CRISTINA SOSA/YH

McCain: character in spades

By this point in the blessed American experiment, a chief executive is little more than a well-dressed thermometer for the moral and spiritual well-being of the nation. In this year's heated GOP contest, both candidates have relatively similar positions on individual issues and on the ideological spectrum; their main differences are best summarized by Jonathan Alter's quip in Newsweek: "McCain survived prison camp; Bush survived summer camp."

McCain's past beats out Dubya's (rapidly depleting) $70 million war chest any day of the week because it's impossible to exhaust a human-interest story. In the 1992 election, a turning point was the airing of a half-hour documentary by the Clinton-friendly Bloodworth-Thomases (creators of Designing Women) called "The Man From Hope." At that time, of course, no one knew, as Hillary later admitted in the first issue of Talk, that Clinton spent much of his time in Hope undergoing symbolic castration at the hands of two shrewish family matriarchs. It doesn't matter—the image sold.

The Bush family, overestimating the power of its own image, seems to think that America will support its dynastic crusade to regain the national throne out of our sense of thwarted justice. Sadly, Dubya is no Lion King. In nearly every article and interview thus far, he has managed to come across as the unexceptional son of good fortune; an online Salon magazine poll currently has him labeled the stupidest candidate by a far wider margin than he won by in South Carolina—with 69 percent of the vote, last I checked. His claim that McCain is a Washington insider is dangerously loopy. McCain has 17 years experience as an Arizona senator; Bush has had a lifetime with a silver spoon poking out through his tonsils.

McCain, on the other hand, uses his experience in Hanoi to create a sense of heroism. In fact, when McCain starts talking about being a Vietnam prisoner of war, it's tough not to adopt an attitude of quiet reverence. It's like sitting on Grandpa's lap, waiting to be dazzled by an account of the way things were "in the good old days." McCain successfully uses this anecdotal evidence to support some of his more controversial stances—his hard-line against flag burning comes to mind. It's as tough to disagree with him as it is with that girl in seminar who always begins her sentences with "Speaking as a [fill in ethnic/national identity]..."

Wisely, McCain has parlayed his own story into an aura of virtue that feels it has nothing to hide (hence his bus, the "Straight Talk Express"), as though he were the inheritor of a tradition of old-fash-ioned gentility. He has compared his environmental pol-icy to that of trailblazer Teddy Roosevelt; Gore, in contrast, has been typed as a New Age tree-hugger, while even Bush campaign managers have admitted the governor's abysmal environmental record in Texas. In an effort to gain more GOP support, McCain has called himself a "Reagan Republican" in California, recalling heroism a little closer to home—Nancy Reagan is a quiet but known supporter.

Whether or not you agree with McCain, it is all but impossible to ignore him. As thermometers go, he is the only one that registers above lukewarm. He is the only "total candidate" playing the field right now—his whole life is his candidacy, from his admitted affair to his daughter adopted from Mother Teresa's orphanage in Calcutta to the unfortunate epithets he sometimes uses for Vietnamese people. He provides answers off-the-cuff to reporters. He bashed Bush in an intentionally mean-spirited speech after he lost the South Carolina primary. Everything he does is honest because he admits his inconsistency. He has "character" in spades. And he will make a wonderful sparring partner against sure thing dry-as-dust Democrat opponent Al Gore. He deserves your vote because his presidency will make the best headlines over the next four years: and that, after all, is the only thing that matters.

Larry Switzky, a senior in Morse, is a columnist for the Herald.

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