The McCain Myth

From Brendan Miniter, the assistant editor of OpinionJournal.com:

Having helped broker the Great Senate Compromise last week, Sen. John McCain is back in the media limelight, winning the usual accolades for bucking his party. But the deal by 14 "moderates" doesn't just preserve the judicial filibuster and allow confirmation of a few of President Bush's "extremist" nominees. It also reveals that the myth the McCainiacs hoped would propel their man into the Oval Office in 2000 still endures, despite evidence of successive elections to the contrary.

The myth is simply that the only way to win elections is to draw voters from the other party by bucking a few of your own party's principles. Call it "maverick moderatism," but this belief has been the foundation for Mr. McCain's strategy for achieving national office and has given us great ideas like the recent iteration of campaign finance reform, opposition to some tax cuts and dogged attacks by Mr. McCain on some military expenditures. It's also the foundation of many pundits' advice to the president that he pick more "moderate" judges, give up on using payroll taxes to create private Social Security accounts, and trim his sails on fighting terrorism by spreading freedom.