McCain's Moment

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But more basically, McCain has managed to dig into the rich and unsettled lobe of the American psyche that, in the shadow of impeachment and in the arms of prosperity, wants nothing more from politics than for something good to happen. Some have called it a tide, but it's almost an ache, not so much about anything specific as about everything in general. When the voters finally spoke last week, they all but said they want the national conversation to be civil and square, not empty or jaded, and they want a leader who will explain what he wants to do and level with them when he gets it wrong.

This was the campaign Bush set out to run, with that talk of restoring the dignity of the office--and McCain is beating him at his own game. "People want to elect a statue," observes Oklahoma Governor Frank Keating, a devout Bush backer. "They want a hero, an unblemished and unvarnished guy in the White House. They don't want to revisit the agony of the past eight years. Bush has to show his character is unvarnished and unblemished." But he's going to have to get past McCain to do it.

"Fine mess you've gotten me into, Weaver," snapped McCain in jest to the 40-year-old political director who first went to McCain in February 1997 to persuade him to run. As word of McCain's rout spread, family members drifted into his suite; children ran between the sofas and chairs, grazing the tables, spilling their Shirley Temples. McCain's daughter Sidney spun youngest son Jimmy as if they were doing the lindy hop. When the networks finally called the race, Cindy's hands flew to her mouth, and her eyes filled; the aides let out a cheer. McCain hugged his wife tightly but did not smile. This was going to take some getting used to.

By the time McCain heard the official results, he had been practicing his acceptance speech off and on for three hours. "Slow, slow, slow," he said to himself as he paced in his suite, as if he were preparing to deliver a eulogy rather than frame the meaning of this moment. This was not a time for whooping or wisecracks; a lot of the country was going to be seeing him for the first time, and he needed to look like a Man Who Could Be President. "The only other speech that will be more important will be his acceptance speech at the convention," said his California coordinator, Ken Khachigian, who was traveling with the campaign through New Hampshire and South Carolina.

The goal was to take the reform message that had played so well in the boutique politics of New Hampshire and ramp it up into a national crusade. Reform had to mean more than McCain's trademark campaign-finance agenda; now it would mean a new kind of party, a new kind of politics with a new kind of leader. "They said there wasn't room for reform in the Republican Party," said McCain, resurrecting a line from his announcement speech. "Well, we've made room."