I am convinced that, despite the hatred on FR for McCain, that he'd have made a much better president than either of the Bushes. I say this because of his arrogance and ego which I believe would have made much more of a difference in beating down the forces of Islam (really crushing them), then re-hiring many of the Baathist Party membership to run the infrastructure--the water works, sewage, electric company, etc., instead of trashing all of them the way GWB let Amb. Bremmer and Rumsfeld do after the downfall of Saddam--remember this is exactly what George Patton did when it came to running his sector in Germany with former Nazi members. IMO this, and the fact there were too few troops to stop the looting and general chaos, led directly to the beginning of the insurgency. There were also too fee troops on the borders in allowing Al Qieda into the country.
I do not know if he would have been as effective as Reagan in forcing bipartisanship, however...and, let us not forget, Reagan FORCED folks such as Tip O'Neil and company go along with him simply because of force of leadership and going directly to the people--it was something that neither of the Bushes were ever able to do.
BTW, it is interesting that you tag yourself after Nathan Forest. It is a shame that most people will always equate him with the founding of the KKK instead of also calling for its disbandment after it became a terror organization rather than a tough political one for Southern rights and violence replaced what had begun as just plain hard-nose politics...however, I do question his war conduct of the Fort Pillow massacre.