John McFlames

It appears that Chris Matthews, the prolix terrier behind the desk of the pornographically titled Hardball, said that John McCain is "kind of a Martin Luther." Oh, you mean he's a zealot and an anti-Semite? Yes? No?

Martin Luther looked at the gorgeous absurdity that was Renaissance Catholicism and thought to himself, "You know, what this really needs is an injection of dourness," and then he set about trying to out-Ferdinand Ferdinand on the question of the Jews. I am firmly convinced that had their never been a Reformation, we would have attained to a glorious, renewed Paganism centuries ago. Plenary indulgences, for instance, were positively Babylonian. High theater became the dull meeting house, and all the pomp and faggotry of men in costume and boy choirs and incense and trilled Latin Rs faded into bad congregational hymning. Yes, it is true that we got Bach out of the deal, but we also got John Calvin, who haunts America in particular to this day.

Personally, I'd describe John McCain as a kind of wannabe Tamerlane.