It must be a trend. First George Will, and now Charles Krauthammer, have done all but come out and admit that John McCain is temperamentally unsuited to be President.
I've read both of these guys for years. Yes, they're on the dark side. They're blowhards and just plain wrong most of the time. But it seems to me they are at least occasionally capable of independent thought and not just people who will robotically regurgitate GOP talking points ala Limbaugh.
In these latest two columns, they appear to be coming as close as they possibly can, without losing all credibility with their own "base," to endorsing Barack Obama:
George Will:
Under the pressure of the financial crisis, one presidential candidate is behaving like a flustered rookie playing in a league too high. It is not Barack Obama...It is arguable that McCain, because of his boiling moralism and bottomless reservoir of certitudes, is not suited to the presidency. Unreadiness can be corrected, although perhaps at great cost, by experience. Can a dismaying temperament be fixed?
Charles Krauthammer:
Part of reassurance is intellectual. Like Palin, [Obama's] a rookie, but in his 19 months on the national stage he has achieved fluency in areas in which he has no experience. In the foreign policy debate with McCain, as in his July news conference with French President Nicolas Sarkozy, Obama held his own -- fluid, familiar and therefore plausibly presidential...he's got both a first-class intellect and a first-class temperament. That will likely be enough to make him president.
I hope this is evidence of something real - a realization of the inevitability of President Obama. I hope it indicates that there are many people - not just independents but open-minded Republicans as well - who realize that this country is in deep, deep trouble. And that the last thing we need is an impulsive drama queen in the White House.