No piling on our guy whether we like him or not

Steve Chapman:

A couple of weeks ago, John McCain strained to ingratiate himself with the activists gathered at the Conservative Political Action Conference. It was an uphill climb: By that point, some movement icons had publicly renounced the presumptive Republican nominee, and attendees were urged not to boo him. Some did anyway, and Mr. McCain was left to ponder the possibility of being abandoned by much of his party's base.

He shouldn't have worried. All it took to rally conservatives behind him was the intervention of the New York Times. Thursday, it published a flimsy, anonymously sourced story suggesting he may have canoodled nine years ago with a cute female lobbyist whose clients had business before his committee. How bad was the article? Years from now, if you type into Google, "Why do people hate the news media?" this story will pop up.

Those who were angered by Mr. McCain's gentle treatment by liberal journalists were angered to see him handled roughly by the same scribes. They quit attacking him and began blasting the New York Times, which had given them plenty of ammunition. Note to the Times: When Sean Hannity sounds like the voice of responsible journalism, you've done something wrong.

With that, the great Republican civil war pretty ended. Conservatives will never embrace Mr. McCain for his views on immigration, campaign finance or global warming. But they may come to echo what was said when Grover Cleveland was nominated for president in 1884: "We love him most for the enemies he has made."

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I am reminded of a Newsweek story from the 1060s talking about how sports had eased the transition from segregation. It was written before the "N" word was banished from such publications. The story described a football game where a man yelled from the stands, "Hey ref. Tell those 'N words' to stop piling on our colored boys."