With my state voting in 4 days, I'm going to go ahead and endorse Romney. I actually like Ron Paul, but I can't imagine once again abandoning our allies even if a war is undeclared.
This post, though, isn't as much about why I'm for Romney as why I'm against McCain. My biggest problem with McCain is that I never get the feeling like he makes decisions based on rational thought, which I find extremely dangerous. If you've been reading this blog long enough you know that I really admire the framers. One of the things I like so much about the Constitution is that this country was not set up as a democracy. Aristotle rightly maligned democracy (literally something like "rule by the poor", a deme was a group of non-aristocrats in ancient Greece) as a form of government where the lazy majority steals from the productive and hard working minority to meet their needs and wants. The founders agreed and set up a government where the majority could vote, but they had to elect representatives who hopefully would have the interests of the state instead of just the majority at heart as they ruled.
McCain seems to do whatever feels right without really studying it. A fantastic example of this is his statement that he would support Roberts but not Alito. I know he has denied this, but there have been quite a few people who have come out and said they were in that meeting and heard him say it, so I don't believe him. The guys at PowerLine make the fantastic point that you certainly wouldn't come to the conclusion that Alito was more conservative than Roberts based on the evidence. You come to that conclusion by buying the media narrative. That, and the fact that he spouts his mouth off and makes good copy, is why the media likes him so much.
But as bad as that is (and I think it's pretty awful), it's not the real reason I don't like McCain. The real reason is that I don't think he can win. I've been watching the Democrat campaign for a while and I think Obama might be a formidable candidate, but only McCain could lose to Hillary. I'm aware that every poll shows McCain as the only one with a favorable matchup in the general, but I don't buy it. I'm also aware of what Dick Morris says and I don't buy that either.
The polls are based on what the public sees now about the two candidates. The media has always loved McCain, but I don't think most of them really care who gets the Democrat nomination. When it comes to the general, though, I have no question about who the New York Times will endorse (except that I'm not sure who will have the D beside their name yet). The story now might be that McCain is a war hero and has the best chance to win the general, but when he's actually up against Obama or Hillary it will be that this election is about some unspecified change (as both Democrats argue their campaign is for) and McCain is a great man who has served his country for a long, long time but he's part of the establishment and would just be for more of the same old stuff. Plus, what's the real difference between McCain and the Democrats. He's for higher taxes, looser border restrictions, restrictions on development to keep climate control in line, against drilling in ANWR, against coercive interrogation, has stated he would not repeal Roe v. Wade, is for federal funding of embryonic stem cell research...
He might differ on federal health care (though economics isn't his thing and he hasn't taken a concrete position as far as I know) and he certainly differs in having supported the surge from very, very early. Do we really want to stake the campaign on early support for the surge against optimism, youth, media support, and the promise of amorphous change?
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