The so called conservative pundits have been doing the same thing of course. And McCain characterizes himself as a conservative as well when he knows very well that he is not. And through all of this it appears that the electorate is buying the story. I suppose the old saw that voters have short memories is true.

The point of this post is to point out how contrary to conservatism John McCain’s record and rhetoric really is. In act after and and statement after statement John McCain has demonstrated himself to be anything but a conservative.

A great place to start in examining that record is a piece by Mark Levin at National Review Online entitled The Real McCain Record. In that article Levin chronicles McCain’s record and a plethora of issues. Beginning with McCain-Feingold campaign finance reform (which limited the only class of free speech the founders had in mind, political speech) Levin demonstrates how far from conservatism McCain is and has been. The list includes the McCain-Kennedy amnesty bill, the McCain-Lieberman anti America global warming bill, the McCain-Kennedy-Edwards trial bar bill masquerading as a patient’s bill of rights and McCain’s attempts to decimate the America pharmaceutical industry by importing drugs from Canada.

Then there was McCain’s opposition to both Bush tax cuts. Today McCain claims his opposition was based on his desire to also cut federal spending. Even that reasoning is weak considering that penalizes tax payers for the government’s excesses but that was not his rhetoric at the time. Rather, McCain engaged in typical liberal class warfare rhetoric.

According to Levin, as chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee “McCain was consistently hostile to American enterprise, from media and pharmaceutical companies to technology and energy companies.” Then there’s McCain’s role in the “Gang of 14, which prevented the Republican leadership in the Senate from mounting a rule change that would have ended the systematic use (actual and threatened) of the filibuster to prevent majority approval of judicial nominees.”

Levin then goes on to McCain’s defense record. Of course, McCain supporters claim that he will vigorously prosecute the war against radical Islamic fascism. McCain’s record, however, suggests otherwise.

His supporters point to essentially one policy strength, McCain’s early support for a surge and counterinsurgency. It has now evolved into McCain taking credit for forcing the president to adopt General David Petreaus’s strategy. Where’s the evidence to support such a claim?

Moreover, Iraq is an important battle in our war against the Islamo-fascist threat. But the war is a global war, and it most certainly includes the continental United States, which, after all, was struck on 9/11. How does McCain fare in that regard?

McCain-ACLU — the unprecedented granting of due-process rights to unlawful enemy combatants (terrorists).

McCain has repeatedly called for the immediate closing of Guantanamo Bay and the introduction of al-Qaeda terrorists into our own prisons — despite the legal rights they would immediately gain and the burdens of managing such a dangerous population.

While McCain proudly and repeatedly points to his battles with Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, who had to rebuild the U.S. military and fight a complex war, where was McCain in the lead-up to the war — when the military was being dangerously downsized by the Clinton administration and McCain’s friend, former Secretary of Defense Bill Cohen? Where was McCain when the CIA was in desperate need of attention? Also, McCain was apparently in the dark about al-Qaeda like most of Washington, despite a decade of warnings.

According to Gun Owners of America, McCain voted in 2004 to force gun owners to purchase trigger locks when they purchased a handgun. In 2004 he offered an amendment to a gun show bill that would have banned the private sale of handguns at gun shows unless a background check was run. The article includes numerous incidents of McCain treading on the second amendment. That should come as no surprise considering his view of the first amendment.

The Club for Growth said, “While Senator McCain’s economic record contains a number of pro-growth positions, such as his support for school choice and free trade, and his steadfast opposition to wasteful government spending, his overall record is tainted by a marked antipathy towards the free market and individual freedom.”

Let us not forget the Keating Five scandal of 1980s. This from Wizbangblue.com:

Few remember that John McCain only narrowly survived the Keating Five Scandal of the 1980′s involving the corrupt dealings of Charles H. Keating and the Lincoln Savings & Loan. Keating was responsible for the collapse of Lincoln, yet gave McCain and four other members of congress over $1.3 million in political contributions to help influence banking and other legislation. McCain later attempted to whitewash his role in this scandal by becoming the poster boy in the congress for campaign finance reform.

