Eight years ago, as the 2000 presidential primaries were heating up and Bush was battling it out with McCain, we were wholeheartedly in the Bush camp and adamantly opposed to McCain. We didn’t like the way he attacked some conservative Christians and we didn’t trust a Washington insider to bring reform to Washington.

While we still support President Bush — and believe that history will look kindly on his efforts against terror and in dealing with the nation’s greatest crisis — we now wholeheartedly support John McCain for President. Why the shift?

Let us count the reasons:

1. In September of 2001, the United States was attacked, with the loss of 3000 lives in the blink of an eye. We are still at war and the enemy — radical jihadists — are just as determined as ever to make 9/11 look like a minor incident. We must continue, even strengthen, the current administrations policies against terror. We know that, if elected, McCain will likely close the Guantanamo detention facility for good and will insure that interrogation techniques for prisoners are closely managed and monitored, yet we also know that he will make life for terrorists even worse than under our current president. As George H.W. Bush (41) was the final nail in the coffin for the Soviet Union, so will John McCain be the final nail in the coffin for global terror.
2. When President Bush pushed through his tax cuts in his first term, John McCain was heavily critiqued for being one of the few Republicans to vote against the tax cuts. His vote was symbolic as he admitted at the time, but his point was that his party was pushing through tax cuts but was not demonstrating enough fiscal discipline to then cut spending. McCain argued vehemently that to do one and not the other was a mistake. We remember being highly annoyed with that “troublemaker” at the time. That said, we believe now that, had the GOP shown enough discipline to follow, McCain’s lead, they may not have lost both the House and the Senate to Democrats in 2006. McCain was right, and the rest of us were wrong.
3. When President Bush made the decision to invade Iraq and depose Saddam in 2003, his strategy, as proposed and backed by Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld, was to go to war “with the army we have.” McCain was an early critic of the strategy, and a vocal critic of the way the war was run. Many conservatives argue that he sounded like a Democrat, but McCain wanted more troops in Iraq, not less. He visited Iraq more than nearly any other member of Congress, and he wanted a surge, not a retreat. So, when President Bush made the very risky decision to implement a troop surge, McCain backed him all the way, despite the fact that the failure of the surge would effectively end his presidential ambitions. Again, McCain was right, and all of his critics were wrong, as the evidence clearly shows. The surge has been more successful than anyone could have imagined, partly because it was accompanied by a change in strategy under General Petraeus.
4. In 1967, on his 23rd bombing mission over North Vietnam, McCain’s plane was shot down and he was taken prisoner. Overall, McCain endured five and a half years of imprisonment, with periods of torture during that time. It was made worse for McCain because he refused to cooperate in any way with the North Vietnamese. What many do not now is that, as the son of an admiral, he was offered release after two years, but refused to go without his fellow American servicemen. He stayed with them until they were all released in 1973 following the Paris Peace Accords. Now he has one son at the Naval Academy and another son serving even now in Iraq. They are following both long-standing family tradition and in the footsteps of someone who is truly an American hero.
5. In 2005, McCain was accused of working against Republican interests when he worked across the aisle to create a voting block of Republican and Democratic senators to end the judicial filibustering of President Bush’s federal and supreme court nominees. We remember again that we were highly annoyed with the senator because we saw his actions as a move to preserve a filibustering process that was standing in the way of the President getting his nominees an up or down vote on the Senate floor. But McCain understood that, should the balance of power ever change, Republicans would need that filibuster power to remain relevant in the legislative process. His agreement with the other Republican and Democratic senators allowed the President to successfully appoint strict constitutionalist judges such as Samuel Alito, John Roberts, Janice Rogers Brown, and others. In 2007, when the balance of power shifted to Democrats, McCain’s efforts at preserving the filibuster process in the senate proved to be invaluable and, dare we say, almost prophetic. Again, McCain was right, and those of us who criticized him were wrong.
6. On the issue of immigration reform, McCain, along with many Republicans and President Bush himself, backed a compromise plan with Democrats that would have finished the closing of our southern border, toughened restrictions on the employment of illegals here in the US, and provided a path to citizenship for those illegals who were already here in the US and were showing themselves to be productive members of our society. We do not support amnesty, however, conservatives who labeled the bill an “amnesty bill” were wrong. The question we must ask ourselves is, do we really want to see the same situation that we saw with Elian Gonzales — federal officers storming a home with automatic weapons and grabbing a terrified child to deport him — times 12 million? We do not, and we think that most Americans agree with us. This is a nation of immigrants and, while there are many here today who are here illegally, we believe the better solution is a path to naturalization which includes adopting English, paying a fine, and paying taxes. Senator McCain is exactly right to have supported Immigration reform and we believe that, had it passed, it would have been the “Welfare Reform” of this decade, in that such reform is long overdue and sorely needed.

For these reasons and others, John McCain has our wholehearted support in 2008. We believe he is the best candidate for the job, especially over a liberal Hillary Clinton and an inexperienced Barack Obama, both of whom want to increase government spending and weaken the country’s stance on terror. Obviously, there are many in the GOP who are attacking him, calling him a RINO — Republican in name-only — and a person who is too friendly with Democrats. But right wing in this country has sounded an increasingly partisan tone with which I find myself in disagreement. Attacks on McCain are based on bumper-sticker slogans and personal insults. This is neither helpful nor appropriate for a man like Senator McCain, who has been serving his country nearly his entire life.

Ironically, it shows you exactly why the senator is the right person for the job. The fact that he can attract both independent voters and even Democrats shows you why the DNC is concerned about this guy. They know that, of all the candidates out there now on the GOP side, McCain will be the most difficult to beat.

At the same time, Republican loyalists like myself can be certain that, while not a perfect candidate, McCain will continue the war on terror, continue to support the control of government spending, will continue to oppose the influence of special interests in Washington, will continue to appoint strict constitutionalist judges, will continue to support a culture of life, and so many other things that are the core principles of our party, and with which most Americans can agree.

If Romney emerges triumphant and becomes the GOP nominee, then we will enthusiastically support him, but we believe with no doubt whatsoever that McCain is the best candidate. We feel that McCain has lived his philosophy of straight talk, even when it meant a loss of popularity. Americans like that about McCain, and we believe they’ll look for that and for the ability to get things done in Washington in our next President.

Critics have used such titles as “John McPain,” and other even less flattering names. We hope in 2009 to call him “Mr. President.”