It’s been a long week for politics. Trying to gauge Hillary Clinton’s “long goodbye,” is one thing, but watching John McCain assimilate into the Republican Borg is probably an event most observers hadn’t expected so soon.

It’s an organism that McCain had long repelled. But since maverick means “being independent in thought and action or exhibiting such independence,” according to the American Heritage Dictionary, it would seem McCain is on his way, and he’s had a little help from his friends this week: President Bush, Karl Rove, Joe Lieberman, Charles Krauthammer and Robert Novak among them.

Things culminated after McCain’s 968-word retort to Barack Obama’s 90-word poke at him for not supporting the bipartisan GI Bill that passed Thursday. It’s now clear that not only are Obama’s dangerous liberal friends and his inexperience on the table – so is his lack of military service (a campaign tactic McCain’s rebuked in the past). Combine this with the backchannel Internet buzz and radio squawking about Obama’s Muslimism, his angry Black nationalist Christian pastor, not mention his desire to play patty-cake with dictators, well, you couldn’t put it together better if it were in a Betty Crocker box: How to Pummel a Democrat in Five Easy Steps.

But where this cake may fall flat is what else happened this week. Chuck Hagel. Republican Chuck Hagel has Obama’s Back.

Hagel called his friend McCain out during public remarks made at an event Tuesday sponsored by the Ploughshares Fund at the Italian Embassy. Reporters were there. Hagel, with apparently no inhibition, upended McCain’s arguments about Obama’s ignorance and naïvete and pretty much told him to act his age. Hagel seemed to have had enough – and whether it was carefully choreographed or not – it hit its mark.

Better yet, Hagel spent even more time boostering for Obama, particularly on the issue of opening dialogue with so-called rogue regimes like Iran, the very sore spot The Borg hopes to expose and rub raw through the end of the fall. Oh yeah, and he talked about impeachment.

Hagel has been moving away from his party in earnest since early 2004, when he was already conveying a hint of buyer’s remorse over his vote to support the President’s authority to invade Iraq several months before. A Vietnam infantryman who had his face practically burned off in the war, he had come to question and reject the polices that led to that conflict long after he got home. He had a gut feeling about Iraq, too, as conveyed in his senate floor speech before the October 2002 vote:

We should not be seduced by the expectations of “dancing in the streets” after Saddam’s regime has fallen, the kites, the candy, and cheering crowds we expect to greet our troops, but instead, focus on the great challenges ahead, the commitment and resources that will be needed to ensure a democratic transition in Iraq and a more stable and peaceful Middle East
We should spend more time debating the cost and extent of this commitment, the risks we may face in military engagement with Iraq, the implications of the precedent of United States military action for regime change, and the likely character and challenges of a post-Saddam Iraq. We have heard precious little from the President, his team, as well as from this Congress, with a few notable exceptions, about these most difficult and critical questions.

Prescient, but he voted with the President anyway, a decision he has since regretted – like another former senator, John Edwards — and has not wavered in his criticism since. Nor has he held back on his colleagues for not standing up to Bush, like this, when he voted for a bill that would have stopped the troop surge in 2007:

If you wanted a safe job, go sell shoes. This is a tough business. But is it any tougher, us having to take a tough vote, express ourselves and have the courage to step up on what we’re asking our young men and women to do?
I don’t think so.

The difference between Hagel and Edwards may be that Hagel’s change of heart never smacked of political convenience – in the manner of a maverick, he’s risked alienation from his party, his friends, his support back home. He doesn’t — yet — seem to be animated by obvious political ambition.

Nevertheless, his very public complaints have mirrored and given credibility to Obama at a time when McCain and Co., are doing their best place him on the fringe, right next to Cindy Sheehan and George Soros. Remarks from Hagel like the ones he made Tuesday night say, “this guy ain’t stupid, he’s not marginal, there are a lot of us like him on Capitol Hill and it’s alright.”

In fact, Hagel and Obama are backed by a majority of the people in this country who think going to Iraq was wrong, and who are concerned that the administration would abandon diplomacy to rush into war with Iran. The GOP found out quick enough during the midterm elections they can’t take the so-called security vote for granted. Hagel has also tapped into a broadening desire for new party representation, and flirted with the idea of a bipartisan “unity” ticket in his new book. He’s retiring this year and some have speculated he might make a good running mate for Obama.

The prospect is interesting, but poses obvious challenges. While he is a virtually stainless senator from a conservative plains state who brings experience, military credentials and a heartland ethos to the table, Hagel’s overall record is nonetheless solid Republican in areas that might make liberal Democrats squirm, particularly on abortion, guns and crime. A pragmatic fiscal conservative rather than an outright social hardliner, Hagel would still have to do a lot of sidestepping on the trail to avoid an exodus to say, Ralph Nader or the eventual Green Party candidate, by a certain segment of the party.

But in favor of this unity ticket, the latest Pew Poll suggests that while the number of Democrats nationwide remains steady, Republicans are dropping and independents are gaining. When Hagel’s name was mentioned for a possible bipartisan run several months ago, moderate Democrats and independents seemed excited. Some say he would also make an impressive cabinet member in a Democratic administration, or even a kick-butt keynote speaker at the Democratic convention in August.

For now, given his support for Obama Thursday night, Hagel seems willing to guard Obama’s right flank. Sen. Jim Webb, a conservative Democrat and Vietnam vet, in remarks supporting the need for diplomacy with Iran in last Sunday’s appearance on “Meet the Press,” suggests he would have Obama covered on the left if and when he finally makes a clean endorsement.

When I interviewed Hagel for this piece in TAC last year, Hagel was riding a rumor that he would run for president. Many had hoped he would. Having interviewed politicians at varying levels over the years, I found Hagel to be as authentic as they come. It’s not hard to see the appeal for Obama – Hagel’s a straightforward, strong, confident small town guy who likes to cling to old fashioned ideas, like limited and honest government. A good guy to have on your crew, I would think, when fighting The Borg.