When I heard that John McCain would appear on Saturday Night Live last weekend, I fretted: Will the likable "old McCain" charm votes back from Barack Obama? (And will he get a last-minute boost Monday night from SNL's election-eve special?) Just because Sarah Palin's SNL spot did nothing to dent Tina Fey's caribou-in-the-headlights impression, there was no guarantee that the cast would not fawn over the frequent guest and one-time host of the show.

But McCain was never pitted against his SNL doppelganger (Darrell Hammond) as Palin was. McCain was pitted against himself. And you gotta say, once he was back on the Rockefeller Center stage, he came off not only game and self-deprecating, but...happy. It really wasn't the performance you'd expect from a race- and red-baiting politician mired in the closing days of a losing campaign.

Still, McCain probably didn't win or lose votes Saturday night so much as he took his first steps towards reclaiming his damaged legacy. Like Al Gore's famous hot tub appearance on SNL, which tipped us off to his decision not to run in 2004, McCain's que cera performance (evident elsewhere on the trail in these last few days) was almost an admission that he knew he was about to lose, padded out with every imaginable electoral excuse. Standing next to Fey's Palin, he presented a cheerier, more ironic version of the victimhood he's been pulsing with for months. "Barack Obama purchased airtime on three major networks," he said. "We, however, can only afford QVC." He went on to hawk kitsch like Joe the Plumber action figures, pork-cutting knives, and the "10 commemorative plates that celebrate the 10 townhall debates between Senator Obama and myself. They're blank, he wouldn't agree to those debates."

And when multi-millionaire beer heiress Cindy McCain, a surprise guest, comes out to Vanna-White some jewelry (described by her husband as "McCain Fine Gold"), echoes of the $280,000 diamond earrings she wore to the Republican convention reverberate uncomfortably in our heads.

It's funny because it's true--so true you want to cringe:

McCain's half-jokey Republican cloth-coat excuse for losing paled next to the chainsaw Fey's impersonation took to Palin. By standing blandly by, instead of stepping in with boilerplate bullroar as he always does in their joint press appearances, McCain seemed to be saying that he's perfectly willing to blame this whole turkey of a campaign on the Thrilla from Wasilla. He even allowed Fey to suggest Palin's disloyalty and indifference to losing this time out.

Nevertheless, dumping on Palin failed to completely charm the live audience. If a few boos could be detected at the beginning of that first skit, they became loud and clear during the intro for Weekend Update:

The "Reverse Maverick," "Double Maverick," and "Sad Grandpa" strategies are so so close to popular perception that you have to wonder: Does McCain know how revealing these jokes are? Is the 72-year-old senator so hip that he's willing to spoof his own weaknesses, or is he so sure of himself that he thinks these whispered suspicions are beyond ridiculous?

These questions are tantalizing because they get at McCain's basic self-knowledge, especially after he's run one of the worst-managed and personally nasty campaigns in a long series of Republican mud spats. He apparently went on SNL to mock and minimize everything he had to do to try to get elected. It was an "I'm still me!" performance, a peek out from the curtain McCain retreated behind when the general election campaign began and Steve Schmidt imposed his famous "message discipline" on the candidate. "I'm not like what John Lewis said," McCain might as well have cried. "I'm not like George Wallace. I'm, like, funny!" There's a legacy for you.

This election has also been something of a legacy burnisher for SNL itself. After two years of buzz that this would be the first YouTube election, or the first Comedy Central election, who'd have thought it'd actually turn out to be a "Saturday Night Live" election? There's no doubt that Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert run much sharper, funnier shows than the 34-year-old broadcast revue, with its painfully boring recurring characters and braying adolescent humor, but McCain and Obama can handle themselves on fake news shows just like they do on real news shows. Maybe they're a bit looser and more willing to spar with the funnymen than they are with MSM journalists, but essentially they're still sitting there in swivel chairs and answering questions. How much personal skin in the game does that require?

SNL's skits are by definition more intimate than that, and take aim at finer points of individual character, as caricatures always do. And mixing it up with the actual people they are parodying makes SNL a more dangerous venue for politicians. You know that by going on Saturday Night Live you risk reinforcing your own stereotype, or worse, undermining your bona fides as a rollicking regular guy by appearing stiff and withholding, as Palin did two weeks ago. By her standard, McCain leapt those rapids with aplomb.

Showing yourself capable of being both amused and amusing is a bigger part of the politician's job these days than ever before, which is maybe why SNL alumni seem to be popping up all over this year. Former SNL writer Al Franken is running for Paul Wellstone's senate seat in Minnesota, and the GOP senate re-election committee felt compelled to fight fire with fire, deploying this TV ad in the last week on behalf of Norm Coleman, Franken's sartorially gifted opponent:

Eeeww, Playboy! But in a battle of celebrity fire power, who'll be persuaded by Victoria Jackson and the Baldwin brother Sarah Palin likes best? And who under the age of 50 even knows who Pat Boone is?

