The Hunger

Presidential Aspirants prefer to call it "the fire in the belly" but, as usual, they are being way too kind to themselves. It bears a much closer resemblance to the desperate need of the brain-eating zombies in Return Of The Living Dead.
I am reminded of this by John Cole's noting that the McCain campaign just hired Tucker Eskew. For those who may have forgotten, Eskew was one of the high-level Bush operatives who stage-managed the brutal and ugly South Carolina primary destruction of McCain's previous run at the Presidency....c'mon, you remember, the one where McCain got accused of having fathered a black child out of wedlock. The one where it was suggested that his years in the Hanoi Hilton had driven him completely insane. Up to now, everyone assumed that Eskew would be about as welcome in the McCain campaign as Susan Atkins would be at a Tate family reunion. But we misunderestimated McCain's sheer hunger - his deep psychological craving for the Presidency. By any means necessary. This is the kind of thing that would have made for good material in a John O'Hara novel.
All politicians have this ghastly trait, for sure. But some hide it better than others. Obama disguises his mad ambition very well, as did Huckabee. Even a sociopath like Clinton could conceal it at times. But Nixon couldn't hide his for even a second and McCain can't either. You can read it on the face....raw nerves, anger and fear. Anyone who has spent time with heroin addicts or alcoholics knows that look.