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September 15, 2008
A Putin Of Our Own
In a post titled "Crooked Talk," Reason magazine's Steve Chapman asks:
Why does McCain insist on running such a mendacious campaign? There is plenty an honest conservative might say in opposition to Obama: He's wrong about Iraq. He's wrong about Iran. He's wrong about offshore oil drilling. He wants to raise taxes. He favors abortion on demand. He would appoint liberal judges. He would impede school reform.But McCain has concluded that a fact-based case about Obama isn't enough to prevail in November. So he has chosen to smear his opponent with ridiculous claims that he thinks the American people are gullible enough to believe.
He has charged repeatedly that his opponent is willing to lose a war to win an election. What's McCain willing to lose to become president? Nothing so consequential as a war. Just his soul.
I cannot think of another time in presidential election history when the fabrications of a major party nominee were so egregeous that they drew nearly unanamous condemnation from all quarters of the press, irrespective of ideological investment. In fact, the press reaction has itself become a sidebar story. Now, increasingly, the story has moved from "whether" to "why," as chapman's comment illustrate. Answers range from desperation, as Chapman formulates it, to shrewd but cynical calculation (see Edsall, for example) to Andrew Sullivan’s notion that the man has simply “lost it.” That last idea may be attractive for some because of the paradoxical subtext of this debate—the vaunted and also universally accepted notion of McCain’s “high honor.” We’d expect this of Nixon, or the Clintons, the line runs—but not war hero John McCain!
Well, let me propose another interpretation, one both consistent with McCain’s take on honor and, at the same time, more disconcerting than other explanations. I’ll call it the “Strongman McCain Narrative.”
One of the more curious things about McCain’s behavior is not that he’s lying, but that he is so brazenly indifferent to being caught. Days after the Palin “bridge to nowhere” canard had been exposed, he continued to repeat it himself (and license his running mate to do the same), and days after his feigned umbrage over Obama’s “lipstick on a pig” comment was ridiculed for being baseless and trivial, he defended it on The View. Though I’m sure McCain would be quite happy to have these and other lies believed by a large section of the voting public, it also seems that he’s not terribly concerned if they don’t. There’s not the push back one might expect—just newer, outrageous, lies. In most formulations, such conduct is evidence of a character defect. But for the strongman—and those who long for him—brazen and audacious lying is an instrumental virtue. It’s proof that he has the cold, steely nerve to do and say whatever is necessary to achieve power. Indeed, it’s evidence that his resolve cannot be weakened by conscience.
The strongman narrative, even the softer, American version, is one that presents it’s central character as one constitutionally incapable of loosing. He will crush anybody in a bar fight because he is willing to bleed to death in the attempt. He presents himself as the man who has the will and tenacity to beat Romney’s millions and Obama’s crowds. Likewise, it seems to say, he is the man who has the balls to pound Putin into submission.
Indeed, he too sees a soul when he looks into Putin’s eyes. It’s one he recognizes very well.
Posted by stevemack at September 15, 2008 03:05 PM
