Why McCain went Right
I’ll admit I have a morbid fascination with the McCain Campaign. I can’t help it. It’s like a natural disaster that no one could have predicted. Right now all fingers are pointing to Sarah Palin, but she isn’t the woman who made McCain run to The Right. Hillary Clinton is.
Let me explain.
Think PUMA was upset when Clinton didn’t get the nomination? Well, their disappointment paled in comparison to the McCain Campaign. Once Obama became the presumptive nominee McCain’s entire strategy crumbled.
Now it’s no secret the Christian Right despised John McCain. They didn’t trust him one little bit. They doubted he shared their “values”. And even though right-wing talk radio harshly criticized their new Republican nominee the McCain Campaign barely spared them a second thought. They didn’t have to worry about Rush or the base because they were going to be running against Hillary. And while the republican base may not happily vote for McCain they could be counted on to perform cartwheels while voting against a Clinton.
And John McCain counted on that Clinton hate. Hell, he bet the farm on it carrying him to victory. With Hillary Clinton as the Democratic nominee then John McCain could easily bank the votes of Far Right and run as a centrist/moderate/maverick. The core base would be too busy spitting out 527 ads to pay much attention to the candidate they weren’t voting “for” anyway. To them defeating Hillary would become their crusade, and they could be relied upon to stop at nothing in achieving their quest. John McCain gaining the White House was merely an incidental.
But then the Democrats went and nominated Barack Obama. This nomination was the flipping the political chess board. The game was over and McCain was in serious trouble. In that instant the townspeople McCain counted on (and had pretty much ignored) put down their torches and pitchforks and… shrugged.
Now I’m not giving McCain and Co. a pass. And I don’t want to hear any bitching, after all is said and done, about how McCain wasn’t allowed to be McCain. If he chose to play the good, little soldier rather than the Commander In Chief role then that is by far his greatest failing. Any leader worth their salt plans for multiple scenarios. McCain did not. In fact, he wasted valuable time during the spring and summer with his head in the sand. By the time the Democratic Convention rolled around his last hope had been dashed. Obama picked Biden, not Hillary. And with that one move McCain’s loss of the Republican base was complete. Overnight McCain found himself thrust into the role of the neglectful lover. How could he woo back a group he not only ignored, but shamelessly took for granted?
Enter Sarah Palin. In essence McCain replaced one woman with another, and in the process achieved the same result- his own irrelevancy. No one is voting “for” McCain. And what’s worse is that he’s sold his soul to a group that, up until the conventions, he’d only shown barely concealed contempt. The man whose entire strategy was based on his appeal to moderate voters – while letting the 527s run wild – has now found himself plastered with mud. He has rewritten his own history, and it ain’t honorable. Oh, sweet irony!
Tags: 2008 Presidential, Hillary, McCain, Sarah Palin, The Right
Interesting analysis. It certainly could explain why he did almost nothing between February and June to get his base behind him, he was counting on their Clinton Derangement Syndrome. However, it was apparent since March that Obama would be the nominee so I still don’t really understand his inaction in the spring.
I agree with you, pandora. I find the McCain campaign utterly fascinating in its ineptitude.
UI, I honestly think they never believed the Dems would “let” Obama have the nomination, and if he did get it then he HAD to put Clinton on the ticket.
Didn’t anyone else feel a little nervous before the Dem convention?
I think that is 100% spot on. Thanks for laying it out so clearly.
One of the things that too many of us accept is that John McCain — before this election — was a moderate republican.
He wasn’t and still isn’t.
His voting record is of a fairly doctrinaire conservative republican, albeit one that that was minted well before the Gingrich revolution required a complete joining with the hive mind. Of course, McCain did famously work on and got passed some bi-partisan legislation, but this was legislation that was important to him for a variety of reasons. We forget though, that there was a long legislative history of bipartisanship before the Rs decided that they needed to pass legislation with the majority of their majority — Ds joining in wasn’t an important goal to them.
The assumption of a Clinton vs McCain fight was that McCain would have an easier time bringing along the Independent voter who would be, right about now, reliving the greatest hits of the missteps of the Clinton administration.
McCain went to the right because he is that far off to the right — he has just had excellent skills and a very compliant press corps in selling that.
I agree to a point, Cassandra. Whether or not (and I believe NOT) he deserved it McCain was perceived as a moderate. He was planning on milking this perception for all it was worth to get what he wanted.
Unmasking the “real” McCain has been quite fascinating, and explains why he’s lost the moderates and independents I was nervous he’d end up winning.
