The Relevance of Personal Sacrifice

Count me among those who believed McCain was "the least repulsive Democrat running." But the last few weeks have really solidified for me that McCain is actually going to be a better president than I would have expected and a clearly superior choice to Obama.

I recognize that not everyone is going to read into this the same way that I did, but I thought McCain's temporary suspension of his campaign was admirable. I don't believe that there was nothing McCain could have done. The man is powerful enough that he's got quite a bit of political capital. If he's willing to spend it to get a bailout done, that's good. If he's willing to do it at the expense of his campaign, that's precisely the person I want to lead us through the crisis.

I also thought that he was being attacked unfairly by the post-debate pundits. I think that most informed people understand by now that the bank and insurance company failures can be traced to the subprime housing crisis, a Democrat idea become law through a sometimes complicit Republican minority. Many attacked McCain for failing to point this out or assign blame, but think about that. Had he done so, he would have undermined his credibility in the Senate as a bipartisan negotiator. Again, he passed up the political points he could have made during a debate - a format and topic that was supposed to favor him! - in service of a greater goal.

I don't know if my impression is just confirmation bias, since I was always going to vote for Obama's opponent. Other people aren't going to draw the same conclusions from these actions. But I see the man, and I know his history of personal sacrifice for the public good, and even though I disagree with him on so much, I can't help but trust him.