Really.
I’ve seen it on the SDMB, on other boards I frequent, and among people I know in real life: ostensible Democrats, leftists, pro-choice types, dope smoking hippies, anti-warriors, and other presumed progressives who constantly make bedroom eyes at John McCain.
I mean, the guy’s just about conservative as you can get. He’s been one-hunnerd-percent behind the neocon vision of better living through war. He’s called the WMD issue irrelevant. He wants to prosecute abortion doctors and people who burn the flag. Discrimination against homosexuals in the workplace is A-OK with him, and queers getting married would destroy the family, the country, and make Baby Jesus cry.
He’s never seen a tax cut he didn’t like, and a flat tax wouldn’t be a bad idea, either. He’s in favor of public school prayer and abstinence-only education. He wants to privatize Social Security and lock up pot smokers.
I could go on, but you get the idea. With the possible exceptions of torture (iffy, given his thumbs up to Gitmo), campaign finance reform, and general personal repulsiveness, he’s philosophically not that much better than Bush.
But I hear my supposed idealogical brethren and sistren (that’s actually a word - I looked it up) pine for a McCain 00/04/08 presidential run, because they’d actually vote for the guy if Karl Rove let him get past the primaries, all the frickin’ time.
So what gives? I understand that he’s probably a righteous dude, at least interpersonally, but so was Regan, and I don’t remember any ISO members getting wet at the thought of the Gipper. Quite the opposite, in fact.
What’s the je ne sais quoi that makes my comrades completely disregard everything they stand for whenever the subject of McCain come up?