story. the national journal tracking the senator s voting record showing just how conservative mccain has become. mccain starting off last decade with a composite conservative score of 61.7 out of 100. the two years mr. mccain ran for president he did not vote enough to be fairly sampled, but last year that score jumped to 84.3. joining me now is msnbc political analyst and author of renegade: the making of a president, richard wolf. good evening, lawrence. if john mccain is trying to go to the right in arizona, get conservative votes, teach me what i don t know about arizona. explain to me why the guy who may be one of the most liberal republicans in the senate we know he voted for the jobs bill, scott brown, he s also pro choice and always has been. explain to me how that senator from massachusetts helps mccain
behalf of all cgi creatures everywhere stating the hayworth ad is insulting to native americans here in arizona and across america. oscar-worthy ads aside, the numbers tell a much different story. the national journal tracking the senator s voting record showing just how conservative mccain has become. mccain starting off last decade with a composite conservative score of 61.7 out of 100. the two years mr. mccain ran for president, he did not vote enough to be fairly sampled, but last year that score jumped to 84.3. joining me now is msnbc political analyst and author of renegade: the making of a president, richard wolf. good evening, richard. good evening, lawrence. if john mccain is trying to go to his right in arizona, get conservative votes, teach me what i don t know about arizona.
the supposedly libertarian- leaning conservatives that his presidential candidacy inspired. if they re not cool with ron paul, who are they cool with? joining us now is dave weigel, the senior reporter for the washington independent. he reported on this weekend s tea party convention in nashville. david, it s very nice to see you. thanks for being here good to see you. thanks. let me just ask you the last question. if they re not cool with ron paul who are they cool with? i would have expected it to be a nice fit between the tea party movement and mr. paul. he s never been a good fit with these types of conservative activists because of the war issue. i kind of got misty-eyed looking at the old tea party videos. i was at one in 2007 in georgetown where a ron paul activist put things like federal reserve and unsound money on boxes and then jumped and smashed the boxes after they threw them on the floor. so they really did invent all of this stuff. but the tea party movement is mor
outgrowth of the angry people we saw frustrated during the mccain/palin campaign saying unpolitically correct things at rallies. ron paul s movement, his presidential campaign was always much more positive and much more about these, this basket of ideas that libertarians could implement that would fix the country. when he talked about getting back to the constitution from the founders he was talking about getting american bases shut down, pulling out of foreign wars, abolishing social security. things like that. the palin version of tea party conservativism is a little bit less specific. it s a lot more slogany. it has, you know, i guess you could write the talking points on your hand if you wanted to. and it s not so much about these well thought out historical solutions but there s a general idea of the constitution and it just so happens to fit in with things that the republican party
we saw frustrated during the mccain/palin campaign saying unpolitically correct things at rallies. not an outgrowth of the tea parties before. ron paul s movement, his presidential campaign was always much more positive and much more about these this basket of ideas that libertarians could implement that would fix the country. when he talked about getting back not constitution, getting back to the founders vision, he was talking about getting american bases shut down, pulling out of foreign wars, abolishing social security, things like that. the palin version of tea party conservativism is a little bit less specific. it s a lot more slogany. it has you know, i guess you could write the talking points on your hand if you wanted to. and it s not so much about these well thought out historical solutions but there s a general idea of the constitution, and it just so happens to fit in with things that the republican party right now is very much into. so, yeah. there s less there ar