The Amazing Colossal McCain

David Weigel | August 21, 2006

Buried in a New York Times story on John McCain's efforts to reach out to Bush supporters is this list of his intellectual advisers.

His growing kitchen cabinet spans an array of issues and backgrounds, and includes James Jay Baker, a former lobbyist for the National Rifle Association; Niall Ferguson, a historian at Harvard; and Barry McCaffrey,  who was the drug czar under President Bill Clinton.

Yes, Niall Ferguson. The brilliant financial historian turned foaming-at-the-mouth "national greatness conservative." The "John McCain and Joe Lieberman will break the logjam of American democracy" argument too easily writes off the fact that both men are far more hawkish than the mainstream voter. McCain, in particular, is a class-A neoconservative and more hawkish than Bush. A president with Niall Ferguson on his shoulder is a president who'll stretch our military even thinner across the globe.

(Cross-posted at AS.com.)

Comments

|8.21.06 @ 2:27PM|#

"The "John McCain and Joe Lieberman will break the logjam of American democracy" argument too easily writes off the fact that both men are far more hawkish than the mainstream voter."

Really? What polls do you have to back that up? Yes, there are the generic "do you approve of how Bush is handling Iraq" polls, but it is unclear what those mean. You can disapprove of how Bush is handling Iraq and still not want to surrender and become a Pat Buchannan isolationist. I am not sure that public opinion is nearly as neatly defined down the "crazy neocon hawk" versus "peaceful clear thinking dove" lines as you would like to think.

|8.21.06 @ 2:33PM|#

He went over the edge a long time ago, when, in The Pity of War, he proved that, statistically, the Kaiser won the Great War while keenly discerning that war (and its aftermath) is bad and expensive and that the aftermath of the Great War was especially bad and expensive.

Good show, Niall!

brian423|8.21.06 @ 2:45PM|#

McCain scares me. I think he's too hot-tempered to have access to the nuclear button.

On a lighter note:

The Amazing Colossal Man: I don't want to grow any more!!!

Joel Robinson: I'm a Toys "R" Us kid!!!

|8.21.06 @ 4:36PM|#

"John's ego was 50-feet tall!"