Changes And Supporting McCain

I unsurprisingly got a comment about my writing and expressing surprise at my support for McCain. As I’ve said before, over the last several years, my ideology hasn’t changed much. But, my disposition has shifted and the conditions we face have changed dramatically. Here is my response:

Cindy:

I'm sure it was on Kerry's One Mom Blog that I saw a comment of yours. I still look in on a handful of Blogs that I watched for months. I've hardly watched my own, in March. Is this mental decompression? There are still things going on in my head. I think I'll turn to a more personal focus on my perspective on life as a person with MS who spends a lot of time analyzing socio-philosophical questions. I don't have the popular platform of a public office or a media program. I don't even have an academic title to flaunt as credentials. I went to graduate school and finished my coursework in the early 80's, but I started working before I finished my essay. In case anyone asks, you can make money as a salesman that you can't make as a student or even as a teacher unless you get a Ph.D. and a good university position. I was at Western Kentucky, not Harvard or Stanford. (Speaking of marketing credentials) :-)

But plainly, I do have a unique position as a philosophically oriented person with multiple sclerosis. It has been interesting watching what has happened in my body and my subjective experience, as well as looking at society from a perspective not largely occupied with labor or an office. There are a lot of people with MS who don't get enough input about the physical and social effects that one might face, and most people have a friend or family member with MS. That's a fairly large potential audience, and their attention might (hardly incidentally) be directed to some social questions.

Speaking of that, I believe I mentioned that I was a MAJOR McCain critic. In the 2000 election cycle, of 14 original Republican candidates, McCain was my LEAST favorite. I called him "philosophically incoherent."

But as I said, I've come to recognize his unique virtues and our unique situation. Especially given that those unique virtues include a gracious and well-meaning disposition, when it comes to those philosophical questions, we should befriend and encourage him, not scorn and repel him. If he disappoints conservatives, that should be all his doing, not ours.

But, the other virtues include a thoroughgoing patriotism relative to foreign policy. And also critically important TODAY is his record and resolve against extravagant government spending. This is no longer a future concern: the entitlements tidal wave hits over the next ten years. For instance, S.S. disability is getting difficult to be approved, because bureaucrats see that there is no money. The plain truth is that there are very few politicians with the resolve McCain will have about controlling spending. That's why Tom Coburn supports McCain. In the statewide constituency pork barrel-prone Senate, Coburn is the closest thing you will see to a "Dr. No."

Just yesterday for instance, McCain said that it isn't the federal government's job to bail out businesses that made bad loans. He's right. This is just the umpteenth manifestation of the endemic pathology of the federal government that subsidizes failure and penalizes success. Of course, this invites more failure and less success. We need to support McCain for these literal VITAL reasons, and encourage and counsel him where we disagree. I think I'll post THIS.