McCain's glass is half empty, and that glass is a urine sample

[Amerigo Vespucci]

GOP insider: ‘I think we’ve got a world of problems’
By: Steve Benen on Monday, June 9th, 2008 at 4:00 PM - PDT

http://www.crooksandliars.com/2008/06/09/gop-insider-i-think-weve-got-a-world-of-problems/



Just two weeks ago, the Politico ran an item about the enormous confidence the Republican establishment has about John McCain’s chances in November. As the piece put it, “any top GOP strategists believe he can defeat Barack Obama — and by a margin exceeding President Bush’s Electoral College victory in 2004.” In some Republican circles, the Politico’s article explained, there’s talk of a McCain “blowout.”

Two weeks later, that sense of bravado seems to be in short supply.

Bill Kristol noted in his NYT column this morning, “lmost every Republican I’ve talked to is alarmed that the McCain campaign doesn’t seem up to the task of electing John McCain.”

Similarly, Tom Edsall reported in the Huffington Post on the growing sense of dread among Republican insiders.

“I think we’ve got a world of problems,” said one Republican strategist with extensive experience in presidential campaigns. He said this came home to him with a thud when he watched Obama and McCain give speeches last Tuesday, with the Democrat speaking before “20,000 screaming fans, while John McCain looked every bit of his 72 years” in a speech televised from New Orleans. <…>

Another strategist with similar presidential experience said “McCain has not claimed the maverick ground that should be his. He has not seized the mantle of ‘change’ and reform that he could own by going to Washington and saying, ‘you know me. You know I’ve been a reformer all my life. Now, here’s how I am going to change Washington if you elect me president.’ And he has not taken economic turf. He has not explained how he is going to grow, not Washington, as the Democrats plan, but this economy to meet the challenges of global competition.”

The glass-half-full take, at least for the GOP, is that this appears to be a Democratic year, and McCain is very close to Obama in national polls. The glass-half-empty approach is that McCain seems to have hit his ceiling of support, and that’s after months of scrutiny-free campaigning.

This obviously isn’t rocket science. McCain has the Republican Party in a bit of a panic, not because his poll numbers are iffy, but because he’s really not offering much as a national candidate, at least not yet. McCain offers more of the same…

Tom Mann of the Brookings Institution argues that “McCain continues to embrace Bush policies on the most important issues, relying on a reputation for independence and moderation that could be lost in the heat of battle with Obama and the Democrats…. ‘Elect me because the other guy is worse.’ Not much of an argument in the face of gale-force winds blowing against the Republican Party.”

…doesn’t offer much in the way of a vision for the future…

Arch-conservative Bay Buchanan suggested that it may not matter what McCain does. Writing in Human Events on June 4, she declared: “In reality there is only one candidate. Barack Obama. In November he will win or he will lose. John McCain is relevant only in so far as he is not Barack Obama. The Senator from Arizona is incapable of energizing his party, brings no new people to the polls, and has a personality that is best kept under wraps.”

…and when push comes to shove, McCain just isn’t a great campaigner.

For one, he’s extremely undisciplined. With virtually no pressure on him at all, he’s already offered a series of troubling gaffes. He’s also prone to — as Kaus says — “reflexive righteous blunderbuss denials” that often get him in more trouble than the original accusation. Third, he’s a horrible speaker. Finally, his fundraising operation has not only been anemic, it’s based on the models of the past.

To be sure, this doesn’t mean Obama is a lock. Far from it — he has a Democratic Party to bring back together, he has plenty of working-class whites to win over, the right-wing attack machine is just now starting to sharpen its fangs, latent racism remains an unknown factor, and there are some widely-believed-but-completely-bogus myths about him and his family that he’ll have to work to overcome.

But under the circumstances, who do you think would want to switch places with the other? McCain or Obama?

[eShirl]

1. is he playing rope-a-dope?

Or is he really as poor of a candidate as he appears these days?

[Amerigo Vespucci]

4. He's the lost kid in a shopping mall...

...hoping a kind stranger will buy him an ice cream cone and call his mommy.

Don't get me wrong.

I did not serve in the military. I salute every man or woman who did, who IS, and who WILL.

McCain's time in the "Hanoi Hilton?"

Just as sure as Kerry deserved his Purple Heart, I acknowledge John McCain as a war hero.

That doesn't mean he should be President of the United States.

He shouldn't. It would be Bush-Cheney's third term.

So YES, he is a poor candidate, but the BEST among a field of LESSER candidates, which should tell you all you need to know about his campaign, and the current state of the GOP.

:patriot:

[Canuckistanian]

2. I find it significant

That McCain hasn't breathed a WORD about his ONE major accomplishment - McCain-Feingold.

It's a poison issue to the 20% knuckle-dragger crowd, but it could be a major selling point to undecideds.

I don't think he knows WHO he should be pandering to.

[eShirl]

11. it's like two different people - McCain-Then and McCain-Now

[Wapsie B]

3. " personality that is best kept under wraps.”

Maybe it's time to unwrap it. Just say'n...........

[billybob537]

5. We shud get us som o that reform Daddy

Shut up you Idiot were the incumbent

[Gabi Hayes]

6. whence it came:

[Amerigo Vespucci]

7. Why War Hero McCain is a COWARD in 25 words or less

...he allowed Karl Fucking ROVE to call his Bangladeshi adopted DAUGHTER an "illegitimate black baby."

She's neither "illegitimate" nor "black"

She is a beautiful child who was ORPHANED.

Nothing wrong with EITHER category, of course...children are INNOCENT.

But if you are "none of the above," maybe your DAD is nothing more than a fucking COWARD for sucking up to ROVE and blowing him until he agrees to manage your campaign and who would ALLOW YOU TO BE CALLED AN ILLEGITIMATE BLACK BABY by FAT-ASSED MOTHERF**KER ROVE.

The "Hanoi Hilton" shit is NULL AND VOID.

McCain wiped his "heroic" ASS with that.

McCain WAS a War Hero.

In 2008, he is a coward and a "bottom b**tch."

That's all she wrote.

[Gabi Hayes]

8. Love your caption!

[Ichingcarpenter]

9. I like the Uncle Fester poster....for GRAMPS!

They're creepy and they're spooky altogether cookie

[Gabi Hayes]

10. It's the WIZ!

http://home.comcast.net/~wizardofwhimsy