Hangover Discurso

This morning's opining on the public discourse.

As we worship our porcelain deities this morning and wonder how we ended up wearing lampshades and coconut brassieres, we're revisited by ghosts of news items past. Let us see what wonderful chunks are floating in our bowl of truth.

Kevin Drum knows who might be responsible for John "The GI Bill Update's a Great Idea But I Still Won't Sponsor It" McCain's reluctance to support our troops' education:

Well, the Department of Defense, for one. They're afraid that updating GI benefits will hurt retention rates as soldiers leave the service to go to college. Charming, no? And of course, it would cost too much. Can't have that when it comes to programs that involve actual help for actual people. Apparently we're better off spending money on sugar subsidies and mediating gang wars in Iraq than we are helping vets get an education. Where's Mr. Straight Talk when you need him?

Mr. "Depends on the Definition of Straight Talk" is busy getting his arse booted off Project Vote Smart's board:

Project Vote Smart, the nonpartisan voter-education nonprofit, confirms today that it has kicked John McCain off its board. Mother Jones reported on Monday that PVS was prepared to make the move due to McCain's nine-month refusal to fill out its Political Courage Test. according to PVS President Richard Kimball, the nonprofit has a rule that bars nonrespondents from serving on its board.

And completing the transition from moderate-ish sort-of straight talker to batshit insane neocon dumbass extraordinaire:

The competition for McCain’s foreign policy soul is over. The neocons cleaned up, took the trophy, and went for beers (or maybe wine spritzers.) Of course McCain is still going to seek and take advice from a gallery of venerated foreign policy wise men, but the idea that there’s actually a conflict between the neocon and realist camps for John McCain’s attention is nonsense. Not only has John McCain long pitched his tent in the neoconservative camp, he advocates a view of American power diametrically opposed to the realism of people like Henry Kissinger and Brent Scowcroft, whose pragmatic approach the neocons have derided in the past as an ideology of “managed decline.”

The only issue I have with Matthew Duss's fine assessment is this hypothetical "gallery of venerated foreign policy wise men" McCain is supposedly "going to seek and take advice from." I'm an atheist - having a really hard time believing that fairy tale. I think Matthew's going to get a nasty shock when he gets a look at who McCain's new friends think "venerated foreign policy wise men" are. Psst, Matt - they don't inhabit the same reality we do.

Can't argue with Matthew's choice of photograph, though. I think it's my favorite pic of McCain ever.

So McCain seems to be confused as to what "maverick" means - he thinks it's going along with rather than against the neocons controlling the tattered remnants of the Republican Party. As Carpetbagger points out, that's only one small item in a long list of confusions:

In just the past couple of months, McCain has been confused about the relationship between taxes and revenues, confused about whether he thinks our current economy is strong or not, confused about why interest rates even exist, confused about his own no-new-taxes pledge, confused about his own Social Security policy, and confused about how he’d pay for yet another round of reckless tax cuts.

And that's just his confusion about economics. Hoo-boy. As St. McSame hisself might say, "Holy Sunni! I mean, Shiite! I mean, what's the difference, really?"

No, it's not tequila makes me sick. It's definitely McCain.