Grrrrrrrrrr. John McCain HA-HA-HATES!! Mitt Romney. Which brings up an interesting little factamundo about this campaign. We've been paying alllllll this attention to the latent misogyny, the latent sexism, the prospect of a woman commander-in-chief, whether women who hate Hillary have probs with women, yawn — when over in the Terminator State last night, the debate was all about McCain looking at Mitt Romney and seeing a straight-arrow pussy who never got drunk, never fucked a whore, and was serving his Mormon mission in France of all places while he was in the Hanoi Hilton. And that's why conservatives (who are not Arnold Schwarzenegger) so loathe McCain, the man who gives them the shot they never deserved (understatement!) at the 2008 election. He is an affront to the very MANHOOD they love so very much they want to marry it. After the jump, Megan Carpentier and I probe the not-so-subtle role of dudehood in the election that could very well turn out to be a showdown between Dreams From My Father and Faith Of My Fathers. Oh yeah, and Britney Spears.

MEGAN: How are you feeling on this cold Thursday morning?
MOE: I am feeling like shit again, no surprises there. I thought drinking something last night might make me feel better but, ha ha, it didn't! Though I woke up with wine stained teeth.
Britney's been hospitalized. That's the news on CNN. I don't think anything else happened.
Oh wait, there was a debate!
That is only slightly less commonplace than Britney being institutionalized or doing something worthy of being institutionalized I suppose!
MEGAN: britney's soooo obviously more important.
I mean, is there a single thing we don't know about these guys now?
MOE: We don't know WHO'S THE REAL CONSERVATIVE AND WHO'S A BIG POSEUR...There's a decent story about John Edwards' leaning toward Obama. His senior rural strategist Dave "Mudcat" Saunders talks about going home, getting into a fetal position on the bed and "sucking my thumb with my gun" — great image! — before he "gets back out" to make sure Hillary doesn't get the nom.
MEGAN: MUDCAT??? Also,did he have his gun in the other hand I hope? People, don't play with guns.
Also, I don't know Mudcat but now I have a mental image of a Bear in my head, in flannel, crying.
MOE: Here's something else he had to say: "Hillary Clinton has about as much chance of beating John McCain as this Scots-Irish hillbilly has of becoming pope."
His reasoning is that she can never get states Kerry did not get, and I don't think our readers will be surprised that I think he has a fair point.
As candidates go, John McCain is only approximately 4000% stronger than George W. Bush...and it is so easy for her partisans to forget — sooooo easy for them to forget — that Bill always had Ross Perot.
MEGAN: Yeah, I think (like many conservatives do, actually) that once McCain is done running to the Right for the nomination, he'll be back running to the center like he did in 2000.
Which will make it hard for Hillary to pick up a lot of the so-called Reagan Democrats. McCain's problem would be turn-out among Republicans, which would handily be solved by Hillary being the nominee.
But, you know, by saying that we're just revealing our bias, Moe. Also, we're betraying our gender and voting with our genitals. Also, we're misogynists. And we're stupid.
Did I miss anything?
MOE: Sorry, I was just reading this Robert Novak column. It never ceases to amaze me how much ire conservatives have for McCain. I suppose this is because he does not believe in their "unity" crap. But GOD, you always think all conservatives care about is abortion, and then they act like taxes are abortion. No wonder that crazy little gynecologist in Texas has so many fans.
MEGAN: The fiscal conservative religion is the reason I found the entire GOP field hilarious funny for a year. You have the former mayor of NYC (who basically won by being a centrist Democrat), the former governor of Taxachusetts, McCain whose McCain-Feingold bill sends Washington conservatives into paroxysms of hatred, and Huckabee who had the audacity to raise taxes during a budget crisis in which he was constitutionally obligated to balance the budget.
That 's why there was such crazy stupid love for Fred Thompson, and such a groundswell of support at first- it wasn't the whole GOP side loking for an "alternative," it was them looking for someone who was strong on anti-tax issues.
And now they're probably stuck with McCain anyway.
MOE: Right, and NO TIMETABLE FOR WITHDRAWAL. If you like Romney, you risk a timetable, you know!
MEGAN: If we tell them when we're leaving, they'll hide out until we're gone!
!!!
MOE: Which sends all the conservatives into suuuuch paroxysms!!!! Because what if he like, uses this as an excuse to RAISE TAXES?????
MEGAN: OH NOES! Head for the bomb shelter, Mabel!
MOE: Anyway I particularly appreciated how Novak says that over and over again
that McCain told some people that they could TOTALLY expect john roberts type justices from him, but not alito!
