McCain's Bumpy Ride
HAYES, STEPHEN F.
McCain’s Bumpy Ride Can a maverick rally his party? by Stephen F. Hayes On an unseasonably warm winter day in 1974, at the Mayfl ower Hotel in Washington, D.C., California governor Ronald...
...He has his eyes locked, unblinking, on the blank camera in front of him...
...Into the hands of America God has placed the destinies of an affl icted mankind...
...He discussed the fl ap aboard his bus as we traveled from rally to rally in Florida...
...As he spoke, McCain fi ngered a 3x5 index card with the exact words Romney had used...
...I am proud that you asked me, and I feel more than a little humble in the presence of this distinguished company...
...And no one was more surprised than McCain himself...
...Romney denied the accusation and complained that McCain’s attacks were dishonest...
...Not everyone does...
...In the days following World War II, when the economic strength and power of America was all that stood between the world and the return to the dark ages, Pope Pius XII said, “The American people have a great genius for splendid and unselfi sh actions...
...by Stephen F. Hayes On an unseasonably warm winter day in 1974, at the Mayfl ower Hotel in Washington, D.C., California governor Ronald Reagan delivered a speech that is often cited today as a founding document of Reagan-sty le optimism...
...Then he won New Hampshire, and he was, as Tucker Carlson wrote in these pages, “the dog who caught the car...
...McCain has been described as a “maverick” so often that writers consciously avoid the clich...
...I don’t think anybody in sports, in business, likes to be behind...
...I just, I just do...
...His teeth are set, his chin thrust forward in go-ahead-I-dare-you position...
...Having to spend time with some jerk journalist who knows that this is my point of view and then reports it absolutely wrong...
...McCain’s win—and the size of it— shocked the political world...
...There is no relief on his face...
...Yet it’s still true...
...And that’s what it was all about...
...But as his party moved to the right, after Republicans took over Congress and later consolidated federal power under George W. Bush, McCain increasingly found himself publicly at odds with his party...
...We are indeed, and we are today, the last best hope of man on earth...
...McCain found himself at odds with a Republican establishment that had given the nation wage and price controls...
...John McCain remembers those words and the ones Reagan spoke moments earlier to open his speech...
...Many in the media agreed with Romney and criticized McCain...
...The leadership of the free world was thrust upon us two centuries ago in that little hall in Philadelphia...
...That little bit of self-reflection—“ I’ve always kind of relished the fi ght”—probably better explains John McCain’s unusual political life and curious ideological journey than anything an outside observer has ever said or written...
...It has to be viewed in the context of the time and what was going on at the time— that was, everybody wanted out...
...And McCain was an early and vocal proponent of a change of strategy that included more troops...
...Between interviews, he maintains the pose...
...As he is fond of reminding voters, McCain was critical of Donald Rumsfeld years before President Bush nudged him aside in November 2006...
...At the time [of Romney’s remarks] it was whether we were going to stay or go...
...Indeed, one could argue that McCain has never been more of a maverick, more antiestablishment, than on Iraq...
...But you also know that in my life, I’ve always kind of relished the fi ght...
...What I’ve tried to do over the years is to pick my fi ghts and know when it’s important to have a confrontation and when not...
...But that doesn’t bother him...
...Iraq was once again at the center of the political debate last week, after McCain accused Mitt Romney of supporting “secret timetables” for withdrawal...
...Reagan described the uniqueness of the American character and challenged those who suggested the United States was in decline...
...But absent a dramatic turn of events, McCain will be like Reagan in one very important respect: He will be the presidential nominee of the Republican party...
...On most issues McCain votes with his party...
...John McCain is not Ronald Reagan...
...In Congress, fi rst as a member of the House of Representatives and later in the Senate, McCain compiled a voting record that could only be described as conservative...
...When he fi nishes, he raises his eyebrows to affect an expression that says: See...
...I’ve always kind of relished the fight...
...Other elected offi cials boasted about their invitations to the governor’s mansion in Austin and tripped over themselves to endorse Bush...
...It’s not that I like being behind...
...In speeches and in discussions with journalists, McCain fi ghts the accusation that he distorted Romney’s words by simply reading the words verbatim...
...I feel good about our campaign,” he said before pausing for almost ten seconds...
...In fact, where Reagan ultimately created a governing conservative coalition, McCain’s success in the early GOP primaries has threatened to tear it apart...
...Three of those men are here tonight, John McCain, Bill Lawrence and Ed Martin...
...It is an honor to be here tonight...
...I do relish the intellectual discussions...
...Some real or imagined slight, let it go...
...Well, back when the Vietnam war was gradually drawing to a close, being a conservative and a hawk wasn’t enough...
...He quoted John Winthrop, fi rst governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, who in 1630 declared: “We shall be like a City upon a Hill...
...Bush had more money...
...There is something in my personality, I gotta admit to you, that enjoys the fi ght...
...For months, McCain had run a carefree campaign...
...Timetables” was the codeword for “bailout...
...Whether it’s coming to defend a little guy on the playground that’s getting picked on or whether it’s gonna be telling the guard in the prison camp—yell the obscenities at him as we’re going to the latrine...
...This happened when planes began landing on American soil and in the Philippines, bringing back men who had lived with honor for many miserable years in North Vietnam prisons...
...McCain looks on edge and unhappy, not at all like a man who has just achieved the greatest political triumph of his life...
...I haven’t gotten that bad...
...Timetables” was the buzzword and everybody knows it...
...It was a year ago this coming February when this country had its spirits lifted as they have never been lifted in many years...
...On his campaign bus two days before last week’s Florida primary, I reminded McCain of those dark moments of his last campaign, the days right after he won, and asked him if he just prefers to be the underdog...
...He started with a hearty laugh, took a bite of a Nature Valley Oats ’N Honey granola bar, and grew quiet...
...Stephen F. Hayes is a senior writer at THE WEEKLY STANDARD...
...Carlson described McCain, just moments after his New Hampshire victory, looking sullen and anxious as he waited for an interview with CNN’s Larry King...
...Let it go...
...Of course, this can be—and often is—overstated...
...Today, McCain is a maverick because he often publicly challenges Republican orthodoxies— on tax cuts, the environment, the funding of campaigns...
...I enjoy the challenge...
...He called for more troops and a change in strategy almost immediately after the invasion...
...And I have to tell you that I hope that over the years I’ve grown to be a better candidate—more knowledgeable on the issues, broader base of support...
...He had the big name and the big-name advisers...
...I apologize...
...There were no expectations, so there was no pressure...
...He concluded his remarks this way: We cannot escape our destiny, nor should we try to do so...
...In 1976, when the party nominated Gerald Ford, McCain pronounced himself a “proud Reagan conservative...
...When John McCain fi rst ran for president, back in 2000, he won the New Hampshire primary by 18 points, briefl y forestalling George W. Bush’s seemingly inevitable victory...
...Nobody but a few of us said we not only can’t get out, we can’t set timetables, we’ve got to increase troops...
...You know...
...He urged this in the face of calls for withdrawal from Democrats, political worries from fellow Republicans, and open scorn from the news media...
...McCain didn’t care...
...A lot of times, not a lot of times, but there have been times when I’ve picked a fi ght when I didn’t need to, you know that...
...We’ve got to have the surge...
...And sometimes he fi nds himself virtually alone to the right of his colleagues, as he has for years on reducing spending and as he did at many critical moments of the Iraq war...
...Let it go...
...There are three men here tonight I am very proud to introduce...
Vol. 13 • February 2008 • No. 21
