Why The Right hates John McCain

So, it's pretty much official now: John McCain is virtually the last man standing. Well, Huck is still around, but we know, and have always known, that he'll never make it. He's just in it to be VP or SecState or something. Thanks a lot, Huck. Thanks a whole lot.

Anyway, I've been thinking a lot about John McCain and been doing a little research on some of the stuff he's done. And if you read this blog (population: 3?) you know that I have a love for psychology and trying to fit things into that perspective. I think I've figured out why The Right hates John McCain.

No, it's not because of McCain-Liebermann (Global Warming) or McCain-Feingold (Campaign Finance Reform- CFR) or McCain-Kennedy (Immigration). Well, it is a little bit. As someone said, the attempt at bipartisanship was nice, but what did the GOP get out of those? (answer: nothing)

I think The Right hates McCain because they lack a perception of control over him. McCain mostly votes with the GOP. He's really not a conservative, but he is definitely a GOP. He's probably a little more to the left than W, but he is certainly a Republican. There is no denying that.

The problem that most people have over him (and they probably don't even realize this) is that they feel they can't control him, or more precisely, they can't really predict his behavior. He's not entirely consistent in his voting and legislation creation.

(If you know anything about our basic needs, you would know that the need for control is our most basic need. Forget food. Forget shelter. Forget reproduction. Perceived control is our most basic need. Without it, our health and mental state deteriorates rapidly and all kinds of other bad things happen to us.)

Take any other GOP senator. Let's say... just off the top of my head... Elizabeth Dole. I don't even have to look up her voting record to tell you that she probably consistently tows the party line and votes pretty consistently along GOP lines, doesn't try to work much with Democrats and if something came up, you could probably figure out which direction she would vote. Not every member of Congress completely consistently votes with their party, but a near totality do. You can reasonably predict the direction most of them will take on nearly any issue.

McCain, and a few others, are different. Joe Lieberman has the same problem on the Democratic side. He fairly consistently votes to the Left of Center, but sometimes, he stands up for something on the Right, and the Left then whine and wail and then things settle down until it happens again.

Basically, I think that The Right simply doesn't trust McCain. He's not predictable and therefore he somewhat messes up the little box most of them have their worlds packaged into. I personally think that McCain's leadership ability leaves a lot to be desired for this exact reason, but politicians really aren't leaders so much as they are managers. Most Americans don't really understand this, but that's another story.

What most people on The Right don't understand now is that there is really nothing that McCain loves more than his own power, which is pretty much like most other politicians (This is why CFR was passed). And to keep that power, he will need to appeal to The Right, which so far he has not done because he hasn't had to or desired to. But what they don't understand is that if he is elected President (Ha Ha Ha!) the control we would have over him, or the perceived control we would have over him, would be greatly increased. First of all, if McCain is elected, it is because the GOP elected him. If that is the case, then the GOP will have likely retaken Congress, which wouldn't send any bills to him that would anger his base. Secondly, if you remember what happened with the whole immigration thing last year, I'm sure it would happen again if McCain tried to pull any dirty tricks.

So, I think that if McCain could possibly convince The Right that he'll "be good" and tow the party line from here on out, he'd probably get a lot of mileage out of that and win a good portion of The Right back from the brink of leaving the party. The only problem is, he'd lose a lot of independents, which is exactly who gave him the nomination.