Why I'm Rooting for John McCain

1) He says stuff like this in Iowa, about ethanol.
2) He says stuff like this about torture and bogus "ticking bomb" scenarios.
3) He was right all along that anthropogenic global warming is happening, back when his party was denying it; and having been right all along, doesn't need to get hysterical now by overselling it as some world-ending catastrophe.
4) He was right all along about how an increase in US troop numbers in Iraq really could make a dramatic decline in violence, even when everybody else (including me) was ignoring him.
5) No one can ever call him a "chicken hawk," not him or his sons (one in the Marines, one in the Naval Academy).
6) His toughness is about a particular issues (Iraq, Osama bin Laden) in which the US is engaged in struggle right now. It is not simply generic "toughness" for toughness's sake (see no. 2 and no. 7).
7) In debates he emphasizes the humanity of immigrants, and it's not just because they are a vote bank for his party.
8) He votes against pork, and doesn't just talk about voting against pork.
9) He is pro-life, and has a long-standing pro-life record, and his one compromise (supporting embryo-destroying stem cell research) is likely going to become a moot point anyway.
10) Another big area where I seriously disagree with him -- campaign finance reform -- is one where I can at least understand why he votes the way he did, and anyway the vast majority of the American legal class is of the same opinion.
11) The question of health insurance and entitlements are big ones, with unexpected ramifications in the coming years. His record shows he doesn't pander to public illusions (see nos. 1, 2, 8), is willing to go against party orthodoxy (see no. 3, 7), and is a conservative (this year's American Conservative Union rating 65%).
12) He doesn't express some desire to destroy American institutions that have a long track record of working pretty well (like the Federal Reserve), just because they don't fit his ideological dogma. (Read the story of the 1987 crash here, and think how it might have ended without the Fed and its branches.)
13) His campaign is actually related to promoting solutions to current practical problems; it's not about pandering to interest groups, or about projecting some mythic "Reagan" mystique, or about fleeing current practical problems in a throwback to policies that were shown by experience decades (or a century) ago to be inadequate.
14) It's a way of expressing my already deep (and steadily deepening) regret for not supporting him in the primary of 2000.
15) He's not getting traction because somehow people think of him as the past, the old fuddy-duddy, the has-been, and supporting him is a way of striking back at the "15 minutes of fame" mentality in American politics.

UPDATE: Turns out, I'm with Jim.

Explaining 2008

As is generally recognized the Republicans are going to get pounded in 2008 (here, here, here). The most important indicator is the strong turn to the Democrats, particularly among youth. Ronald Reagan's "children" almost made the country majority Republican, but George W. Bush's "children" are going to make it majority Democrat.

The question is though: what will it mean? The failure of Bush as a president? The failure of the Republicans as a party? The failure of conservatism as an ideology? The election won't give a decisive answer to this, since ideologies aren't on the ballot; parties and candidates are (and President Bush isn't). But let's take a look at Britain: there the failure of Tony Blair over Iraq is most definitely his personal failure, not one that will long affect the Labor party or center-left ideology in general.

This is the key: the Bush presidency failed in ways that exactly fit the stereotypical image of the Republican party. (And in the mass view, the Republican party=conservatism, just as the Democratic party=liberalism.) It's that congruence of his failure with the perceived failings of the party that makes his failure "stick" to the party. Each party/movement is susceptible to different such besetting sins. Had Bush been a Democrat, his polls would still be in the 20s, but the Democrats would still have a significant chance to win in 2008. Why? Because his failures aren't "Democratic" mistakes, they're "Republican" mistakes. That may be unfair, but it goes the other way around too. Had Jimmy Carter been a Republican, his mistakes would not have tainted the Republican brand the way they tainted the Democrat brand.

So what are the policies failings that taint the brands?

For the Republicans it's:
1) Starting failed wars
2) High unemployment
3) Slashing programs for deserving poor
4) Abusing executive power

When a Democrat does any of these things (think LBJ and Vietnam) they may become personally unpopular, but the brand doesn't suffer. When Bob Dole pointed out in 1996 -- in response to the usual "aren't you Republicans all war mongers" line -- that the big wars in his lifetime had all been started by Democrats, it was a mere debater's point that made him look like some kind of cynic -- even though it was completely true. Unfair? Well the Democrats have their own crosses to bear:

For the Democrats it's:
1) Allowing America to be humiliated by foreigners
2) High inflation
3) Allowing undeserving poor to live off the public
4) Crime waves

A Republican can have these failures (think the crime wave and the welfare state expansion under Nixon) and not suffer the way Carter did for them.

