This is very simple. McCain, like all of our career politicians, is very, very good at manipulating the average person. This is especially handy when the average person doesn’t have the foggiest idea how economics works or what is and is not in the Constitution.
A coworker comes to mind. He describes himself as hardcore conservative, an enemy of the Left. However, he is most definitely a socialist follower. On the subject of why alternative fuels are unable to dent the market share enjoyed by petroleum fuels: He thinks it is because Big Oil is just too powerful. On the subject of whether we should adopt a complete tax reformation such as the FairTax: he thinks that the removal of embedded taxes would not be passed down to the consumer (apparently being completely ignorant of the effect of competition on pricing). On the subject of the McCain-Feingold BCRA: He looks bewildered and asks, “What’s the BCRA?”
McCain knows the average American is completely oblivious to what goes on in Washington. He knows most Americans don’t read National Review. Most Americans don’t read the Wall Street Journal editorial page. Most Americans don’t listen to Neal Boortz or Rush Limbaugh. Most Americans have only the vaguest notion of what a conservative or liberal is.
To win the votes of people who think they are conservative but are mouthbreather ignorant, you only need to put on the Lee Greenwood/Red-White-and-Blue decorations/BBQ/Backyards/Ballgames/John Phillip Souza Americana-in-a-box get-up and you’ve won their hearts. John McCain is selling political corruption and vote-buying socialism all done up in star spangled wrapping paper.
The fact that the opposition in the more openly socialist DNC is so far obviously of the Berkeley set is a major reason why McCain’s ploy works.
To those diehard followers of the GOP leadership scared witless of the idea that their success, as the Rush Limbaugh has famously noted, does not depend on who wins elections, I say this:
I’m not voting for Hillary/Obama. I’m voting AGAINST McCain. (I might have stomached Romney, but not the Manchurian Candidate…no way.)
I fell for the “lesser of the two evils” trick in 2000 and voted for a RINO. Shame on the GOP.
Then, in 2004, I fell for it again. Shame on Me.
That’s two mistakes. I will not make a third.
BTW: RED QUEEN! RED QUEEN!
