Fix Congress - Earmarks, Update

Senator John McCain is going to veto all earmarks and save us $100B annually.

Most experts use a total of between $16B and $18B for all earmarks, so I find it difficult to see how one can get $100B out of that. Even the Center for American Progress Action Fund, with their own ax to grind, estimates only $52B.

I just don't know about McCain. I haven't decided on my Presidential vote and I have always respected McCain as one of us retired military, one who has integrity, and one brave enough to buck his own party. But he sure is losing me with this apparent drive to self-destruct.

First there was walk in an Iraqi market, sans body armor, to show that Iraq was safe. It turned out to be staged, something I would expect from Clinton but not McCain. Then came his mistaking Sunnis for Shiites in a speech about progress in the Iraq War. You simply cannot understand even the basics about Iraq (or all of the Middle East for that matter) if you can't tell a Sunni from a Shiite. But that was not the only gaffe on Iraq, just the most blatant.

Is my hero going senile? More likely it's his handlers. If they come from the RNC training camp, then I don't hold much hope for McCain unless he decides that he must run his own campaign. If that letter I received from the RNC is any gauge, the RNC is far removed from the voting public with the exception of that 30% that still thinks Bush is doing a good job.