Slate.com has a pretty thorough explanation of what happened and it isn’t pretty for McCain. Charles Keating ended up going to prison for bilking depositors in his Lincoln Savings and Loan out of billions of dollars. It was the biggest of the savings and loan scandals and McCain was wrapped up in it. Keating contributed large sums of money to McCain’s campaign and sought McCain’s assistance with federal investigators. McCain claimed he was just making sure a constituent was being treated fairly but Keating was McCain’s long time friend as well as contributor.

John McCain’s record is one of corruption, consistent opposition to the Republican Party and conservative ideals. He has a reputation for fits of anger and anyone in Washington knows that you cross John McCain at your own peril because he will do everything in his power to get even. He is dishonest and will do and say pretty much anything to get elected.

Much has been said over the last few days about Rush Limbaugh’s assertion that he may not vote for the Republican nominee this year. I’ve had my disagreements with Rush during this campaign season but on this I’m in agreement. If John McCain wins the Republican nomination I will not vote for him. I’ve written about being careful about what you say regarding other Republicans because you may find yourself having to vote for them. In this case I’m not worried about it because there is no conceivable circumstance where I would vote for McCain. He is in the same category as Lindsey Graham. In McCain’s case I won’t vote for the Democrat nominee but I will either vote third party or not vote at all in the presidential race. There is simply no way I can, in good conscience, vote for this man. And I’m convinced that there are many like me.

That brings us to the widespread claim that John McCain is the only candidate who can beat Hillary Clinton (or Obama). I don’t believe McCain can beat either of them. Despite what the polls may say, McCain is the least electable of the Republican candidates. He does not inspire the rank and file of the Republican Party. There is so much bad blood that he would only serve to divide the party. And the claims that those in the middle, the so called moderates, would vote for him in large numbers is, I think, simply untrue. By and large those people will break for the Democrat candidate. McCain will get some of them, to be sure, but not enough to do the job. As for the Republican base, many will stay home. Others will vote third party. Some may even vote for the Democrat in protest. But at the end of the day, McCain will not have the support of the base. He will not have the support of conservatives.

And all those “conservatives” endorsing McCain today are, I believe, doing so because they believe the claim that he is the only one who can win. It is a lie perpetuated by the left with the help of the media. As Rush pointed out to a caller on Friday, what good is the endorsement of the New York Times? Does anyone believe they will endorse McCain over the Democrat nominee? Of course not.

UPDATE:

For even more details about McCain’s record of dishonesty and liberal policies, see Ann Coulter’s column, ‘Straight Talk’ Express Takes Scenic Route to Truth. The more you learn the more you realize McCain is a scoundrel!

Because it was still quite close I don’t think second place does too much damage to Huckabee.  And, because independents won it for McCain, I’m not convinced that will translate to states that hold closed primaries.  I certainly hope it won’t because McCain is many things but conservative is not one of them.

Thompson came in a distant third.  Had he been a close third he might have still had a decent position but he was 13-14 points behind Huckabee.  In my view that pretty much ends it for Thompson.  He may hang in there a little longer but his campaign is effectively over.

Listening to FOX News the consensus seems to be that after today the race has been reduced to McCain, Romney and Giuliani.  I pray that isn’t the case considering none of them is conservative.  They further believe that if Giuliani doesn’t win Florida it will be down to McCain and Romney  If that eventuality occurs, I’ll have to do some serious soul searching about how I will respond.  I am a conservative and I don’t know that I could vote for McCain under any circumstances.

I simply do not buy the argument from most of the talking heads on FOX News that this is the end of the road for Huckabee.  Second is not what he wanted but the fact is he’s still viable.  Florida is next and neither Huckabee nor McCain is going to win there.  Next is Super Tuesday and lot of states do not have open primaries.  I don’t believe McCain can win in the south without independents and Huckabee will win in those states.  What is more likely in my judgement is a spread of delegates following Super Tuesday that has Huckabee squarely in the pack along with others, none with enough delegates to take them over the top.

