John McCain
Do Conservatives Need to Grow Up?
By Daniel Muniz

Bringing conservatives on board won't be easy for McCain… Republicans are in a sour mood, especially the talk-radio mafia that regards McCain as anything but a reliable conservative.

McCain's touchiest problem--his scourge--is talk radio. Rush Limbaugh, Laura Ingraham, Mark Levin, and others raise legitimate complaints about his flirtations with Democrats and his apostasy on campaign finance, guns, immigration, and embryonic stem cell research.

Fred Barnes – The Weekly Standard

Fred Barnes is one of many conservative voices who are now coalescing behind Senator John McCain in the 2008 presidential election. He and numerous others have a vague understanding to why conservatives are upset but he admonishes them by insisting that it is time to “grow up” and stand behind McCain.

Lots of other elected officials are now supporting John McCain but they represent the “establishment” of the Party. That is the “scratch my back and I will scratch your back” network of politicians who have benefited from favors, earmarks, fundraisers, etc. So in other words, these politicians owe McCain something even though many of them have probably been burned by the senator at least a couple of times in the past.

So is it time for conservatives to bury the hatchet?

Yeah, John McCain may have stabbed Republicans in the back a few times; okay, maybe lots of times. Even so, without a unified and supportive base, a Republican nominee will have a tough time getting elected. Do conservatives really want a very liberal Democrat elected instead?

Let me tell you what I think about that.

All this anger and anguish about John McCain must come from somewhere. Although Barnes and others condescendingly mock talk radio and the conservative blogosphere, they don’t seem to grasp the harsh reality that this resentment has a source, namely the mouth and actions of John McCain.

So in other words, talk radio didn’t invent this anger. It originated from the duplicitous and disingenuous behavior of the Arizona senator. The conservative movement has a number of cherished principles that appeal to a broad range of people in the Party and McCain has gone out of his way to insult and demean most of them.

Furthermore, the press loves extremes and John McCain was their poster boy and media darling. He was willing to publicly bash a Republican president and Republicans in both the House and Senate while often siding with Democrats to stymie conservative issues. Consequently, McCain was richly rewarded by the media with glowingly positive publicity.

Now was this a one-time occurrence that isn’t a big deal?

Absolutely not! Each time McCain bucked conservative principles and trashed conservative figures, he loved it and he especially enjoyed the enormous media attention that it attracted. And much like a drug abuser who needs a bigger fix the next time around to satisfy his cravings, McCain became intoxicated with the press fawning all over him so he didn’t disappoint them by continuously bashing the GOP.

And now all of a sudden, he realizes that the base doesn’t support him.

Well, it is a little difficult for the rank and file to smile when you have all these knives sticking out of your back.

Conservatives like John Hawkins of Right Wing News are far more diplomatic. Hawkins and others know that McCain is a dirt bag but they feel that the ordinary conservative really doesn’t have a choice other than to support the candidate that has an R attached to their name. At least I can respect their honesty and frankness because they aren’t lying about McCain’s bogus credentials and they are not condescending like Fred Barnes and others.

But there comes a breaking point where conservatives are fed up with voting for people who do not share their values.

And even worse, John McCain is not making any real attempt to mend the fences. Yes, he is paying a little bit of lip service to conservative issues but he isn’t bothering to address what the real problems are. In fact, too many of McCain supporters are blaming conservatives as if it is their fault that they resent the senator.

If Fred Barnes and other McCain supporters want conservatives to grow up, then it is time for the Arizona senator to look in the mirror and finally realize that it is himself, not talk radio, who is fully responsible for all the angst and white hot fury that so many Republicans have of him.

If John McCain wants our support as well as our vote, then he needs to “grow up” and start acting like a conservative. But until that happens, the rank and file Republicans will still view him with suspicion and distrust.

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