If McCain Had Been Elected... Would We Have a Climate Bill?

Allow me to posit an extremely radical hypothetical. If John McCain had been elected president in 2008, would the United States have its first federal law aimed at curbing greenhouse gas emissions? I might be crazy, and it pains me to say this, but I think the answer might actually be yes.

Watching John McCain over the last year and a half has been terribly disappointing. As soon as J. D. Hayworth threatened to challenge him in the Arizona Senate primary, McCain abandoned the "Straight Talk Express", abandoned many of his prior views and principles, and started positioning himself as an arch-conservative who supports a border fence, wants to extend Bush's tax cuts for the extremely wealthy, and scorns the notion of capping our climate pollution. Despite some of the most overt flip-floppage we've seen this year, McCain's strategy appears to have paid off with the GOP, as he trounced Hayworth in Tuesday night's primary.

McCain: "I Never Considered Myself a Maverick"

In a move that clearly shows McCain's desperation stemming from a challenged primary for his Arizona Senate seat by former Congressman J. D. Hayworth, McCain told Newsweek in a recent interview that he "never considered [himself] a maverick." McCain, who very much owned that term during the 2008 presidential election, seems to have completed the decimation of his image as an above-the-fray politician to a pandering, willing-to-say-anything-to-get-elected hypocrite.

He cannot honestly think that the American people are as dumb as his former running mate. It's only been a little more than a year since the presidential campaign when he was using the word "maverick" with impunity. Until Saturday, that is, when he disavowed himself of the word as casually as one would an buzzing gnat; a small annoyance. But unfortunately for McCain his attempt to indulge his base by denying that the majority of 2008 ever happened is well off the mark. And it's also going to piss off this guy.