A major party realignment starts when a Democrat or a Republican president fails in a way characteristic of his party. It is confirmed when the succeeding president of the other party manages to go two terms without a serious failure characteristic of his party. Young voters bond to the President who seemed to reverse the sins besetting the other party, without falling into his own party's characteristic weaknesses. A young voter pulling the lever for Reagan in 1980 "knows" (even if it's not actually borne out by facts) that he's going to be tougher than Carter on Communism, crime, inflation, and welfare cheats. But he that party allegiance won't jell if Reagan gets America into a failing war, or causes massive unemployment, or throws grandma out in the snow.

Unfortunately for the Republicans, the Democrats are much more aware of their weakenesses than the Republicans are. The DLC, for example, is well aware of these Democratic areas of weakness, and recommends a policy of national strength, fiscal conservatism, get tough on crime, and welfare reform.* Republican "moderates" are, unfortunately, obsessed with the idea that opposing abortion, gay rights, etc., looses the Republicans elections, which is just not the case. Electorally, social issues are either a winner for the conservative side or, more usually, make no difference one way or the other.

What the Republicans really need is an "RLC" devoted to preserving general Republican positions while cautioning the party on the need for: prudent foreign policy (translation: no Iraqs), respect for constitutional checks and balances (translation: no Dick Cheneys), and preserving the safety net (translation: no Hoovers). That way they would know their weakness. As for social conservatism: experience shows that it's really hard to enact a policy in Congress in policy that is radical enough to turn off American voters (the Terry Schiavo business came close, but absent Iraq, etc., would have been only a blip on the screen). It's not the John Ashcrofts "RLC-ers" need to be warning against, it's the "Vulcans" and Alberto Gonzalezes.

You can see the result in the fact that we have now had three Republicans who fell exactly into the trap they should have avoided, while the Democrats have had only one classic Democrat failure.

Hoover tainted the Republicans with unemployment and throwing grandma out in the snow, Nixon with executive abuse compounded after the fact with (strangely enough) failing to end quickly enough the Vietnam disaster his Democratic predecessor started, and Bush now with Iraq, compounded by executive arrogance. The only Democrat to taint his brand was Carter with foreign humiliation, continuing crime, and inflation.

So the big question after 2008 is whether President Clinton and the Democratic Congress will be able to avoid: foreign humiliation, inflation, welfare cheats, and crime waves. Despite the rumors of a leftward swing of the Democrats, I think the continuing consensus of the Clinton wing and the overall environment will keep the Democrats moderate -- but the first could be tougher. If she can't avoid it, then she could find the Democratic realignment vanishing as fast as did the post-Watergate one.

FURTHER THOUGHTS:
I) I could probably add to the Republican list of "besetting sins" a no. 5 "unfair hostility to immigrants and minorities" and to the Democratic list a no. 5 "unfair pandering to immigrants and minorities" with the proviso that the minorities in question change. Before 1945 it was pretty much Jews and Catholics, while after 1965 it became blacks and Latinos.

2) Were the 1968-1972 elections a realignment (one that got aborted by Watergate)? Certainly if you think of crime waves, and undeserving poor and pandering to minorities as besetting sins of the Democrats then they could be (and were) painted as guilty of them. But I think Vietnam scrambled the whole thing. Johnson was a Democrat fighting a senseless war which didn't fit the narrative. As a result in 1968 Humphrey was basically running as a centrist -- in between the radical demonstrators and Nixon (not to mention Wallace). And in 1972, McGovern wasn't the president, and I don't think realignments really happen unless the person(s)/party in the White House (and/or Congress) manifestly screws up. In any case as far as I know, 1968 and 1972 had very few coattails for the Republicans.

3) I should have given the Republican poo-bahs credit for having been very savvy about avoiding the Hoover charge, not actually eliminating any welfare programs until they have been manifestly proven to be really damaging (think welfare reform in 1995). As a result, no Republican president has fallen victim to the "they threw grandma out in the snow" charge since Hoover.