Un-President McCain

From Lance Mannion via James Wolcott.

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Un-President McCain
John McCain went on ABC's This Week and pretty much told the nation what we all ought to know by now, essentially saying, "I'm a pandering, hypocritical, unprincipled Republican weasel who'll do or say anything to get the Right Wing Christians to come out and vote for me in the primaries and there's absolutely no good reason anymore for Democrats or Independents to vote for me for President in 2008 so I guess I never will be President, darn."
McCain told George Stephanopoulos that he wants to see Roe vs. Wade overturned and that he wouldn't mind a Constitutional amendment banning abortion, which is very easy for him to be in favor of because, as he knows, with the Democrats in charge of both Houses for at least the next two years, such an amendment will never make it out of committee.
Of course, we've been expected not to notice that such an amendment has never made it out of committee over the last 4 years while the Republicans have been running the show.
Republican Senators don't want to amend the Constitution. They just want Right Wing anti-abortion types to think they do and to be able to blame Democrats for the fact that abortion never gets completely outlawed everywhere.
For some reason the Media used to present McCain as a social liberal---which, by the way, when you're talking about a Republican, is someone who will make sure that the sons and daughters of the rich and upper middle class continue to enjoy privileges that the rest of the country is denied, access to safe abortions, same sex marriage, fabulous and high status jobs for women. As Scott Lemieux says:
the fact that McCain wouldn't dream of applying general bans on abortion to people in his social circles doesn't make him a pro-choicer; it makes him a Republican. John McCain's daughter won't have a problem getting an abortion whether Roe is good law or not, but a lot of other women won't be so lucky. Social conservatism for thee-but-not-for-me is pretty much what social conservatism means in this country.
Now we know he's a different order and magnitude of hypocrite.
I wrote some posts last week in which I might have sounded as if I think McCain will be the next President. (Here, here, and here.)
I only meant to write about him as the guy the smart money is on. But I wouldn't even bet on him to be the Republican nominee.
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