John McCain, Fairy Tale Candidate

And by “fairy tale” I do mean in the “I can’t distinguish fact from fiction” sense.

Apparently John McCain told two compelling stories at Saddleback Church over the weekend, both of which are seriously lacking in the credibility department.

First there’s the infamous "cross in the dirt at Christmas” story, which McCain never mentioned in his autobiography or indeed ever before--until this campaign, that is. Some even suggest the story was cribbed from Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, who unfortunately died last week and therefore cannot weigh in on the issue.

In another instance, McCain repeats a hoax circulated by right-wing bloggers last winter about Al Qaeda using two mentally disabled women as suicide bombers. It doesn’t seem to have happened that way, but hey: it feels true, right?

All of which goes to show that when it comes to saying and doing anything--anything--to get elected, McCain has no shame. He’ll even lie about his faith, to one of the country’s most influential pastors.

And don’t even ask about this whole ”cone of silence” nonsense. Seriously, don’t ask: according to McCain’s spokesperson, questions like that are out of line on account of McCain being a former prisoner of war and all. So I guess we aren’t allowed to question his integrity on anything, ever: not about making up the cross in the sand story, not the Keating Five affair , not whether he cheated on wife Carol with Cindy, not how he helped Cindy evade felony drug charges. Guess he gets a pass.

And I have this to say to Pastor Rick Warren. I have been defending this event all across the blogosphere. I've been telling people it's just a means of allowing the candidates to address a specific constituency, just as they address any other group of voters. But you tilted the scales, buddy. You gave one side an advantage by not ensuring McCain was in the green room before the whole thing began. So maybe folks were right. Maybe there’s a reason we shouldn’t let church folks inexperienced in the cut-throat ways of presidential politics be put in charge of these things.

McCain fabricated a couple of doozies at Saddleback that show him to be the worst sort of hypocrite. One story was carefully crafted to tug the heart-strings of Christian voters; the other, to tug at the trigger fingers of warhawks. Will either group learn the truth of these tales? Will any of us?

Of course not. John McCain was a prisoner of war. How dare we even ask.