I wrote a while back, with reference to John McCain, about the difference between honor and reputation, arguing that Sen. McCain knew the difference even if the New York Times didn’t (and presumably still doesn’t). Now Sen. McCain’s campaign has released a rather extraordinary Web ad which, inter alia, proves that he does indeed know that difference well. Perhaps the most remarkable thing about this ad is that it’s all about how he learned that difference—and that it’s unsparing about just how much he had to learn, and how much growing up he had to do, before he went to war. He’s not pulling any punches about the kind of person he was before his stay in the “Hanoi Hilton,” and I respect him even more for that.
