Paul Rahe again.

Professor Paul Rahe is a favorite big picture thinker of the Powerline blog.  His analysis of Obama's first year in office is here, and it is devastating.  While sympathetic to his argument that McCain was a horrible candidate, I can't agree that he may have even been worse than Obama has turned out to be.  It seems inconceivable that McCain would have mounted a full-court press to take over 1/6th of the US economy, nor would he have effectively nationalized the auto industry to help out the UAW, nor would he have politicized the banking industry in the manner of Obama's administration.  While McCain was a weak candidate from the conservative's point of view, we would likely be much further along in terms of recovery from the foolishness that led to the financial meltdown in 2008.