Letter to John McCain

Dear John,

It breaks my heart to tell you this, but, I’m afraid that it's over between us. Please don’t be too sad, it’s really for the best. Something’s changed, you’ve changed, and we just don’t have anything in common anymore. I can only hope that, in the end, I’ll remember you for your positive attributes rather than the nasty ones that are so fresh in my mind.

I’ll never forget the John I once respected...those steely eyes, that bold independence, your maverickeyness...and the way you drew me in close and whispered “country first,” just took my breath away. You were a hero, a partner in patriotism. I miss you already!

Actually, I’ve been missing you for months, years perhaps. I can’t pinpoint exactly when it happened, but somewhere along the way you changed. Though the shift began years ago, the metamorphosis was complete only recently...and now, it’s like I don’t even know you anymore!

All of a sudden, “Mr. Independent” morphed into “Mr. Anything to Win”...which transformed “Mr. Patriot” into “Mr. The Ends Justify the Means,” and that guy has, apparently, ceded his independence to the higher powers of “the party,” a group notorious for pitting Americans against their fellow Americans as a means to gluttonous personal gains.

The man they have turned you into is not the man I once admired. The John I fell for was a principled man who stood up for what he believed was right. The John I respected was a patriot and would never have accepted the type of gutter politics that aims to destroy the social fabric of his beloved America...my beloved America.

It just doesn’t seem like you to embrace a campaign of fear and hate and the fact that you have is very disappointing! You have painted your opponent as an Anti-American, terrorist-sympathizing, Commie socialist who wants to destroy this country, while knowing full well that it isn’t true. Shame on you! Worse yet, you have remained quiet when the mere mention of his name engenders shouts from the crowd of “kill him” and “terrorist.” At a time when unity and national pride is so critically important, silence is the least patriotic response of all.

At the end of this campaign you will return to a comfortable life and your independent ways, but the fear and division that your campaign has incited in some of your followers will stay with them. You know, it only takes one trigger-happy nut to do the unthinkable and unless you, as the current leader of your party, do something to squelch the anger and hatred that your ill-conceived tactics have fomented, you, sir, will share some responsibility if President Obama meets the same fate as JFK.

I therefore implore you, my dear John, to do the right thing and stop the madness. Stop the name calling and help heal this fractured nation. Start acting like the patriot I know you to be.

“Country first,” you say...well, my friend, it’s time to put country before “self.”

You say you want to change “politics as usual.” Then do it! Stand before the American people and denounce the forces that are tearing apart our exquisite democracy and weakening our mighty nation. Apologize for the fear and division you have inspired. Calm the crazies whom you have motivated to violence with the trash talking.

Setting the record straight, i.e., that Obama is not some scary “other” that must be feared, might even help you salvage your reputation. Don’t forget, your legacy is on the line here.

Before you jumped on the Rovian Way and allowed your bid for the highest office in the land to devolve into slanderous innuendo and incendiary rhetoric, you would have been remembered as an American Hero and as a well-respected U.S. Senator. There would be a list of your bi-partisan accomplishments and photos of a courageous young soldier, the POW who survived the horrors of a 5-year nightmare in the Hanoi Hilton. Instead, those honors will be the footnote, and you will be remembered as the presidential candidate who, in his desperation, abandoned everything he believed to be good and right about America, and ran a campaign that appealed to the basest fears of his constituents. You will be remembered as a man who, in the end, did not put his country first.

And that, too, is a crying shame.

Formerly yours,

Jane Q. Patriot