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Post-election McCain stays the same
(Agencies)
Updated: 2009-02-03 17:20 WASHINGTON – It is hard on the psyche to lose a US presidential election. Al Gore, when he lost, fled to Europe and grew a beard.
George H.W. Bush received an honorary knighthood from Queen Elizabeth and began parachuting out of airplanes. Michael Dukakis became a college professor. Bob Dole made Viagra ads.
More so than many recent presidential candidates who did not make it to the White House, McCain, 72, seems to have had a quick adjustment back to what he had been doing before he began his quest for the presidency. He hatched his re-entry plan with a close friend, South Carolina Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, two days after the November 4 election. Arizona Senator McCain huddled with his close allies at his Sedona, Arizona, retreat and sketched out an agenda to work on national security issues and health care. "I think the best thing to do is get busy and stay busy and move on," McCain told Reuters in a recent interview. "The other thing is, I'm humbled to have had the opportunity and I'm grateful for every day, every moment of every day." To some extent the new McCain is much like the old one. He is still willing to buck members of his own party when he feels it is necessary. An example: Texas Republican Senator John Cornyn, who has tangled with McCain in the past, saw McCain puncture his attempt to raise doubts about Hillary Clinton's bid to be secretary of state. Cornyn was concerned about the potential for conflicts of interest created by foreign donations to the charitable foundation of her husband, former President Bill Clinton. But McCain, the Vietnam fighter pilot who was shot down and spent 5-1/2 years as a war prisoner, shot Cornyn down, urging the Senate to approve Clinton by unanimous consent. "I think the message that the American people are sending us now is they want us to work together and get to work," McCain said on the Senate floor. BIGGER DISAPPOINTMENTS Cornyn, who is head of the effort to see Republicans elected to the Senate in 2010, has no hard feelings. He said he is grateful McCain has decided to run for re-election in 2010. "I think he's jumped right in and been the same old John McCain he was before he ran for president," said Cornyn. "Hey, you know, if John McCain's anything, he's a tough guy. He's surely had to handle bigger disappointments in his life." Republican strategist Rich Galen said that of the last several presidential election campaigns, McCain seems to have handled defeat the best. "It seems to me that McCain has jumped right back into his work in the Senate and I think that is an indication that his temperament and interests are better as a legislator than as an executive," Galen said. The man who defeated McCain on November 4, US Democratic President Barack Obama, sees the potential of an ally in McCain, given his former rival's maverick ways. The night before the January 20 inauguration, Obama threw a dinner in McCain's honour, saying with the election over, "each of us in public life has a responsibility to usher in a new season of cooperation built on those things we hold in common, not as Democrats, not as Republicans -- but as Americans." McCain told Reuters he saw areas where he could work with Obama, such as shaping policy for Afghanistan and health care. "I think the role is as loyal opposition and work with them whenever possible and however possible but also there will be differences because we are of different philosophical grounding," he said. McCain has made clear to Obama that he will not be a "yes man" for the president in the Senate minority party. He raised sharp questions about the price tag and direction of a $800-plus billion economic stimulus plan and said he was disappointed Obama has not negotiated with Republicans on it. "Republicans are not reluctant to spend money or to appropriate money to try to get the country moving again economically. We just see this legislation as not achieving that goal," he said. |
