I just don't know what took Milbank so long.

Inordinate fascination with old, white military men by the pussies in our corporate media?

Awww, boo hoo. Lil Milbank misses his tire swing. Wise up asshat, McCain's been a tool for nearly a decade.

I heard this exact same complaint on the Bob Rivers show a year ago. Has he been asleep?

John Stewart show had a good take on McCain a couple of days ago, it was about his position on DADT in the military. I agree with Stewart, some old people are older than others and McCain must be forgetful to put it kindly.

I don't think he was ever a maverick. It was always bullshit. Always.

It's fascinating to reflect on the fact that McCain chose a couple from AK who not only wanted to remove AK from the Union, but also pay no taxes of any real sense to the same entity.

McCain is forever branded with Palin-toddology.

mudflats.net has it all.

McCain is part and parcel of an underground, filthy rich elite who claim to be real Americans, but who are pigs.

Tanning beds have been demonstrated to lower cerebral functions, causing one to utter extreme
nonsense.

Think how long John's been in the sun?

"McCain's been a tool for nearly a decade" bobo teh clown

-uh, how about fifty YEARS? Bottom of class at Annapolis- legacy plebe- crashed planes, divorced wife for a younger, richer model, shot down while bombing civilians (WAR HERO!), changes his mind more often than his underwear, totally without principals (supported Bush). I could go on. . .

Of course, at no point will Milbank ever confront the possibility that he was, actually, wrong about McCain all those years ago in the SUV, and that his proximity and star-struck naivete led him to believe that this man who has always been an ass was actually a mavericky good guy. That would be asking too much.

Milbank's never been what you'd call a quick study. But how he loves a man in uniform.

This kind of extreme sycophancy of a supposed journalist is nauseating. Why the hell would a reporter ever feel the need to make excuses for a politician in the first place, let alone publish a piece lamenting the exonerations. If he were capable of feeling shame, he'd be overcome.

I just don't know what took Milbank so long.

That's easy, Milbank is a fool and a sycophant. It's taken him more than a decade to disengage his lips from McSame's pale, withered butt-cheek.

Now, if he would reach over and tap Schmuck Todd on the shoulder.

I just don't know what took Milbank so long.

He was HIPmotize by the taste of lipsmacking good bbq ribs!

Correction - McCain is only Anti-Big Government when Democrats are in power. When Republicans are in power he's too busy feeding at the trough, just like all the other anti-government republicans.

Ever notice how slime sticks to each other?

Think of why Sarah Palin would've been a perfect VP, with her vast newspaper knowledge and ability to
milk the public teats.

Now think of McCain and his buddies.

Then there are the military profits.

You betcha.

It's been fun walking at themudflats.net

And the lord saideth...

this too shelby pass....

I think there's an additional factor-- in 2000, the Washington press corps had to come up with a plausible alternative to Al Gore. And remember, the Villagers still despised the Clintons, and Bush was an ex-Texas Governor with an unsettling smirk, rather than Commander In Chief, and King. So, they fell in love with McCain.

I have respectuflly disagree. he's always been a D-head.

Barry Goldwater, became more idiosyncratic late in life, supporting gay rights and denouncing the religious right

Also embracing UFO conspiracy theories

Just sayin'

"It's been several years since the senator gave up on his 'maverick' shtick. Shouldn't media professionals have noticed long before now that he's just another predictable conservative Republican?"

Steve, you've got to remember that these are professional journalists -- media professionals, as you put it. The masters of the news channels. You know -- morons.

McCain supports amnesty for illegals. If you're that corrupt and unpatriotic, you should be in the Democratic party.

I never understood that McCain admiration thing. Did I miss something? There was the corrupt McCain, the wily McCain, the militarist McCain, the womanizer McCain, the spoiled-son McCain, the wife-dumper McCain, the hot-dogger McCain, the irresponsible pilot McCain, the corporate McCain, the marry-for-money McCain, the...

Where does the decent, maverick McCain fit in? Was he a construct? A nine-day wonder? Somehow I must have missed that stage.

McCain didn't "throw it all away." He's always been a bullshitter. Just that more people are finally noticing it. He was an asshole in the 1980's (the Keating Five), he was an asshole in the 1990's (the POW hearings), and he is still an asshole. He's rode that "He was tortured" pony for all it was worth.

Milbank is a Villager and as such doesn't see the rest of the country or it's citizens.

Meh. EJ Dionne, on NPR not twenty minutes, finally specified that the US senate is "becoming disfunctional." He apparently just noticed this, and he's one of the smart ones in the Beltway press.

The senate, and particularly the Republican caucus, is fully stocked with morally and intellectually feeble narcissists who wouldn't last a week running a real-world business or organization. All most of them have going for them is years of accumulated power and deviant political cunning.

The one thing that nobody has mentioned is that McCain's "Maverick" personna was nothing more than shtick - far more flash than substance.

For every McCain - Feingold bill, there are innumerable party-line conservative votes.

McCain was not Barry Goldwater's protege. They were never close. Goldwater made it clear that he preferred other potential senatorial candidates to McCain.

Sorry. You misspoke. McCain isn't just another "conventional conservative" or any of this other blahblahblah. McCain is simply just another opportunistic Republican.

Milbank's affection for McCain may go along with his (Milbank's) contempt for women. This is the guy who said (on NPR, during the Democratic Primary) "Hillary Clinton was situated immediately behind Barack Obama, making it easier for her to actually place the knife into his back, if that's what she was trying to do." Later, on MSNBC News Live, Milbank called Clinton's seat "a perfect spot" and stated: "She could have inserted the knife right there without even being detected." (see http://mediamatters.org/mobile/research/200701240005) . There were a lot of reasons I preferred Obama to Clinton, but Milbank's (repeated) comment said more about his own fear of powerful women than anything else.

I thought McCain was a Republican I could vote for until the last election. Now I am wondering if this is and always was the real McCain and the other one was just a costume put on for the masses.

I just don't know what took Milbank so long.

Whoa, whoa, whoa! Easy there, Tex! You're a-talkin' like Milbank is gittin' off the tire-swing! Shee-oot, don't you know by now that YOU NEVER GET OFF THE JOHN MCCAIN TIRE SWING! DO YOU HEAR ME! Even when some cowpoke like Milbank writes somethin' that makes you THINK he's a-gittin' off the tire swing, it's just so's that LATER he can write about how MAVERICKY his MAVERICK is MAVERICKIN'.

Political perception is fleeting, but tire-swinging is forever.

Homework folks. McCain has always shifted to the right in election years. He is principled that way. Just like he was principled in his choice of Palin -- "absolutely qualified".

But each time it gets harder to hold on to the hope that there's still an iconoclast in there somewhere. -- Milbank

Milbank's hard-on for McCan't may be getting harder to sustain (none of us are getting any younger) but it doesn't mean he's ready to give up entirely. If I were you, Benen, I wouldn't yet celebrate Milbank's "celibacy".

there was absolutely nothing "idosyncratic" about goldwater supporting gay rights and denouncing the religious right. It was CONSISTENT with what he believed as a conservative and shame on you for buying into this foolish lie that is demonstrable false by anyone who cares to check out the facts. But heah, its a democracy. Everyone can sell out.

What Milbank, to this moment, doesn't seem to understand, is that when an operator like McCain turns his toothy grin on a Milbank, and drives him around in his SUV, it's *not because he loves Milbank* (believing this is what really got Milbanks Mancrush going).. but because if McCain can enlist Milbank (as he did) then Milbank will enlist his readers. Milbank, like many preening Villagers, thought it was all about him. Well, it was, but not the way Milbank thought it was.

What fools the Villagers are.