McCain Needs Cartoons To Understand World Issues

The Washington Monthly's Steve Benen on George Will's "un-love fest" for John McCain:

And today, Will labeled McCain "John the Careless," citing among other things, McCain picking Sarah Palin for the GOP ticket because he seemed to believe "never having attended a 'Georgetown cocktail party' is sufficient qualification for the vice presidency."

The column is worth reading, but this is the paragraph that stood out for me:

Palin may be an inveterate simplifier; McCain has a history of reducing controversies to cartoons. A Republican financial expert recalls attending a dinner with McCain for the purpose of discussing with him domestic and international financial complexities that clearly did not fascinate the senator. As the dinner ended, McCain's question for his briefer was: "So, who is the villain?"

This is amusing, but it's also important. McCain's appreciation for policy complexities doesn't exist. Maybe he's impatient, maybe he's easily confused, maybe both. But McCain not only prefers to see the world as black and white, good guy vs. bad guy, he needs this dynamic to make sense of current events. Subtleties, nuances, and depth are inconvenient, and therefore dismissed.

He's Grandpa, what do you expect? But Benen takes it further, breaking down why an out-of-touch, old man without intellectual seriousness is dangerous:

"There are three key angles to this. First, it's about the single worst quality a president can have, especially in a time of crisis.

Second, it helps explain why McCain's attacks against Obama have been almost entirely personal. Obama, as far as McCain is concerned, "is the villain." He doesn't deserve respect; he deserves, McCain seems to believe, to be destroyed.

And third, McCain's style is so similar to Bush's worldview, it's frightening. The only key difference is Bush, who famously boasted that he doesn't "do nuance," generally approached politics with a genial attitude. McCain likes to "reduce controversies to cartoons," but with angry and erratic temperament."

Too bad George "I'll Carry The Water" Will didn't say this 6-8 years ago when it obvious, yet unpopular, to blast a fellow conservative.

Source: The Washington Monthly