McCain's Inharmonious Song Stylings

That sound you hear is the McCain Straight Talk Express going “boom.”

One of the more poignant bloggers today is The Cunning Realist. Aside from his less than humble name, he/she has an uncanny way of finding the appropriate analogy to a current event. The latest flap involving Senator McCain's joke about bombing Iran left me reticent to jump on the left-leaning bandwagon of castigation. Was is merely an off-hand remark-- a joke-- served up as red meat for the faithful at a campaign event? Perhaps.

But TCR put a nice frame on it:

Scenario: China, the world's preeminent superpower, invades and occupies Canada on a false pretense and lets it descend into civil war. The U.S., a developing nation without nuclear weapons, watches from next door. Then a senior Chinese official who could soon be the country's next president starts singing songs about "bombing the U.S." at political rallies. He gets laughs and applause.

As an American, would you or would you not demand that Washington develop the ultimate deterrent against that madness?

There may have been a time when the United States had some moral authority in the world, and we can debate as to when such authority began to wane: our imperial conquests during the Spanish-American War, the displacement of millions of Palestinians in 1948, our overthrow of various popular leaders in 1953 Iran, 1960's Central America and Vietnam, our attempted coup in 1961 Cuba, or our continued misadventures in nation-building.

Regardless, from any perspective outside of our own jingoist self-aggrandizement, the current US foreign policy is a disaster of epic proportion. This may be how empires end. I'm not a historian, but I can imagine some Roman Senator in 300 or 400 CE joking about the perceived ineptitude of the barbarian Visigoths to the loud guffaws of his civilized constituents. Administration apologists, of which McCain is one, are quick to show much feigned concern for how dissent will play into our enemies' hands. How do jokes about pointless aggression and murder play?

John McCain's past history puts him clearly in the category of hero. He has my respect for his past service to our country, his unquestioned loyalty and bravery so many years ago. But a President McCain? I think not.