Barack McCain?

Did you wake up in time to see the Republican Presidential Candidate accept the nomination this morning?

At least one thing from the Democratic camp has been weighing on the mind of this candidate... the whole 'no more 4 more years of Bush' theme. Look at the time he spent today on distancing himself from Bush 43. You would have thought after 8 years of being in power, and a TWO term Presidency just starting to fade away, a candidate for the GOP would have at least acknowledged the Party faithfuls' pride in their Dear Leader. Instead, he went on and on about how the ordinary American was 'hurting' and finding it hard to put gas into his tank and food on the family table. And how opposed he was to pork barrel politics. And how, with the big broom of Palin by his side, he was going to bring 'Change to Washington'. This latter seems to be a pet theme of American Politics in general and Presidential Politics in particular. EVERY major stump speech, convention speech and televised debate suggests that every candidate is interested in bringing change to Washington. So where the hell is the change? And equally, how can Joe Public continue to listen to this unorginal boilerplate as anything more than vacuous promiseering?

Now hear this: Al Gore just became McCain's speechwriter. Where else did he get the long pitch about the new, renewable energy economy and millions of new jobs that will stay in America instead of running away to they-who-shall-not-be-named? It might as well have been a certain Obama doing the talking.

Finally, the bit I love the most: Americans griping about how badly McCain was treated in the POW Camps of the VietCong. Here is a man who has voluntarily chosen to enrol in his country's army and is parachuting into enemy territory, not for spreading peace and love and enrolling poor Vietnamese children into school, but to shoot, maim and kill. He is caught and becomes a POW. The Vietnamese, never the world's wealthiest people, are deep into an endless war of attrition where the staple diet of the average citizen is a weak tapioca gruel. What does this son-of-Admirals expect, filet mignon done medium rare with a nice and dry Napa Valley Cabernet to go with it? And a four-poster bed to retire into after a long day on the Golf Course? Listen chaps. Your country crossed an ocean to beat up a tiny, helpless people but didn't count on their determination, ingenuity and fearless sacrifice. Uncle Sam's posters still carry a bloody nose, three decades on. McCain fought an unjust war and picked up some heat. So he was not the guy who took the country to war but merely a youngster who bought the whole patriotic psychobabble.

Change is coming, quoth... quoth who? Barack McCain?