It’s going to be a while before we know who the Republican nominee is and it could end up in a brokered convention, something we haven’t seen in some time.  If that happens who knows what the outcome will be?  At that point anyone could get the nomination, even Fred Thompson.

We got in the building to vote and there were maybe 10-15 people in the line.  The poll workers said it had been steady all morning but not a great turnout.  That was a disappointment.

We cast our votes, me for Huckabee, and headed home to watch the news.  Of course all morning the coverage was on Nevada where FOX News called the GOP race for Romney very early.  There was a lot of speculation about how Nevada might impact South Carolina (idiotic speculation in my opinion).

The weather appears to be an obvious factor today.  According to all the talking heads, Huckabee is strongest in the upstate where they’re getting snow today, though nothing is sticking according to my son in Greenville.  McCain is supposed to be strongest in the Lowcountry where it has rained pretty steady all day.  Who will be hurt most by the weather?

Some analysis of exit polls on FOX News I found interesting.  As expected Huckabee has the highest percentage of evangelicals and McCain the highest percentage of veterans.  According to the report, there has been a higher percentage of evangelical than veterans in the exit polls, not unexpected since there are more of them in the population.  The most interesting part of the analysis was that conservatives were breaking for Huckabee by six points over McCain.  That’s encouraging.

As of 5:00 I’ve seen no actual returns for this primary and as much as I’d love to see some numbers, I think that is preferable since it isn’t influencing voters.  The bottom line is, this race is too close to call.  I still think Huckabee is going to pull it out but it could be late this evening before I know if I’m right or not.

I’ll be staying up as long as it takes to follow the returns this evening and as soon as someone is declared the winner, I’ll be back to write about it.  In the mean time, if you’re in South Carolina and you haven’t voted yet, get out there and do it!

Here’s how I see it.  McCain was counting on winning in Michigan, or at least running a close second.  As it stands now it looks like he’ll be a distant second.  That hurts him in South Carolina.  The McCain campaign spin is that the large contingent of veterans in South Carolina is well organized and they will carry the day.  I don’t think so.  I think McCain comes in second or third on Saturday.  Those veterans may have done it for him had he won in Michigan but that didn’t happen.

Thompson has really been working hard here the last week and it is clearly paying off.  But he came in behind Ron Paul in Michigan which could hurt him as some see him as a lost cause.  That can only help Huckabee who hasn’t been sitting on his laurels either.  I think Huckabee wins in South Carolina.  Thompson comes in second or third.  If McCain can hold on to some of the numbers he’s built and comes in second with Thompson third that could spell the end of Thompson’s run.  Even Newt Gingrich thinks Huckabee is the man to beat here and he doesn’t see it happening either.

I’ve said before that from an ideological perspective I like Thompson over Huckabee.  I wish Thompson had executive experience though.  For the most part the voters prefer former Governors over former or current Senators.  Unquestionably Huckabee has the executive experience and Thompson doesn’t.  But otherwise I really like Thompson’s positions pretty much across the board.  The problem is, I don’t think he can win.  His abysmal showing in Michigan strengthens that view.  Huckabee, on the other hand, has shown his ability to build support and gain momentum in spite of a lack of funding.  Now he’s raising money at a much faster rate with the added momentum.  Thompson seems to be on fire now but I still think it’s just too late.

The latest Rasmussen poll has McCain with a strong lead in South Carolina, nine points over Huckabee but Real Clear Politics still has gives Huckabee +3.7.  While I generally like the Rasmussen poll I have strong doubts about this one.  I live here and talk to people.  I think I know a little about what’s going on here.  McCain may have a small lead going into today but if it’s actually a lead it will shrink following his distant second place finish in Michigan.  Besides, people in the south aren’t fans of McCain.  I think the Rasmussen poll is way off and I think Saturday will demonstrate that.