He Contains Multitudes

Good article from Robert Gordon and James Kvaal which notes that John McCain has developed a marked tendency for offering contradictory proposals on a wide range of issues.

In his defense, I'd say that constantly contradicting himself is a kind of mavericky thing to do.

Comments

Meanwhile, over at The Carpetbagger Report, they've identified 61 of McCain's changes in policy.

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/16124.html

-g
(h/t South Florida Daily Blog)

Posted by g | July 9, 2008 10:01 AM

Thank God Obama is the model of consistency. /sarc off

Posted by Judd | July 9, 2008 10:08 AM

To make matter worse, there are rumors circulating that McCain traffics in teenage girls, hides razor blades in Halloween candy, and tortures cute cuddly puppies.

Posted by kafka | July 9, 2008 10:16 AM

I'm not at all a fan of McCain, but is there anything substantively good you can say about him? Besides the fact that he's not as bad as Bush?

Posted by Andrew Fly | July 9, 2008 10:18 AM

Self-destructively mavericky. I think his contradictions point to his incoherence. McCain cares about three things: 1) Becoming president (being popular); his very limited sense of honor that excludes almost all Americans from either patriotism or integrity (the only way to serve your country and therefore to be a patriot is to serve in a war -- how many of us does that exclude?); and 3)Going to war.

His past maverick stands are beginning to look in retrospect like stances he took just to be contrary or to look honorable, rather than stands taken from principle or integrity. I'm beginning to think that McCain's sense of integrity was that the integrity was in waging the fight against those who disagreed with him in his own party, not in the issue itself. O

verall, McCain appears incoherent. He doesn't seem to really care about anything but war. His contradictions make him seem as though he doesn't even understand anything but war or patriotism or knee-jerk reflex dissent. He doesn't seem to understand the economy, nor global warming, or to care enough about those positions (campaign finance reform, immigration, torture) on which he has taken supposedly prinicipled stands in the past to remain consistent.

Which is why his accusations that Obama has flip flopped seem hollow -- despite the fact that much of the MSM swallows this hogwash about Obama hook line and sinker and has jumped on the flip flop accusation bandwagon (like they do every presidential cycle, thus aiding the Republicans, which always puzzles me, considering that the majority of journalists identify themselves as liberal).

The flip flopper here is McCain, not Obama. He has actually abandoned past CAUSES in order to win over his base. I don't see that Obama has done that -- he has been flexible and nuanced in his positions, and has understandably moved to the middle in the general, but he hasn't made a 180 degree turn the way McCain has.

And unfortunately for McCain, because of his age, his incoherence is looking remarkably like something approaching senility.

ANd as I've said about the horrific way Clinton ran her campaign -- who wants a president who can't even run a good campaign. If anything, the management of McCain's campaign has been worse than Clinton's. A lot worse. The only reason he's still standing is because of his personal reputation for integrity, which is being obfuscated by his flip flops, and because he was the best of a bad lot; the republican candidates were awful this year.

Posted by cnnr | July 9, 2008 10:24 AM

He has actually abandoned past CAUSES in order to win over his base

He has actually voted against some of his own bills. Can you imagine the field day the press would have if Obama had done that?

Of course, maybe voting against your own bills is the premier sign that you're a maverick ... or a schizophrenic.

Posted by LFC | July 9, 2008 10:32 AM

What is it the Evangelicals say? If you don't stand for something, you'll fall for anything?

Posted by aleks | July 9, 2008 12:10 PM

I concentrate toward them that are nigh—I wait on the door-slab.

Posted by Trieu | July 9, 2008 12:58 PM