Charlie Black, My Man of the Hour

Aw, hell, Senator, the goo-goos and censors and thought patrollers are once again demanding Charlie's resignation, but don't you listen to them. You keep him right where he is, Senator, right where he's needed, right where he'll always do you the most harm: in the firing line.

Assassinations seem to be a hot button of speculation this election cycle, having laid waste to more than one candidate's message discipline. First came, well, you know who, referencing Bobby's grim and untimely exit at the hands of a madman as her flagging campaign's ultimate raison d'etre. Her reasoning may have been cold-bloodedly justified, but its public airing was as mad as the assassin and just one more nail in her political coffin.

And now, not much later, we have Charlie in a not dissimilar situation and quickly surrounded by not dissimilar calls for his withdrawal. Because in an interview with Fortune magazine, Charlie allowed the "unfortunate" history of singular human slaughter to blossom into a fantasy of mass human destruction, and hence his boss' own raison d'etre. Wrote Fortune:

One good scare, one timely reminder of the chaos lurking in the world, probably saved McCain in New Hampshire, a state he had to win to save his candidacy -- this according to McCain's chief strategist, Charlie Black. The assassination of Benazir Bhutto in December was an "unfortunate event," says Black. "But his knowledge and ability to talk about it reemphasized that this is the guy who's ready to be Commander-in-Chief. And it helped us." As would, Black concedes with startling candor after we raise the issue, another terrorist attack on U.S. soil. "Certainly it would be a big advantage to him," says Black.

Charlie was only speaking the truth. Of course another terrorist attack would benefit John. I don't know of a single, credible political analyst who disagrees; but just as naturally, the analysts are permitted to openly speculate about such things -- and the campaigns themselves are decidedly not.

But for Heaven's sake, let's not gin up the pressure for Charlie's resignation. Unlike Hillary's grossest of political faux pas, Charlie's benefits the progressive opposition -- he stands naked as a splendid example of GOP desperation: only mass human destruction, or its happy prospect, can save them. What a message, in an election defined by economic calamity and change and hope.

Besides, what immediately preceded Charlie's quote in Fortune magazine was the staggeringly similar by John himself. It's just that it's getting lost in all the brouhaha over Charlie's ingenuousness.

Here's what Fortune observed about the Republican presidential candidate when it asked "what single economic threat he perceives above all others":

McCain at first says nothing. He sits in the corner of a sofa, one black, tasseled loafer propped against a coffee table. We're in the presidential suite on the 41st floor of the New York Hilton. McCain has come here ... to talk to us and to let us take his picture. He is wearing a dark suit, as he almost always does, with a blue shirt and a wine-colored tie. He's looking not at us but into the void. His eyes are narrowed. Nine seconds of silence, ten seconds, 11.

John was stumped. Economics? Whoa, that's a bit out of my field. But wait, I'll give you an answer -- one that I hope chills your cajones: "I would think that the absolute gravest threat is the struggle that we're in against radical Islamic extremism, which can affect, if they prevail, our very existence. Another successful attack on the United States of America could have devastating consequences ..."

... and, sotto voce, the merriest of ramifications for John.

As Fortune continued: "Not America's dependence on foreign oil? Not climate change? Not the crushing cost of health care? Eventually McCain gets around to mentioning all three of those. But he starts by deftly turning the economy into a national security issue -- and why not? On national security McCain wins."

Yes, he probably does. But not the way he's playing it -- the way, that is, he and Charlie are forcing it.

The swarthy bogeyman strategy had already exhausted its bad GOP-self by the 2006 elections. Now, it's a parody of a caricature wrapped in a burlesque, to paraphrase Winston. And voters just aren't buying it -- not, especially, while being swallowed up by the economic marvels of Bush-McCain, a rather pertinent topic of conversation that sends John staring absentmindedly into the abyss.

Voters, in time, notice these things. They notice when a candidate is but a blank slate upon which nothing immediately relevant to their lives will apparently ever be written. By constantly framing the nation's welfare in singular, foreboding and hair-raising terms, John McCain & Co. merely emphasize what it lacks: a relevant plan.

And the last thing we should want to do is take a guy like Charlie Black -- what with all his thuggish dictator friends and lugubrious references to America's future -- out of action. I think he's delightful.