Why John, why?

During the election, I spent a lot of time saying "Where's the old John McCain from 2000?" Like a lot of other people, I saw a distinct change in McCain over the Bush years, culminating in his fear-mongering, Palin-picking, uninspired Presidential run. After he lost the election, I thought that he was now free of Bush and the Republican far right he had to pander to. Soon, he would regain his footing as the Senator/Elder Statesman and spend the rest of his political career free to live up to his reputation as a "straight-talker".

But that seems all but lost as the first post-election political event he attends is campaigning for Georgia Sen. Saxby Chambliss.

Back in 2002, when Chambliss ran attack ads portraying his Democratic challenger, Vietnam Vet Max Cleland, as weak and unpatriotic, McCain called the ads "disgusting" and "reprehensible." A brave, non-partisan defense for a fellow Viet Nam veteran. Chambliss received five student deferments and avoided serving in Vietnam.

"I've never seen anything like that ad," McCain, a Vietnam prisoner of war, said in 2003. "Putting pictures of Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden next to a picture of a man who left three limbs on the battlefield, it's worse than disgraceful, it's reprehensible."

But that McCain seems to have disappeared for good in 1999 after Bush gutted him for the Republican nomination, and with nothing left to lose, he doesn't seem to know his way back to the Straight-Talk Express.

But why, John? What are you doing it for?

Sorry to see you go so soon, John. You died too soon.

Here's the Chambliss attack ad.