Bold new leadership that looks pretty much like what we've had for eight years

Yay! In a speech yesterday, John McCain laid out his "vision" for what will be accomplished during his first term as president. Vision is apparently what all the kids are saying now when they mean "campaign promise."

These campaign promises are different than the usual kind though, since they are made by a war-hero candidate with lots of legislative and foreign relations experience and a maverick brand. They're also different because it appears that he'll accomplish everything that Bush wanted to (and more) by using pretty much the same approach that Bush did. But this time—and this is the important part—he'll do more of it.

Here's an example: McCain really likes the war in Iraq. Don't get me wrong... he thinks that Bush terribly botched the job, but it was exactly the right thing to do. Remember the "surge" (surge being roughly defined as "do more of what you're currently doing, indefinitely")? It was McCain's idea. Remember the "Mission Accomplished" banner under which Bush was photographed? Small potatoes. John McCain hung his own future "Mission Accomplished" banner yesterday by saying that by the end of his first term as el presidente:

1. We win
2. Most of our troops will be out
3. Osama bin Laden will be caught or killed

Amazing! How will he accomplish these things? He doesn't say, but apparently by doing more of what hasn't won, gotten our troops out, or killed bin Laden so far.

But wait! There's more!

The Taliban will be on the run, the country will be prosperous again, taxes will be more fair because rich people and corporations will pay less, people who have lost their jobs will be all better now, public education will be fixed by killing it, and people who can't get insurance today probably will be able to because the government will continue to do mostly nothing to help and we all know that the free market has been a great success in that quarter.

Oh yeah, and the government will be much smaller, but the military will be much bigger. I'm a little hazy on this one, since I thought that the military was part of the government, but maybe that'll be outsourced, too. He didn't mention anything about the Haliburton Army or the Blackwater Marines, but I suppose that's a possibility.

There was a teeny-tiny disclaimer toward the beginning: "I cannot guarantee I will have achieved these things." Listeners may have lost that little point in amongst the other 99.71% of the speech, but it's a small thing. It's a vision, after all. And don't forget... we'll get all this by doing pretty much what we've always done before! I love visions.