Republican Senator John McCain has the unique distinction of being the Republican candidate that even Republicans don’t like. After taking the GOP lead on Super Tuesday, McCain is now attracting more criticism than ever as liberals and conservatives alike unite in their mutual distaste for the Arizona Senator. Republicans think he’s too liberal, Democrats think he’s too conservative, and no one seems to know quite how to take his policies on a variety of subjects.

McCain’s recent comment that he would support staying in Iraq for a million years, as long as Iraqi soldiers are the only ones being killed, pushed away many of the liberals he’d drawn in with his anti-torture campaign.

Even die-hard Republicans are vowing their support for a Democratic candidate as the only reasonable alternative to voting for McCain if he wins the Republican nomination.

What is it about this war veteran that has so united such diverse groups of voters? His policies on taxes and immigration inflame the conservatives, while his stances on abortion and gay marriage are among the complaints from liberals. But one thing that nearly every McCain non-supporter agrees with is that his propensity for flip-flopping really sets their blood boiling.

There are plenty of McCain flip-flops to choose from, and picking just five was not an easy task. Of course, some changes that seem like flip-flops can indeed be natural changes of opinion, which everyone - even a presidential nominee - is allowed to have. Regardless, some position changes can’t be called anything other than what they are: flip-flops designed to attract a certain group of voters.

1. McCain sponsored and strongly endorsed a campaign finance reform bill which even carries his name, but he failed to support a vital component of the bill in January of 2007.

2. In 1999, McCain claimed that he would never vote to repeal Roe v. Wade because of the danger it would cause to women around the country. Then, in 2006, he claimed to support a repeal because the issue should “return to the states.”

3. The anti-torture bill that McCain so energetically supported failed to receive such an energetic defense from him in court when it was invoked to protect the rights of a Guantanamo Bay detainee.

4. Sen. McCain once had a huge problem with the Wyly brothers, two businessmen who were largely responsible for the ads that took down McCain’s presidential bid in 2000. He referred to them as “coyotes” and claimed that their tactics were illegal. Guess who McCain solicited financial support from in 2006.

5. Once a very vocal opponent of Bush’s tax cuts for the wealthy, McCain rapidly changed position and promised to support some of the very same bills in 2006.

The cynics among us might say that it’s a series of remarkable coincidences that most of McCain’s flip-flops have served to make him more appealing to conservatives once his position as a 2008 presidential candidate was looking more secure. Of course, most of these policy changes have had the opposite effect, as conservatives have a much better memory and liberals have far less tolerance than McCain hoped.