open mind when thinking about complex issues, and is willing to sell out any of his beliefs if it is politically expedient. (Sound familiar?????) Take torture for example. Here is a real war hero who was tortured by the NVA, and has been a strong voice against torture during his Senate career. When the Bush administration began waterboarding and torturing Iraqis in Abu Grav, John McCain stood up to them and demanded it be stopped. But now he says that as long as the Army manual doesn't explicitly ban a method of torture, then it can be a useful tool. He used to rail against Camp Xray at Gitmo, but now it is barely an issue. Last time I checked, we still had a majority of the enemy combatants from the Afghanistan war imprisoned there. Shouldn't he talk about closing that prison? Or has he changed his position?

If John McCain can "come around" to the Neocon position on torture, he can come around on any topic. This is why John McCain is avoiding issues like they are the plague. If voters actually knew John McCain's current stance on taxes, the economy, the war in Iraq, or the environment, they would realize that he offers nothing that Bush hasn't already "given" us.

Instead of offering us the moon and delivering a manned space flight, John McCain is offering us a replay of the past 8 years. I can see John McCain gutting federal budgets for scientific research and gutting the clean air act. I can picture John McCain saying "you're doing a heck of a job Brownie". I can imagine John McCain shifting troops from Iraq to Iran.

It is not just more of the same. It is our worst nightmare.