Honest John McCain - Nicknames and Why He'll Lose

I used to be a fan of Big John back when he was a "maverick". For this run, old John seems to have made a couple of very serious political miscalculations. First, he's decided to cozy up to the thoroughly insane religious right. Back in 2000 you could argue he lost the nomination to incurious George because he not only failed to pander to the loony faith-heads, he actually stuck his thumb in their eye by calling their Grand PooBahs "agents of intolerance". Clearly JM decided he wasn't gonna make THAT mistake again so this year he went a'courtin and winds up french kissing the likes of John Hagee and Rod Parsley, two men that suffer from clinical psychosis. Now, I don't seriously think McCain is really in these nut jobs camp. If I'm right, he embraced these lunatics for purely cynical political reasons. Some maverick. If I'm wrong, he's actually become one of the agents of intolerance he decries.

The second giant mistake is making "staying the course" in Iraq the centerpiece of his campaign. While there are doubtless a significant portion of folks that are ok with doubling down of GWB's disastrous policies, most American's have come to understand that our adventure into Iraq has furthered Bin Laden's goals at the expense of our own. We have created a situation that risks flipping stable and nuclear armed Pakistan into the hands of radicals. We have immeasurably strengthened Iran. We have driven oil prices up by increasing the instability of the middle east and decreasing supply coming out of Iraq. The "surge" was done to give time for political reconciliation. By that measure, a total failure. We really want to continue these policies?

Lastly, for this post, I'm annoyed that a man that's running on his foreign policy experience keeps mixing up Iraq and Iran and can't seem to keep straight the difference between a shiite and a sunni.

A partial list of insulting plays on JMcM's name - please add your own.

John McCan't
McCan'tRemember
Hard Candy McCain
McPain
C3PO (for the way he moves)
Captain Jowls
I Can't Believe It's Not Bush
McBush
BPH John
The Ticking Temper
McMetamucil
McGetOffMyLawn
McMoreOfTheSame
Popeye
McAncient
McCoot
McManchurianCandidate
McAnus
McCainMutiny