McCain’s Concession Speech

To continue my four-month-long tradition of responding to things five days late, I just watched the McCain speech and have to say the first half or so was wonderful.

John McCain seemed genuinely disgusted and impatient with the boo-birds that lustily made themselves known each time Barack Obama was mentioned.  Though this does not excuse his ‘use’ of these individuals during the campaign, I am glad to see once again that John McCain did not share their vitriol and is eager to dispose of them as they have outlived his purposes.

The manner in which he disposed of all of what he has become this past campaign was both glorious and telling.  I am happy that since John McCain will reside in the Senate for at least a part of Obama’s presidency that he does not intend to continue on the tract on which he found himself these past months.  At the same time, it seems clear to me that he saw the campaign as a game or a play of fiction: That he could appeal to Americans’ basest fears and prejudices during the long campaign and expect no real harm or no real lasting smudge on his character to come from it.  It appears to me he did campaign with only winning in mind and although he may have preferred not to, he does not anything he did or supported was outside the accepted rules of politics.

After the 6:30 minute mark or so, the speech turned to the empty tripe I would normally expect, including the requisite praise for his albatross.  He did treat us with a subtle shitting on Todd Palin.  I may be making too much of this, but pay attention to his handshake with Mr. Palin at the end.  It’s the same way I’d shake the hand of someone who just sneezed.

And whose idea was it to half McCain walk off the stage to Darth Vader’s theme?

Now it remains to be seen if the public can wipe away the memory of John McCain Running for Office, especially when he comes up for re-election in 2010 (should he decide to run) or in the years after his career is over as one of the more beloved statesmen who fell short of the Presidency in recent American history.

“In 1966, Andy Dufresne escaped from Shawshank prison. All they found of him was a muddy set of prison clothes, a bar of soap, and an old rock hammer, damn near worn down to the nub. I used to think it would take six-hundred years to tunnel under the wall with it. Old Andy did it in less than twenty. Oh, Andy loved geology. I guess it appealed to his meticulous nature. An ice age here, million years of mountain building there. Geology is the study of pressure and time. That’s all it takes really, pressure, and time. That, and a big god-damned poster. Like I said, in prison a man will do anything to keep his mind occupied. It turns out Andy’s favorite hobby was totin’ his wall through the exercise yard, a handful at a time. I guess after Tommy was killed, he decided he had been here just about long enough. Andy did like he was told, buffed those shoes to a high mirror shine. The guard simply didn’t notice. Neither did I… I mean, seriously, how often do you really look at a mans shoes? Andy crawled to freedom through five hundred yards of shit smelling foulness I can’t even imagine, or maybe I just don’t want too. Five hundred yards… that’s the length of five football fields, just shy of half a mile.”

Will John McCain emerge clean out the other side?

… and the cow goes moo