Way back before dubya won the Republican nomination and went on to Florida recount glory and this abortion of a presidency, I was something of a John McCain fan. I don't often vote Republican any more because the party has gotten way too chummy with the far-right religious kooks, but I was prepared to make an exception in his case. I had a lot of respect for him then. All that respect has been eroding over the last few years of watching him become one of dubya's boot-lickers, but it wasn't until he sacrificed his principles and let them do an end run around his torture bill with a bullshit presidential signing statement that I gave up on him for good.

He's only gotten more pathetic since then. Now he's trashing the Iraq Study Group Report and calling for more troops in Iraq. How can a Vietnam veteran and former POW condone the expansion of yet another stupid, mis-begotten war? It blows my mind. It looks like he's rolling the dice and putting all his own presidential hopes behind a wartime candidacy. I'm thinking he really shot himself in the foot on this one. Public opinion is now 71% against our current strategy in Iraq. I'm betting that both the Democrat and Republican primary campaigns will be about who can most effectively manage the re-deployment and ultimate withdrawal of our forces (I've already accepted that dubya is not going to do it). McCain is positioning himself to campaign around the issue of leading us in a war we've already lost.