{"version": "1.0", "type": "rich", "title": "So, since people are asking me about it and I don't feel like having an opinion today: what's your take on John McCain?", "author_name": "kontextmaschine", "author_url": "https://kontextmaschine.com", "provider_name": "kontextmaschine", "provider_url": "https://kontextmaschine.com", "url": "https://kontextmaschine.com/post/177404697713/", "html": "<div class=\"question\"><strong>bloodandhedonism</strong> asked: So, since people are asking me about it and I don't feel like having an opinion today: what's your take on John McCain? </div>\n<p><a class=\"tumblr_blog\" href=\"/post/177404533803/\">kontextmaschine</a>:</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>His main role was to perform that \u201cmaverick\u201d character, which I suppose signaled to those types that the Republican Party had a place for them (someone\u2019s always gonna be the most marginal member of a coalition, after all) but\u2026 was that even a <em>type</em> in the first place? What is a McCain Republican anyway? Gen-X career military who signed on through the post-Nam nadir? A Scoop Jackson Reagan Democrat? Someone who still flies a POW-MIA flag but prides himself on distance from <em>other</em> red tribe totems?</p>\n\n<p>A tenured media figure more than any voter, really - he had a following within the elite, maybe it comes down to him doing what they wish they had the strength to - call shenanigans on all the BS of the status quo then, um, apply no appreciable force to it other than towards marginally higher military spending?</p>\n\n<p>And McCain-Feingold, whose impact was to be rejected.</p>\n\n<p>Also in 2008 he represented the third straight term that Republicans nominated a fighter pilot despite the universal consensus those guys are huge pricks, though he was the break in an otherwise 5-term run of nominating teetotalers</p></blockquote><p><p>Also I suppose we now have confirmation that a 2008-elected McCain would in fact survive his maximum term and not automatically elevate Sarah Palin to the presidency</p></p>"}