He was perceived as moderate, but one of the things I said repeatedly back in the spring is that McCain had never had to respond to a campaign that would vigorously work at deconstructing that facade. Obama’s critique of that so-called moderation was unflagging (often whithering) and now most folks see McCain — rightly — as too ideologically close to Bush.
Personally, I wonder if John Kerry would have challenged the “common wisdom” about John McCain so directly.
Pretty much McCain’s entire political career can be summed up by saying that he’s done whatever is in the best of interest of John McCain. If it meant making himself over as some sort of populist crusader after the Keating Five bit, so be it. In the last eight years, it meant cozying up to the Bush administration, moving out of step only when it might have meant a victory for him personally. You can’t blame him for wanting to run with the “in-crowd,” but he CAN’T hold himself out as a reformer or some sort of outsider. That dog don’t hunt.
Good stuff!
If McCain loses, the day he picked Palin as VP will go down as the day he lost it. The ‘it’ being socially-liberal fiscal conservatives and Indies.
The pick flew in the face of all the bullshit he was spewing from day one…..Country First. Well, anyone with half a brain knew he was pandering to the mythical PUMAs and the reptilian-GOP base. But what really destroyed his candidacy was the way he turned his back on his most ardent supporters, the Press. I really do believe that McCain thought the press just would fall in line, regarding the Palin sequestering. But to our benefit, the press actually did their job. Who wudda thunk it? And with that, the many faces of John McCain began to be peeled-back and it revealed to the world the person really he is.
Many pundits will blame his shift to the right and Palin as the main reasons for his downfall. But in reality, McCain was never the person he projected to be…..just like Bush, he was a child of privilege and a contemptuous little fuck who whined when he didn’t get his way….Finish at the bottom of your class? Well, here’s a spot at the War College; only the best and brightest get to go! Your lack of book-learnin’ and application of training manifests into at least 3 jet crashes? Sure son-of-a-son-of-an-Admiral! Here’s another multi-million dollar tax-payer funded play toy for you! The same manifestation and mavericky attitude gets you shot down over N. Vietnam? Sure, go ahead and tell your captors who your daddy is…just so you can get the medical treatment you so truly deserve! Your POW-mates can just suck it up! Need a job? Dump your crippled wife for a newer, wealthier model. Hell, just go ahead and move to a district you’ve never lived in and run! You’re a war hero and Cindy will pay for it! Get busted helping out your wealthy benefactor? Change your image. Become the Maverick! Kiss-up to the press and play the role of party-spoiler (but only when it’s convenient – such as opposing Bush’s budget in 2001. It wasn’t ideology or conservatism; it was payback for the 2000 campaign and to possibly set-up a run in 2004….but alas, 9-11 changed everything). Need votes? Embrace the bastards you once publically condemned! Hire a wing-nut-wet-dream, ditto-head as your VP!
McCain the Maverick was about as real as WWF wrestling persona….Marketed and tested for public consumption, but in reality, not as seen on TV.
What the masses didn’t know was McCain’s always been about #1 from the day he entered the USNA. I think they know it now, and I’m sure Janet Napolitano is aware that a Senate seat may be up for grabs in 2010.
Wow, VC! Brilliant comment.
I think that all of us, who’ve been speaking the truth about McCain for years, feel vindicated. Hell, two weeks ago my mother (a pretty informed liberal) told me that McCain wasn’t really pro-life. Picture my head exploding!
And you’re correct. Turning his back on the press was a huge mistake. It made him vulnerable in ways he never was before.
Yes, I think VC is right. McCain lost the election for sure when he picked Palin. It didn’t matter that it looked like a huge win for him for a couple of weeks after the convention. He went for a base pick and that would alienate the moderates. I also agree that turning away from the media and becoming just another media-bashing conservative really hurt his image. Even now there are many members of the press who are trying to make excuses for him – probably because they don’t want to admit that they were fooled and he was never the man they thought he was.
Thanks!
The veneer is clear to the one’s paying attention.
“If you have to remind everyone who you are, you’re probably not.”
The lies, smears, and insistence on Palin’s bona fides, really turned the national press against him. Take note of all the local reporters that now have access to the McCampaign….bypass the big-wigs and give the small guys a chance!
Right! They’re just looking for sheep to promote and not question their talking-points.
True, UI. I guess my point was what, I believed, led him to picking Palin. An option I’m convinced wouldn’t have existed if Hillary was in the picture.
Think Hillary is having the last laugh?
SENATOR STEVENS GUILTY