In endorsing Hillary Clinton over Barack Obama in the Democratic primary, we noted that it was an easy call for us: She was the more conservative, so she got our vote. The presidential race is an even easier call: Send John McCain to the White House instead of Obama.

Heaven knows, John McCain isn't a perfect conservative. He's too proud of being a “maverick,” which means he likes to cross the aisle and cooperate with the likes of Ted Kennedy on ill-conceived government monstrosities. His McCain-Feingold bill, for example, ignores the First Amendment in its quest for campaign finance “reform.” He's too willing to open our borders for a “comprehensive” immigration plan. He can be stampeded into harmful policies because of hype about global climate change.

But his instincts are good, and he is conservative where it counts. He is a fiscal hawk in a time when government is far too bloated and overreaching, for example.

And Obama is a perfect liberal - perhaps the most liberal presidential candidate of the modern era. Despite his talk of a “new kind of politics,” he has the same old bag of redistribute-the-wealth tricks. It might have fancier language, but his politics of envy isn't exactly new. Perhaps too many voters are suffering so much from Bush fatigue that they can ignore that, but they do so at their peril.

It seems likely that Democrats will increase their majority in the House, and they might even gain a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate. Imagine the damage that could be done in four years by Obama in the White House and Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid in the Congress.

And think even longer than four years. It seems likely that at least two Supreme Court justices will need to be replaced in the next four years. McCain would nominate justices who believe the Constitution means what it says. Obama would appoint justices who just make it up as they go along.

Finally, it is still a dangerous world out there, which the current financial crisis can make us forget. There are people out there who wish us harm and have the ability to cause it. Of all the candidates who sought the presidency this year, McCain stands alone as the one best able to handle that danger. He has the ability to make the tough calls and the judgment to handle the unforeseen crisis.