Like many people, I have a hard time feeling sorry for Republican presidential candidate John McCain of Arizona. He always seems so utterly self-sufficient and confident — even pugnaciously cocksure — of every position he takes that empathy just feels wrong, somehow. He’s withstood the rigors of the Hanoi Hilton, after all, and become a national figure; why would he need my pity or concern about anything?

Still, I do feel for Senator McCain today because it seems increasingly likely that that’s the highest office he’s going to reach in this lifetime — senator. A new Mason-Dixon poll of likely voters in the key early state of Iowa shows McCain tied for 5th among Republican presidential aspirants, pulling just 6 percent of the vote. And when you once were thought of as the man to beat for the Republican nomination, but now are effectivelly tied with knuckle-draggers like Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee and Kansas Sen. Sam Brownback, who have said publicly they do not believe in evolution, the reversal of fortune has to hurt.

Yes, some of the blame for the low level of public esteem rests with never-to-be-President McCain himself. No one told him to cozy up to plummeting lame duck President George W. Bush or make unswayable support for the despised Iraq War his primary identifying characteristic. But some of the bad things happening to Sen. McCain just aren’t his fault.

Like this, courtesy of the McCain tormentors over at Wonkette:

Yes, those are a bunch of pictures of John McCain’s wife, Cindy, as published in Harper’s Bazaar magazine. And yes, the now-never-to-be-first lady is standing on a tire.