The Wall Street Journal-20080202-Mettle of Honor

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Mettle of Honor

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Judging by his campaign's rise, fall and new ascension, John McCain's energy is most controlled and effective when he's low in the polls, but becomes volatile when he's up.

Take Wednesday's debate at the Reagan library. Hot off his critical victory in Florida, Mr. McCain might have settled into a role as confident frontrunner. Instead, he came across as nasty, even laying into Mitt Romney as some kind of robber baron for having succeeded in business: "Oh, I'm sure that, as I say, he's a fine man. And I think he managed companies, and he bought, and he sold, and sometimes people lost their jobs." Mr. Romney also helped to create many more jobs, and such dynamism is called capitalism, which Mr. McCain at other times claims to believe in.

The exchange, along with some others, reflects a couple of Mr. McCain's less appealing traits. One is his occasional penchant for antibusiness demagoguery, as when he attacked drug companies in a previous debate, only to have Mr. Romney respond, "Don't turn the pharmaceutical companies into the big bad guys." Mr. McCain shot back, "Well, they are."

It's also obvious that Mr. McCain takes politics personally, which can shade into self-righteousness when people oppose his positions. One of our colleagues called Mr. McCain's performance on Wednesday a "victory snarl," which was about right. Should the Senator sew up the Republican nomination, none of this is the way to unite his party, or to reassure conservatives that his fall campaign will be about more than his personal honor or renegade habits of mind.