RNC Wrap-Up: Doing the Time Warp With John McCain

Well, that wraps things up at the RNC. And the one kind thing I can say about the GOP's convention is this: I admit, they had some pretty sweet musical selections tonight - from Heart's "Barracuda" to Journey's "Don't Stop Believin," 80's hair bands were alive and well at the Republican National Convention. If only Barack Obama could commission some Twisted Sister for his next big rally - either "We're Not Gonna Take It" or "I Wanna Rock" would be more than appropriate.

Seriously though, McCain's speech tonight was quite the oddity - a mostly personal speech that preached change, right in front of a crowd of hardcore Republicans who would probably be mroe than happy with eight more years of George W. Bush. McCain is now both a party leader and a candidate trying to position himself as anything other than a Bush, so it's going to be quite the tightrope walk for him to manage. I mean, just last night, we had Sarah Palin brazenly declaring that it was well within our rights to torture terrorists, even as it's been John McCain who was one of the Bush administration's most outspoken critics when it came to the blind eye given to torture at Guantanomo Bay.

Look, the fact is, I really do think that at one time, McCain was in many ways the real deal. Even if you didn't agree with him, you had to give him credit for not always conforming based on party loyalties, and for reaching across party lines on issues like the environment, campaign finance reform, etc.

But John Kerry said it best in his speech last week - Senator McCain has been a far, far different person than Candidate McCain. And that's not just hyperbole, it's fact. Just look at where McCain's stood on the issues - where he stood three or four years ago as opposed to today. Look at the McCain who fought a bitter primary battle with George Bush and the McCain who is now desperately appealling to the Republican base.

The fact is this: John McCain now leads the party of George W. Bush, and he's yet to concretely spell out how a McCain presidency would differ from that of his predecessor. Four, five years ago, we might have guessed. But now, the line between the "maverick" McCain and the msot unpopular president in recent American history is a fine line indeed.

Now, McCain's account of his time as a POW was in fact moving ... it was nearly as moving tonight as it was the 5,000 other times we've heard it from Republicans who have little else with which to advocate him. In all honesty though, McCain's biography is an amazing, fascinating, and tragic story - it's the stuff of inspirational movies and heroic tales. But here in 2008, in a world that is now generations removed from Vietnam, a fascinating story does not by default mean that someone will be a great president, and it certainly does not mean that someone is on the right side of the issues. The same thing goes for Sarah Palin - aww, she's just like us - she drives her kids to school, has a family, goes to her kids' games. Well gee whiz, that makes her just like millions of other Americans, so that must mean she's qualified to be vice president! I mean, Joe Schmoe drives his kids to work and goes to soccer games, lets make him vice president too!

But really, what I don't get about McCain is that he speaks about how he was tranformed by his POW experience, and how the experience made him hate war. And yet, everything McCain says makes it sound like war was the best thing that ever happened to him. Only through war and tragedy did he learn about friendship and dedication and overcoming adversity. War was the single most defining thing in John McCain's life, and though he claims to hate it, it colors his entire worldview. And McCain talks about change, yet all of his foreign policy attitudes are rooted in a soldier's mentality, in that same "good vs. evil," simplistic world view that so many Republicans share. It's us against them - even tonight, McCain assured us that HE knows how the world works, HE knows evil! It sounds to me that what he knows is fear. Because when you're too afraid to hope for a better world, the easy thing to do is to simply reassure yourself that hey, at least we have the bigger guns and better bombs.

When you're a soldier, you're putting your own life on the line, and because of that there's no choice but to create a narrative that you're fighting for something worth dying for. You have to have that good vs. evil mentality, because if you don't then how do you justify fighting and dying for a cause that may not have legitimacy? Everyone wants to believe that they are part of a greater purpose, that they are on the side of good. And sometimes, they might be, and sometimes, there might be shades of grey. And a president has to recognize those shades of grey, because he's the Commander In Chief who's actually determining whether it's worth it to send Americans to their deaths for a given cause. When the orders come down the officers and soldiers - they don't question - that's their role, to do as told and assume that their mission is in fact a righteous and worthy one. But that IS NOT the role of the President. The President needs to see all sides of an issue, to see all strategies, to be ABOVE the soldiers and not one of them. The soldiers don't question the nature and premise of the mission ... but the President always does and always must. I don't get that from John McCain. He still sees things in terms of victory and defeat, as if those two terms are always absolutes. That's a mentality left over from Vietnam, where the need to "win" overshadowed the bigger picture and the realities and horrors on the ground. It's a mentality that doesn't play in a world where we're not attacked by nations, but by terrorist cells, where rising powers like China and India demand a different kind of diplomacy, and where a strong and united international community is more important than ever, as the world gets increasingly smaller due to technology and globalization. And McCain and his obsolete worldview of military absolutes, of us vs. them and victory vs. defeat and good vs. evil? As Joe Biden said - that's NOT the change we need.

As we head into the debates, I think that gap will become very apparent to the American people. At least those of us who know to think not like players on Team America, but like citizens of a global community.