John McCain

The first of what promises to be many posts about John McCain and/or that running mate of his. Before I knew any better, John McCain was someone I could respect -- someone willing to stand up for his convictions even when it meant going against those in his own party with whom he disagreed, someone willing to take a politically unpopular stance for something he believed in (ex. campaign finance reform). He always appeared transparent -- what you saw looked like what you got.

Of course, this isn't the case now, nor was it really ever. But what really took away the last shred of respect I had for John McCain as a politician was his appearance on "The View" last Friday. Joy Behar called out the self-proclaimed "straight talker" for spreading malicious lies about his opponent. Anyone who can navigate the Internet well enough to perform a simple Google search (which I'm not sure applies to McCain, but I digress...) can verify that the claims in question (Obama advocated teaching sex ed to kindergarteners, Obama's lipstick-on-a-pig remark was a sexist jab at Sarah Palin) were and are patently false.

And yet McCain had the nerve to defend the lies, to deny that they were even lies at all. Unbelievable. He's like a kid caught with melted chocolate smeared on his hands trying to tell mommy that he hasn't been in the cookie jar. Ridiculous!!

Richard Cohen from the Washington Post has perhaps said it best:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/09/15/AR2008091502406.html