I have been refraining from blabbering about political matters for a while now. The time for making fun of the revolting buffoon currently residing at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue is well past: The Drumpf regime is no laughing matter and hasn’t been in quite a long time (if ever it was). I find myself struggling daily to comprehend the horrifying depths to which this pathetic excuse for a human being will sink, aided and encouraged by the shameless complicity of his spellbound cabal. Watching clips of Drumpf’s never-ending campaign rallies I despair of the possibility that we can ever find common ground again in any of the core values that this flawed union was founded upon. The hate and divisiveness seem overwhelming and appeals to reason and decency fall on deaf ears.   The passing of Senator John McCain, however, provides an exceptional opportunity for reflection. I long found John McCain to be a frustrating presence in the national political debate—frustrating because I considered him a thoughtful, honorable and decent individual whose hawkish tendencies I strongly disagreed with. In the waning days of the second Obama administration, when the nuclear treaty with Iran was being hammered out, I was dismayed to hear McCain insist that we should not be negotiating with the Iranians—his approach was more along the lines of ‘Bomb now, talk later.’ Of course, I was adamantly opposed to his presidential ambitions and his fateful decision to hitch his star to the likes of Sarah Palin for the 2008 campaign was ill advised in the extreme, not only in terms of how it diminished McCain’s own stature but in that it conferred a certain degree of legitimacy on the nascent Tea Party movement. Those now seem like innocent and idealistic times.