The Daily Show nails it.

I couldn't agree more.

John McCain used to be my hero. He was a maverick and proud of it, someone who didn't just occasionally say no to the party establishment, but someone who did it almost out of habit. He voted his conscience. He compromised when it was necessary. He was beholden to no one but his constituents, not beholden to party politics or the extremes. The things he says in those Daily Show clips are inspiring and sublime, and now he's just another bitterly partisan politician-as usual.

He was a radical moderate. Now he's just another Republican.

Maybe our system has deteriorated so badly that centrists like he once was cannot survive. Maybe mavericks really do now mean what Sarah Palin thinks they mean -- people so radical that even party leadership tries to rein them in.

Maybe America no longer wants the real John McCain.

I get the feeling that the old McCain is the real McCain. I'd like to believe that he's dying inside every time he calls Obama a socialist against American values. I'd like to believe that, upon getting re-elected, he will once again be the great man he once was and that he needs to be again.

He is fighting a grueling re-election battle. From my couch I can't conceive the realities and difficulties of such a fight, so maybe this is all a great but unavoidable evil.

If so, it's sad and scary, because that means this new, lock-step angry soldier McCain is what the American people want.

I hope it isn't. I hope he or his advisers have grossly misjudged what his voters are looking for.

For the sake of our process, I hope we haven't turned off the old, great McCain.