An insightful post from Ezra Klein

Check it out here:

The problem with elections is that few candidates can accept that there are years in which they should lose. Not because they are possessed of insufficient virtue, or because they would be poor leaders, but because their party has failed, and the economy is poor, and the Iraq War was a mistake. Because they were unlucky, and it is simply not their year, and their depressing job is simply to sustain the continuity of the two-party system. If McCain were to accept the likelihood of loss, his incentives would be to ensure he falls with honor. Instead, he insists, understandably, on holding fast to the increasingly slim possibility of winning. But that requires an increasingly vicious and desperate strategy that is, by turns, racist, bigoted, fear-mongering, and dishonest.

AND ALSO THIS, from James Fallows:

If John McCain has a better set of plans to deal with the immediate crisis, and the medium-term real-economy fallout, and the real global problems of the era -- fine, let him win on those. But it is beneath the dignity he had as a Naval officer to wallow in this mindless BS. I will say nothing about the dignity of a candidate who repeatedly winks at the public, Hooters-waitress style. A great country acts great when it matters. This is a time when it matters -- for politicians in the points they raise, for journalists in the subjects they write about and the questions they ask of candidates. And, yes, for voters.