A Glimpse of the Real McCain
By Alan Stewart Carl | Related entries in 2008 Election, Bush, McCain
What has George Bush done wrong in his presidency?
Spending, the conduct of the war in Iraq for years, growth in the size of government, larger than any time since the Great Society, laying a $10 trillion debt on future generations of America, owing $500 billion to China, obviously, failure to both enforce and modernize the [financial] regulatory agencies that were designed for the 1930s and certainly not for the 21st century, failure to address the issue of climate change seriously…
And that’s not even a Democrat.
In fact, that’s John McCain in a recent interview with the Washington Times. He also added that he disagrees with Bush’s use of executive privilege to sidestep oversight and Dick Cheney’s assertion that the vice president is part of both the executive and legislative branch.
I agree with everything McCain said about Bush. But if McCain wanted to run away from his own party’s president this forcefully, why not begin doing so two months ago? And why not choose a running mate who appealed to the center rather than one who has appealed primarily to the base?
This is the great error of the McCain campaign – a complete inability to integrate the Republican base with political independents. And I don’t know how much of that is McCain’s fault and how much is the party’s fault. I’m not sure the Republican base can be integrated with significant numbers of middle-of-the-road independents. The party has compromised too many of their convictions and has become too defensive of positions that don’t deserve defending.
I’ve never believed the Democratic spin that McCain would just be another Bush. Some might call this recent criticism of the current administration a desperate move. But I think this is the real John McCain who’s too often been consumed by the machinery of his own campaign. Unfortunately, it’s too late to brand himself as a third-way candidate. And I don’t think he’s even trying to – I think this is just a frustrated man releasing some steam and the McCain we’ll see over the last twelve days will be the same we’ve seen during the last several months.
If McCain loses this election as predicted, I think he’ll look back and regret the choices he made in the final months of his campaign. Hemmed in by his own party, thumped by an economic crisis and hurt by his own failures of judgment, McCain has just never acted like the real John McCain. That’s a terrible shame. The real McCain could have won this thing.
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October 23rd, 2008 at 10:26 am
I think you’re spot-on here, Alan. The GOP has run so hard on wedge issues over the past decade that the job of appealing to both the base and independents is nearly impossible at this point. Although I’m an Obama supporter, I can definitely see where it’s been easier for him to appeal to both Democrats and independents with a unified message.
Unfortunately, I think McCain’s messaging confusion began after the 2000 election, and is also where I lost a lot of respect for him. He was raked through the coals by Bush’s campaign, in part due to his moderate image, and then essentially gave up on that image to regain his party’s favor. Trying to reconcile the pre-2000 McCain with the post-2000 McCain is no easy task, either for McCain or voters, IMO.
October 23rd, 2008 at 10:37 am
Double Amen! Too little, too late! McCain and the GOP don’t deserve to win. And America in financial crisis doesn’t deserve Obama and Democrat control of all three “Houses.” Our “leadership” is pathetic (both current and potential)! It’s a Perfect Storm Nightmare! What’s a real Independent to do? Vote 3rd Party, keep the fingers crossed, and pray (if you’re so inclined) for the next few years.
October 23rd, 2008 at 11:36 am
Alan
I’m having a hard time juxtaposing your positions on “who is the real Barack Obama” and “who is the real John McCain”. On the one hand, you had a post yesterday saying that we haven’t seen enough of Obama and because we don’t have a long record we can’t judge who he really is. On the other hand, today you sieze on one of the more favorable of the many McCain’s we’ve seen over this campaign, and say that this must be the real McCain.
It’s just a little strange to me that Obama has had a consistent message through the campaign while McCain has been all over the map, yet the posts are “who is Barack Obama” and “I know who the real McCain is”.
October 23rd, 2008 at 11:43 am
Yup, spot on, Alan. Frankly, I blame the party first. Why did they nominate McCain if he’s the apostate true believers say he is?
Then I blame McCain. Why pick a ticketmate who is red meat appeasement to the faithful? Is this really what his gut said?
Someone had to make a decision between whether to target independents to expand appeal or to target the base to win via superior base turnout. Was there a way to market McCain to both? I kinda doubt it, not in 2008. As you suggest, the gap is probably too vast to be finessable.
I expect McCain to go down as himself. He’s been John McCain too long to go down like a consultant-bot. He’s 72. This is it. There’s no reason to leave anything in the tank. Let it all hang out.
October 23rd, 2008 at 11:56 am
Dr. Pete, you stole my response! Exactly what I was going to say. While I don’t think McCain will be a replica, I’m put off enough by his stance on wars and his lack of policies on the economy to not vote for him. Not to mention Miss Alaska dontcha-know.
October 23rd, 2008 at 11:56 am
md: McCain has a long public record from which I can draw to make my conclusions. Obama doesn’t. It’s that simple. I can be pretty sure I KNOW when McCain is pandering and when he’s speaking from true conviction. I don’t know how to distinguish the same within Obama.
That doesn’t mean I like what McCain has done in this campaign or that I don’t like what Obama has said in this campaign.
October 23rd, 2008 at 12:07 pm
When you have a fairly recent video showing McCain defending himself as having voted 90% of the time with Bush while he now says he has lots of disagreements with him what does that tell you?
October 23rd, 2008 at 1:32 pm
@ JimS
That he’s finally got the base locked down and is now trying to get independents.
Wont work of course, it’s too late in the game.
October 23rd, 2008 at 1:33 pm
@kranky – I don’t think the Republican party elite ever wanted McCain as their choice. They just couldn’t agree on anyone else enough to put someone over the top, and McCain had enough popular support to win by default. Since Cheney wasn’t going to run and everyone was terrified of Bush’s “blessing”, there was never a clear line of succession, and the end-result was a complete mess for the GOP.
October 23rd, 2008 at 1:36 pm
Jim: I say he said that when he was trying to prove he was “Republican enough” to be the Republican nominee. It’s politics as usual but it’s unfortunate he’s felt so obliged to play the game.