…when right-​wing hack­ery col­lapses under its own weight. Jonah Gold­berg, ladies and gentlemen:

Polit­i­cally, I think [McCain's plea to post­pone the debate] is shrewd, even wise. It demon­strates McCain’s will­ing­ness to make pol­i­tics and par­ti­san­ship a sec­ondary con­cern. Obvi­ously, some of McCain’s detrac­tors will see it as a gim­mick. But pol­i­tics is all about gim­mickry in a sense. Sym­bolic ges­tures, tac­ti­cal posi­tion­ing, over­tures to con­stituen­cies: that’s what politi­cians do to com­mu­ni­cate what kind of politi­cian they are.

It really is an astound­ing feat of non-​logic, which might be poetic if it weren’t so dumb (which it isn’t because it is). Here’s my best attempt at a translation:

You see, McCain is polit­i­cally shrewd because he’s will­ing not to be polit­i­cal, which is the best way to be polit­i­cal–except for the fact that he’s being polit­i­cal by stag­ing this gim­mick, but that’s fine, because that’s what politi­cians do, and John McCain is a shrewd and wise politician.