"How much worse does Obama have to get before Althouse decides McCain would have been better?"

"Ann, are there any benchmarks we can set on what has to happen for you to change your mind? I'd like to set an over-under on the date. A lot can happen in three years."

Writes d-day in a long comments thread that began last Friday.

What you need to understand, d, is that I am plagued by a vivid imagination. It's easy to look at Obama and see what you don't like. Whenever you do, think about what McCain would have done and spin the wheel forward a few turns. That's what I do. I think McCain would have played nice with Congress. And the Republican Party would be in shambles instead of scrambling to get its act together for the next election.

Here's my original 2008 election post-mortem — "How McCain Lost Me". Excerpt, beginning with a quote of something I'd written just before the election:

"Usually, I prefer divided government, but that doesn't mean I need to support McCain. I've seen McCain put way too much effort into pleasing Democrats and flouting his own party, and I can picture Obama standing up to the Democratic Congress and being his own man. What, really, will he owe them? McCain, by contrast, will need them. And we've seen that he wants to be loved by them.

"Sometimes, I think that letting the Democrats control everything for 2 years would work out just fine. Let one party take responsibility for everything. When they can't whine and finger-point, what will they actually step up and do? It will be interesting to know. And it will do the Republicans good to retool and define themselves, with an eye toward the 2010 election. I'd like to see this clarification after so many years of obfuscation."

This goes along with my problem that McCain had abandoned the effort to define himself as conservative. I could see myself voting for a conservative. I would like some good conservatism. But I did not see it in McCain. Certainly, just bringing in Palin was no substitute for having his own clear principles.

Yes, yes, I know. The "clarification" is killing us, and once we're dead, there's no coming back. And Obama isn't standing up to the Democratic Congress, unless he's doing it in some really subtle way that one day I'll appreciate.

It's hard, but I still have my...



... Althousity of Hope.