John McCain was a very poor student at the United States Naval Academy;  only 5 of his 895 peers fared worse.  In my mind, this doesn’t automatically disqualify him from being President, but it certainly can’t be construed as a positive thing.  What will prevent him from being President, however, is his own constituency.

McCain is obviously an intelligent man, despite his lack of respect for Annapolis, one of our most revered military educational institutions.  One look at his warm, grandfatherly face will reveal (unless it’s nap time) bright, engaging eyes, and if you hang around him long enough, you may catch yourself laughing at one of his numerous ribald jokes.  His barbeque techniques are legendary, apparently, and if I’d been able to down a couple cold ones (and perhaps a couple more) along with the sycophants from the mainstream media at his family cabin in Sedona recently, I might have found myself beginning to actually like the man McCain.

I’ll tell you right now what I don’t like :  his constituency of primitive, uneducated war mongers, and his disingenuous pandering to them.

The political beauty of the McCain campaign, is that it can play the all-powerful war card either face up or face down.  McCain himself was a prisoner in Vietnam for five years, and thus he can authoritatively (and justifiably) voice concern over things like torture, which immediately sucks 95% out of the guilt pangs regarding our recent prisoner-related atrocities in Iraq and Gitmo.  McCain can also play the hawk, which is his most comfortable role, because with respect to war, his dumbed down audiences never demand anything more subtle or intellectual than the word “win.”

McCain’s crew is a simple bunch.  We can either win this war against “the terrorists” or lose it.  To a McCain fan, it’s not how you play the game, it’s whether you win or lose.  As long as the fan himself doesn’t have to participate directly in the game, the Oakland Raiders Al Davis’ mantra “Just win baby” is as righteous, religious, and as moral a stance as it gets in the McCain bible.  Go get ‘em tiger… we’ll be here barbecuing in Sedona when you get back.

Come on, Senator McCain.  The purposeful dumbing down of America has gone on long enough.  War is not simple.  It’s not black & white.  It’s not something that necessarily has a clear cut endgame anymore – if it ever did, particularly when it now involves loosely organized factions that can blend in seamlessly with ordinary families and peace-loving citizens.  It’s time to go back to school, McCain.  I think you missed some important classes.

GO OBAMA!!!

	Web useless-knowledge.com