Frankly, I can’t blame him. Even the most optimistic of Republican commentators acknowledge that the Republicans are in dire straits. Evidence has mounted rapidly after President Bush’s near calamitous second term that the public’s patience with the Republican Party has grown thin. Few of the many issues include: The plummeting presidential approval ratings, the overwhelming takeover of both chambers, and the lopsided voter identification towards the Democrats.

The breaks for the Republicans have been few and far between in the last four years. In the last three special elections, held due to retiring House Republicans, the Democrats won handily despite the heavily Republican tilts of the districts. After the most resent loss, a staggering 8 percent defeat in ruby red Mississippi, a sense of mounting panic seemed present among House Republicans. “Asked if he thought there should be a change in House GOP leadership, he (Representative Tom Davis, R, VA) brought up the 2006 election and the loss of Congress, then wondered aloud why, when ‘the plane is being flown into the mountain,’ there has been no change in direction…” (Source: MSNBC)

So it should come as no surprise that McCain is dusting off his mantle as an independent, moderate, maverick. The only problem is that for the last 8 years, his voting record tells a very different story. Somehow he has convinced our country that the man who voted in favor of staying in Iraq, wants to overturn Roe vs. Wade and offers no comprehensive solution for the growing health care crisis, is somehow a “moderate.”

On most every level, you will get the same policy under McCain you got under Bush. For the sake of fairness, let’s look at all the places where our bold and magnanimous maverick has broken with his party. Torture has been the one of McCain’s biggest talking points; it is certainly a bold move to help pass a toothless torture bill that 80% of his party supports anyway in defiance of a president with a 32% approval rating. The media, ignoring the fact that the bill did nothing, had a field day heaping nothing but praise on their rebellious darling.

After this nice stunt it seems that his leadership ran out: On February 13, 2008, he voted with his party to allow water boarding by CIA interrogators. Nice flip-flop Johnny. His other moderate vote that he touts constantly is his opposition to the Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest one percent. Let’s take a quick look at how that one held up. On April 11 2004, McCain said, “I voted against the tax cuts because of the disproportional amount that went to the wealthiest Americans.” And now, he says that he “voted to extend them because it would have the effect of a tax increase.”

Let’s be clear: This man watched his own party run this country into the ground for the last eight years and now somehow expects America to forget and invite 4 more years of failed policy. Don’t let him get a free pass.