Alito wore his conservatism on his sleeve!
And then McCain claims to have FORGOTTEN ALL ABOUT THE CONVERSATION
BECAUSE HE'S OLD
but then Novak asked the people to whom he was supposedly talking shit about Alito
and they didn't remember really either
(because they are old)
MEGAN: Novak should talk. I saw him at a cocktail party a couple of weeks ago. Another year, and he's gonna look like Yoda.
MOE: Hahahaha at the end of the column, you're like, Novak, this story is so fucking stupid and convoluted and you cant even keep it straight. Because you're OLD.
MEGAN: Stupid and convoluted, that sums up Novak's writing style to a T.
Speaking of McCain and conservatives, now that he's all cool again, Schwarzenegger is going to endorse him.
Because that's totally helpful among hand-line conservatives.
er, hard-line.
MOE: Okay remember last night when I was drunk and we started going through the Wikipedia entries of Gravel and McCain?
MEGAN: I wasn't sober or anything! But, yes.
(Also, did you have to tell everyone that when we get drunk we Wiki candidates and then IM about it? It makes us sound nerdier than we are).
MOE: Yeah especially since we were talking about the commenters, ahem. But seriously, so yesterday we learned that Mike Gravel is six years older than John McCain and that he is fundamentally awesome, and that John McCain's groomsman was Clinton defense sec. William S. Cohen and his groomsman was Gary Hart. And I think there's something about that; like, when the conservatives express all this hatred for "inside the beltway" republicans, I think they are just jealous bc they never get to be, like, the popular kids sorta?
And the Governator is just going to make them even more pissed off.
Him and John Voight and Rambo.
Is it just me or did you forget Huckabee was still in this race too?
MEGAN: Well, you know, "still in" is a relative term.
He's still running.
I wouldn't call him "in" the race.
MOE: Here's Salon's take on last night's GOP debates: he emboldened front-runner took shots at Romney throughout Wednesday's GOP debate, as if winning seemed less important to him than pissing off his rival.
"As if."
MEGAN: Yeah, that sounds like McCain. He really apparently dislikes Romney and likes fucking with people he dislikes.
MOE: That's a funny thing about McCain. He hates Romney. And I hate Romney, but not as much as McCain hates Romney. And I wonder, what exactly does McCain hate so much about Romney? I think I would go back to the 100 demerits he received at the 27 high schools he went to or whatever. He looks at Romney and sees a simpering pansy who never had a one-night stand, never got into a fight, never talked back to his parents, never gave a shit about being anything but not fucking up, who served his Mormon mission, the most ballsy motherfucking task expected of someone like Mitt Romney, in motherfucking FRANCE. I bet Mitt's tour in France overlapped with McCain's tour in Hanoi. Anyway, it's some deep-seated manhood shit going on there; McCain doesn't think Romney has earned his manhood at all.
MEGAN: Whoa. You totally got my attention there.
I don't understand men and their man-stuff.
MOE: Well I think that's what's going on. And it's funny, because on one hand, I agree and it's exactly what bothers me about Romney — and really all private sector Republicans born into privilege and handed MBAs on a silver platter — that they haven't really earned their viewpoints because they haven't fucking seen anything. And yet, you know, I'm a woman, so it all seems a little ridiculous and over-the-top.
MEGAN: Well, you're one of a very small minority of women to ever actually have a pissing contest, so it doesn't surprise me that you'd have more insight into that than me.
MOE: Hahaha. Well it makes me think back to that thing he said off the cuff to the man in the crowd accusing him of carpetbagging when he was first running for congress in Arizona back in 1982.

Listen, pal. I spent 22 yars in the Navy. My grandfather was in the Navy. We in the military service tend to move a lot. We have to live in all parts of the country, all parts of the world. I wish I could have had the luxury, like you, of growing up and iving and spending my entire life in a nice place like the first district of Arizona, but I was doing other things. As a matter of fact, when I think about it now, the place I lived longest in my life was Hanoi.

I mean, what can you say to that? What can you say to McCain when he defends immigrants? Conservatives hate him because he's an affront to their manhood.
MEGAN: Because he has balls.
MOE: And the amazing thing about Obama is that he has all this going for him WITHOUT the burden of having grown up the short guy.
MEGAN: Is McCain short? I thought he was more shrunken old man than actually short. Also, I'm 5'4", so short is sort of relative.
MOE: Yeah, he's short. You never want to see him standing next to Michelle Obama.
He was like 123 pounds in his wrestling days.
Thank you, Wikipedia.
MEGAN: Honey, I don't want to be seen next to Michelle Obama either.