Precedent

A commenter protests in re: my assumption that the media will, as it always does, forgive John McCain his appalling campaign:

The media loved McCain for certain traits, traits that he’s abandoned in his pursuit of the Presidency. He’s never getting that back.

The obvious problem here is that the presence of traits such as “honor” in John McCain was always entirely imaginary. Since the idea that he was an honorable campaigner was always a media myth made up out of whole cloth, there’s absolutely no reason the media won’t re-attribute these traits to McCain after the campaign. “Look at that hang-dog expression! He’s learned his lesson!”

Spackerman reminds us of the most obvious precedent — his celebration of the Confederate flag during his (run-by-racists) 2000 primary campaign in South Carolina:

Remember in 2000 when McCain refused to call for the removal of the Confederate flag from the South Carolina statehouse? It was a blatant play to the ugliest aspects of American politics, an unsubtly coded attempt to identify himself with white resentment. But what was even more astonishing was what happened after he lost the GOP primary. Here’s CNN from April 19, 2000:

“Former GOP presidential candidate John McCain called for the removal of the Confederate battle flag from atop the South Carolina Statehouse on Wednesday, acknowledging that his refusal to take such a stance during his primary battle for the Palmetto State was a “sacrifice of principle for personal ambition.”

This was pretty widely hailed as a triumph of straight talk. McCain admitted such transparent cynicism! What a breath of fresh air! Now, there’s another way of looking at this moment. One that a less, frankly, white group of trail reporters might have picked up on: despite finding the flag personally offensive — because it is a symbol of racial subjugation; and treason in the interest of white supremacy — McCain didn’t mind exploiting it. He didn’t mind aggravating the most noxious division in America if it served his ambition.

To state the obvious, if you know that the Confederate flag is a symbol of treason in defense of slavery and lawlessness in defense of apartheid and just go ahead an exploit it anyway, this is much, much worse than someone who at least sincerely believes that it’s a symbol of “heritage” or some such. And yet, countless journalists took his self-promoting apology seriously. So why should another round of lying and race-baiting present a problem for his immediate reputation?