Sen. John McCain is well known for his occasional irascibility. He is capable of taking umbrage and venting his pique in public. He has assailed corporate leaders and even lashed out against members of his own party from time to time.

So we have to believe that he has been downright disgusted by Barack Obama’s vacuous promises, his calls for appeasing terrorists, his refusal to admit that the Iraq Surge succeeded, his suggestion that the energy crisis can be solved by inflating tires and “getting tune-ups,” his insistence that working as a Chicago legal aid attorney somehow qualifies him to be president and his Napoleonic deportment during his recent world tour.

If McCain is as appalled as we are by Obama’s callowness and naiveté, his campaign has done an excellent job of camouflaging it. Where is McCain’s righteous indignation? Obama served only 143 days in the U.S. Senate before he declared for the presidency. He never ran a business, never served in the military and never introduced a significant piece of legislation. Neither is he a fount of original thoughts, his only literary contribution consisting of a book he wrote about himself.

McCain, on the other hand, has served in the U.S. Senate for 33 years. He is a war hero. Whether one agrees with him on significant issues, he has been one of this generation’s leading Senate voices. He placed his career on the line in backing the Surge and won the bet.

So why does the McCain campaign look and sound collegial, understated and “senatorial”? The former Navy pilot has earned a reputation as a “straight talker.” But the voters have yet to obtain from him the candor they deserve.

McCain’s recent ads ask the question: Is Obama “ready to lead”? His campaign thus requires voters to reflect when no reflection is necessary. This is a question that should be answered rather than asked. There is nothing about his background or ideas that qualify him to lead the U.S. Why won’t McCain just say that?

The Sacramento Union endorsed Obama over Hillary Clinton in the California Democratic Primary because he seemed to embrace an ideology more flexible and less narrow than Clinton’s. But Obama has revealed himself to be just a younger, hipper version of John Kerry and Al Gore. His views are indistinguishable from Kerry’s failed prescriptions of four years ago. He has displayed an anti-military arrogance and a “blame America first” disposition that are the hallmarks of an unregenerate leftist.

This is far too critical a juncture in the global War on Terror to entrust America’s future to a self-described “citizen of the world” who would treat terrorists less like combatants and more like criminal defendants. America’s economy is far too fragile to be placed in the hands of someone who wants to raise taxes. McCain needs to say this, not just infer it.

The McCain campaign thus far bears a troubling resemblance to the failed 1996 campaign of another cantankerous senator and war hero, Bob Dole. Either Dole himself was reluctant to tell voters the unvarnished truth about Bill Clinton or his handlers were unwilling to let him.

McCain is basically a conservative with maverick tendencies. Some of his ideological idiosyncrasies have nettled core constituencies. We prefer that he ditch the junk science of global warming, recognize the need to drill for oil in ANWR, abandon the notion of amnesty for illegal aliens and attack Obama as we have seen him attack some Republicans.

McCain needs to demonstrate that he is the same tough guy who stood up to the Hanoi prison camp torturers, George Bush and his blow-hard colleagues in the Congress. He should remind us that he took on Bush and budget earmarks when no other Republican would.

He needs to tell us how he is going to restore American prosperity and contrast that with Obama’s liberal tax-and-spend ideology. McCain wants to cut taxes; Obama wants to raise them. McCain wants to drill for oil; Obama wants to inflate tires. McCain wants to end earmarks; Obama wants to socialize healthcare and about everything else he can get his hands on.

McCain needs to make clear that our most important national priority must be to destroy international terrorism and protect America. He needs to take ownership of the Surge, and remind voters that Obama favored abandoning Iraq to al-Qaida.

Finally, he must tell voters the truth about open borders and out-of-control illegal immigration. Importing undeserving people into the U.S. is bankrupting our hospitals, burdening our schools and filling our jails. McCain should demand respect for American sovereignty.

Election Day is less than three months away. It is not too late to run a campaign that will put 40 or more states into McCain’s electoral column. But that is not going to happen if McCain’s media moments involve holding hands with the Dalai Lama, sitting in a golf cart with George H. W. Bush and watching a distracted housewife pick up fallen produce from a supermarket floor.

John McCain, where are you? We want you back.

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