John McCain is going down - or up - with this ship. WaPo reports today on the senator's commitment to stick with his position that the war in Iraq is winnable and must be won.
McCain fought in 'Nam, and knows what it's like to lose a war because things fell apart on the home front. He stuck it out in a Viet Cong prison for years - and came home to a country that had turned its back on his war. Now, he's poised to become the anti-Kerry: willing to jeopardize his own political capital by standing almost alone as a vociferous supporter of the war, the surge, and the president.
McCain is doing the right thing - not just for the troops, but for John McCain. As he and his advisers know doubt know, he has failed to capture interest by running with the pack of right-of-center Republicans. He doesn't have the outside-the-Beltway sensibility and credibility of Rudy Giuliani (who knows that it's funny, not evil, to imitate Marlon Brando's "Godfather" accent), nor the business credibility of Mitt Romney, nor the conservative credentials of Newt Gingrich. He has a legitimate chance of being the only candidate who made his name on foreign policy and supports - wholeheartedly - finishing the job in Iraq.
While I did not support entering Iraq in 2003 (see my article), Global Review firmly believes that abandoning the Iraqis is not an option. You break, you buy it; the Pottery Barn rule.
There are a lot of Americans who agree with me. And there are even more Republican primary voters who do: families of soldiers who believe their boys can win, veterans who don't want to abandon this generation's ugly war, and those hard-core neocons and Cold Warriors who are 100% behind President Bush. McCain may not get the whole country behind his notion that we should lean in, not out, from Iraq, but if he can capture a significant core, he has a chance of sticking around long enough for things to go right in Iraq - or for his optimism and certainty to catch on in what may become a field of calibrators.
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