McCain turnaround

I don’t quite know how I feel about this. I honestly feel sad for these people who have been misled. People make fun of them because they are ignorant, but that’s not entirely fair. She honestly thinks Obama is an arab terrorist. If you actually thought that it would be a big deal to you too.

McCain seems to be doing the right thing now, but these people didn’t make these things up on their own. It’s the old Rove tricks of subtly lying to people, and putting misconceptions in their heads that you don’t bother to correct. This is the biggest problem I had with the Bush administration. When a majority of your citizens thought that there were ties between Al Qaeda and Iraq and you don’t bother correcting them, you are not showing good leadership, you are being deceptive. Even if Bush had nothing to do with that perceived connection (which he certainly did), or likewise McCain & co. with the perception that Obama was an arab terrorist, leadership means correcting the false beliefs of the people that look to you for leadership.

I liked the old McCain, now that he doesn’t think he has to win at any cost, maybe it’s coming back out? It’s a shame the whole campaign wasn’t run with this sort of integrity. The Republicans honestly don’t have a bad platform, it’s one I think a lot of informed people would get behind (free markets, emergent order, libertarianism, look at Ron Paul, jesus), but the group of people that can follow a party for ideological reasons, while knowing that their leadership is talking out both sides of their mouths to the ignorant masses, pretending to care about gay marriages, and abortion etc is fast waning.