You Can't Always Get What You Want

Debra Saunders of the San Francisco Chronicle finds the behavior of conservatives criticizing John McCain to be juvenile.

"To the purists, elected officials are supposed to go to Washington to not work with those on the other side of the aisle," Saunders writes. "They don't want results. They want a food fight. This is not the conservative base; it is the kiddie wing of the Republican Party."

Frankly, there have been tantrums thrown by activists in both parties in this campaign, and we're just barely a month into the voting.

With Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama running neck and neck for the Democratic nomination, it might continue until the convention in Denver this summer. The Wall Street Journal suggests that we may witness a return to the infamous "smoke-filled room."

On the Republican side, Mitt Romney dropped out of the race today. Realistically, that should just about wrap things up for McCain -- except that he didn't exactly get a rousing welcome from the activists who heard his speech to the Conservative Political Action Conference in Washington this afternoon.

Addressing the organization a couple of hours after Romney's speech to the group served as his platform for announcing his withdrawal, McCain said, "I know I have a responsibility, if I am, as I hope to be, the Republican nominee for president, to unite the party and prepare for the great contest in November."

Some people in the audience applauded McCain, but others booed.

It's getting harder for me to see anyone uniting this country. There's been so much bitterness and hostility from both sides. And it's largely been aimed at rivals from within each party. Normally, this kind of venom is used against the other side.

Republicans have been finding McCain lacking when it comes to his conservative credentials. And they haven't hesitated to say so. You could hear it in his reception from the CPAC audience. You can hear it in the rantings of Rush Limbaugh and Ann Coulter.

The Democrats aren't immune. I was listening to National Public Radio on my drive home from work this afternoon, and they were talking to women who have been working in Clinton's campaign. These women were openly hostile to Obama because of his gender -- and they seemed to think that was justifiable because the same kind of thing has been done to Clinton and other women in politics over the years.

On a personal level, I've been called "sexist" because I want to know the details of Clinton's White House experience. As far as I know, she never served in an elected capacity and had no authorization to participate in policy making. I'd like to know why she is qualified to be the "leader of the free world." I don't think I'm asking any more from her than I ask from any other candidate.

Do we want to get to the point where gender doesn't matter in American politics? If we do, somebody is going to have to be mature in dealing with it.

And when I hear from Obama's supporters, I hear the hostility in what they have to say about former President Clinton's blithe dismissal of Obama's position on the invasion of Iraq. They see it as a racial slap from a president who once was their ally.

I've been dismissed by Obama's supporters as "racist" because I question the legitimacy of his claim to have opposed the invasion of Iraq from the start. He was an Illinois state senator when Congress voted to give war authority to President Bush. Since the Illinois state senate did not vote on the issue, we have no record beyond what Obama has been quoted as saying, supposedly at the time of the invasion.

Obama is forthcoming about his lack of experience, but his supporters bristle when asked for evidence of the "good judgment" he claims to have. I don't think he's being asked for any more than other candidates.

Do we want to get to the point where race doesn't matter in American politics? If we do, somebody is going to have to be mature.

Being mature does not mean going out of your way to alienate those on whose support you depend -- or may depend in the future.

But I wonder if anyone connected to the presidential campaign has that kind of maturity.