LA Times cuts to McCain's core

Here's a nice little piece by the LA Times' Assistant Editorial Page Editor, Matt Welch. Some juicy exerpts:

If his issues line up with yours, and if you're not overly concerned by an activist federal government, McCain can be a great and sympathetic ally. But chances are he will eventually see a grave national threat in what you consider harmless, or he'll prescribe a remedy that you consider unconscionable. Nowhere is that more evident than in his ideas about the Iraq war.

McCain has been banging the drum from nearly Day One to put more boots on the ground in Iraq. "There are a lot of things that we can do to salvage this," he said on "Meet the Press" on Nov. 12, "but they all require the presence of additional troops." McCain is more inclined to start wars and increase troop levels than George W. Bush or Bill Clinton.

McCain, who has tried so hard to paint himself a libertarian, is the exact opposite. Personally, I believe in business regulation as protection for the middle class and consumers, but as a social libertarian- ie. of the belief that what you do in the privacy of your own home is your business- McCain scares the crap out of me.

McCain, on the other hand, is a third-generation D.C. insider who carpetbagged his way into office, believing to his core that "national pride will not survive the people's contempt for government." On Nov. 7, those conflicting worldviews collided when Arizonans voted on whether to outlaw gay marriage. McCain campaigned in favor of the ban, in the name of "preserving the sanctity" of heterosexual unions. His exhortations went down to surprising defeat. Not, one suspects, for the last time.