Re-tiresome

Oh, so now McCain says it's a good idea to inflate your tires. This is something new: He has taken to attacking Obama on positions where he agrees with Obama. Another example: he flayed Obama for his proposal to withdraw from Iraq, then said it was a "pretty good" timetable. Meanwhile, he also continues to attack Obama for positions Obama hasn't taken or is no longer taking--like Obama's position on offshore drilling, which has become a reluctant yes, in order to get a compromise piece of energy legislation through the Senate. McCain continues to say Obama is opposed. He also says Obama is opposed to nuclear power, which Obama never has been--a position he took some grief about during the Democratic primaries. It's getting hard to keep all of McCain's attacks--and his rules about when it's ok to compromise and when not--straight.

For those of you who are new to politics: Obama's position on offshore drilling is what is called a compromise. It is how significant legislation gets passed--which is something that hasn't happened very often lately. It is what McCain did when he joined thirteen other Senators to come up with a plan to allow some, but not all, of the President's Republican judges to be confirmed while preserving the minority right to filibuster. (McCain criticized Obama--rightly, I believe--for not joining that compromise.)

In this case, Obama decided to allow offshore drilling in order to get more funds for alternative energy development. Not a bad deal, I think...and I hope it passes when Congress reconvenes. (McCain is opposed because the bill contains a tax increase, a principle on which he will not compromise...except, maybe, when it comes to his own plan to cap-and-trade carbon emissions, which contains a hidden tax on electricity.)

The price of governing is ideological impurity. It is a principle John McCain has favored in the past, and may still, except--apparently--when it is done by Obama. But it's hard to tell.