PERRspectives: McCain Does the Hokey Pokey

May 25, 2008

McCain Does the Hokey Pokey

You put your right hand in. You put your right hand out...

Like an overexcited kid at a birthday party, John McCain has been doing the political equivalent of the hokey pokey for the past two years. That is, after first running hard to the right to woo conservative primary voters, McCain then veered sharply left since wrapping up the Republican presidential nomination. And as the imbroglios this week over his shifting stands on immigration and embracing the religious right show, John McCain is finally paying a price for it among right-wing Republicans whose party he crashed.

A little history shows why McCain's 360 on immigration reform is producing a firestorm of criticism among the conservative chattering classes. Back in 2003, the Arizona Senator declared, "I think we can set up a program where amnesty is extended to a certain number of people who are eligible." Throughout 2005 and 2006, John McCain along with Ted Kennedy (D-MA) led the Senate fight for comprehensive immigration reform combining a guest worker program, new paths to naturalization for current illegal aliens and improved border security. That effort, of course, was ultimately torpedoed by his own party.

It wasn't that defeat, however, but the overwhelming xenophobia of the GOP primary electorate that led McCain to abandon his leadership role - and principles - on immigration. As the Washington Times and Meet the Press detailed, McCain underwent a conversion on the road to the Republican National Convention in Minneapolis. As the ultra-right Times noted on January 14, 2008:

The Arizona Republican now says that, in the wake of last summer's defeat of "comprehensive immigration reform," he has "gotten the message" that the border must be secured before the status of illegals already in the United States can be dealt with.

The chilly reception McCain's immigration record received among Republican primary voters might just have something to do with his perpetual pledge during the GOP primaries to "secure the borders first."

But that was then, and the general election is now. Desperate to improve his chances among swing state Hispanic voters moving in droves to the Democrats, the supposed maverick John McCain this week reversed course on immigration - again.

At a round table with business leaders in California's Silicon Valley on Thursday, McCain completed his circular journey on the issue. As the New York Times noted:

In yet another sign of his pivoting toward the general election, Senator John McCain said at a roundtable with business leaders here today that comprehensive immigration reform should be a top priority for the next president...
...He added: "I believe we have to secure our borders, and I think most Americans agree with that, because it's a matter of national security. But we must enact comprehensive immigration reform. We must make it a top agenda item if we don't do it before, and we probably won't, a little straight talk, as of January 2009."

The reaction among the mouthpieces of the right was immediate and vitriolic. The puerile Michelle Malkin fumed, "Shamnesty John McCain is back in full force: No, he never 'got the message.'" Over at Right Wing News, John Hawkins penned a diatribe simply titled, "Why I will no longer support John McCain for President." Over at HotAir, Allahpundit fumed, "You guys think I'm kidding about writing in Hillary." It's no wonder the McCain campaign quickly scrambled to reassure foaming at the mouth right-wing writers that there's "been no change in his stance on immigration."

As with immigration, McCain tacked hard to the right when it came to his just-in-time primary pandering to Christian conservatives. Two years before he shared a San Antonio stage with Texas pastor John Hagee, John McCain in the spring of 2006 sought to jump-start his GOP presidential bid by repairing his frayed relationship with the religious right. On April 2, 2006, McCain appeared on Meet the Press and retracted his famous 2000 claim that the late Reverend Jerry Falwell was an "agent of intolerance." On May 13, 2006, McCain delivered the commencement address at Falwell's Liberty University. There, the two men walked on stage together, where Falwell then praised his former foe, "the ilk of John McCain is very scarce, very small." That trip to what Jon Stewart deemed "crazy base world" led directly to the backing by ministers John Hagee and Rod Parsley, two endorsements McCain aggressively sought.

But there, too, the demands of the general election led to McCain's strategic retreat towards the center. The GOP nomination in hand, McCain this week dumped his Ministers of War when their shocking statements and End Times visions threatened to turn off independent voters.

As Sarah Posner writes in the American Prospect, key figures on the religious right aren't happy about it. Evangelical leader Bishop Harry Jackson complained:

"He reached out to Hagee and Parsley precisely to bolster his acceptance among evangelicals. Now folks don't know what he means. Is he for us or against us? I think other pastors and religious leaders would be hesitant to endorse McCain. How does he fill this credibility gap that goes back to 2000?...He sought them out in a pandering sort of way, and then he publicly ridiculed them."

Tony Perkins, head of the Family Research Council, said simply of McCain's faith-based flip-flop on Hagee and Parsley, "this doesn't help."

But that's a strategic risk John McCain seems willing to take. After all, John McCain in his eternal quest for the Republican presidential nomination adopted virtually the entire Bush agenda so beloved by the right. But with his nomination secured, McCain is rapidly running away from his party and his president. (McCain's high-profile outreach on global warming and the environment is another case in point.) The man who in January campaigned as a "true conservative" is now, in the words of his senior adviser Charlie Black, "slightly right of center."

After all, John McCain will do whatever it takes to pin the tail on the donkey in November, even if that means continuing his political hokey pokey dance. As for disgruntled conservative Republicans, they have little choice but, as the saying goes, to dance with who brung you.

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