John McCain is, in my mind, a tragic hero.  He was the man we needed in 2000, but didn’t get.  In 2008, he’s the man we got and didn’t need.   He’s a man that deserves his own party, not one that has to use fear mongering and divisive (hearsay based) whisper campaigns to get elected.  Many will say his weaknesses in economics or choosing Sarah Palin was his downfall.  That wasn’t the reason I started rooting for the other guy.  It was the reversal of character, aligning him with the far-right and resorting to the same mudslinging techniques that brought him down in 2000 that changed my mind.  He stopped being the John McCain all of us centrists loved, the John McCain that stated, publically, the Bush campaign should cease tarnishing John Kerry’s war record.  Right before our eyes, he morphed into every other red-state pandering republican and in some cases worse (I haven’t heard cries of “Socialist” in my adult life).  I know why he did it, to win, but how would you feel if your favorite baseball pitcher changed teams and when asked why would he change uniforms, when he was so beloved by his previous city, his answer was, “To win.”  The situation he fell into, with this election, warranted extreme measures, but unfortunately all measures taken led him away from his historical appeal.

Everything else aside, it was good to see the old McCain, again.  His sincerity was apparent to all that watched the speech.  His lifetime of service to his country remains a model to emulate and his demeanor, even in defeat, is worthy of our utmost respect.

Think of all the Spider-Man movie antagonists. You have the Green Goblin, a tortured soul. He wants to do what’s right, but that damned formula is forcing him to be evil. You have Doctor Octopus, tormented by the loss of his true love; manipulated by his tentacles. You also have The Sandman. He killed Peter Parker’s uncle and you’re still not allowed to hate him, because he has a sick kid. So, why should we root for Spider-Man, when there’s no pure evil to balance out the pure good? Another question you have to ask yourself is this, why aren’t we allowed to hate these guys?

The villain should be the unsympathetic embodiment of all the ills that plague our time. Iron Man was dead-on in this aspect. You have a greedy, anything-for-profit, capitalist, providing terrorists with weapons. You hate everything about him and want him to be destroyed. It’s a declaration that popular culture recognizes these traits to be repugnant. In a time with outrageous gas prices and oil companies making record profits, it’s our way of saying, “You have us in your clutches at the moment, but history will hold you in the same regard as slave merchants and robber barons.”

There’s another reason a truly evil villain resonates so strongly with me, personally. I developed my moral foundation from comic books. I didn’t get my introduction to good vs. evil from religion or philosophy. These things are above a child’s head. All I needed to know was Superman fought the bad guys and I wanna’ be like Superman. Of course, I learned of the varying degrees of grey, as I got older, but there’s something comforting in seeing a real asshole being defeated. It’s an affirmation that my initial beliefs still hold true and the Universe has balanced itself out, yet again. It’s also profoundly refreshing to see that some unredeemable jerk has been held accountable for his actions.

I say, bring on the dicks. Give us someone to hate. Although, taking jabs at the untouchables is no ground-breaking maneuver, at least it’s not cowardly. From a movie-goers perspective, it’s refreshing to see that a few people still have a little bit of backbone. After all, it makes the hero’s victory all the sweeter.