It's funny because it's true.

Comments (12)

1. Pat Boone?

   Daniel Boone's son?

   Posted by sloper at 11/03/2008 @ 3:20pm

2. "McCain seemed to be saying that he's perfectly willing to blame this whole turkey of a campaign on the Thrilla from Wasilla. He even allowed Fey to suggest Palin's disloyalty and indifference to losing this time out."

   S'why I think he and his loyalists will be out first and strongest post-Tuesday with "It was HER. She done it to us!" excuses.

   Problem is...McCAIN was the one that picked Palin. So how does he blame her, without admitting what neither he (nor any right-winger) WOULD admit...

   that he didn't properly vett her or that he knew she was dopey and just put her a shat at the Oval Office simply because Obama didn't pick a woman.

   Watch for it...the McCain folks (as well as Peggy Noonan, David Brooks, David Frum, Kathleen Parker, etc.) will make sure that "Palin in '12" is as likely as "Quayle in 2000".

   Posted by Maskdelta at 11/03/2008 @ 4:03pm

3. Wonder if anyone caught a caller this weekend on c-span 1 who stated that mccain was no hero in vietnam. He went on to say that mccain only served 3 months in vietnam before being shot down and that he(mccain) was known as the parroket of saigon. I had heard him referred to as the song bird of saigon before but never on c-span.

   Posted by Truthman at 11/03/2008 @ 4:04pm

4. Posted by RedRiver_. at 11/03/2008 @ 4:16pm

   For further details, go to the Ward JOOA Corp website!

   heheh

   Posted by Maskdelta at 11/03/2008 @ 4:25pm

5. Posted by RedRiver_. at 11/03/2008 @ 4:44pm

   Investment opportunities abound at Ward JOOA Corp....if McCain wins that is!

   heheh

   Posted by Maskdelta at 11/03/2008 @ 4:46pm

6. Truthman, yes it is true. Not only that, but McRant is possibly one of the worst pilots ever to fly a Navy arcraft. He had several accidents that would have gotten anyone but an admiral's son a dishonorable discharge;then daddy pulled strings to get him yet another aircraft which he promptly hand-delivered to the North Vietnamese. I can't imagine what he must have gone thru in that prison, knowing that the only reason he was there was his own incompetence and nepotism. How depressing. Kerry was an actual hero, but we know what happens to them, they are ignored and insulted.

   Posted by oldintel at 11/03/2008 @ 4:49pm

7. RedRiver, you are the real hero. For you to post on this forum is akin to a suicide bomber infiltrating the Bagdad Green Zone with a cherry bomb taped to his balls. You exemplify the heroism factor of the right wing warriors.

   Posted by mcasenl at 11/03/2008 @ 4:52pm

8. "Yea, those Undemocrats sure know how to spice up an election! Doggone them for clinging to their Bibles and Guns like the fools Obamanation despises!!!!" Posted by RedRiver_. at 11/03/2008 @ 5:03pm

   Generally speaking, people who have a serious, well-thought-out point to make refrain from name-calling and excessive exclamation points (you know, smart people, like Barack Obama). Scream all you want about unrelated or peripheral issues today. Tomorrow evening I suggest you look at the national scoreboard. You'll have to get used to "President-elect Obamanation!!!!!!!" and an even larger "Undemocrat majority!!!!!!!".

   Posted by Be Good at 11/03/2008 @ 5:34pm

9. Red River.. Have You ever Been to Murtha's state..?? If you drive between Philly And Pittsburgh and dare stop along the way, you find rednecks and racists.... Call a pig a pig... How dare someone tell it like it is. Now im not saying all the people between philly and pitt are rednecks/racist, that would be a gross generalization which is a tool of the right wing spin machine. But when all you get on the radio is Jebus, Rush, and country tunes... Well it dosent take an Angela Landsbury/Columbo type to figure out the flavor of that electorate.

   Now stop with the sour grapes. get on your knees, and hail your New Commander in Chief... President OBAMA !!!!

   Posted by Vvf1969 at 11/03/2008 @ 6:36pm

10. "McCain's que cera performance"

    ¿que cera?

    that means "what wax".

    hey,

    he's not THAT old.

    Posted by frosty zoom at 11/03/2008 @ 9:30pm

11. "was almost an admission that he knew he was about to lose,"

    that,

    or he's comforted by the "pennsylvania secret".......

    Posted by frosty zoom at 11/03/2008 @ 9:31pm

12. rio,

    so much projection, so little time.......

    Posted by frosty zoom at 11/03/2008 @ 10:06pm