(Updated) Cynical Ride-To-Rescue Strategy Flops: McCain Campaign Still Imploding
UPDATE: Blaming Barack Obama and Congress, in other words everyone but himself for the failure of his latest and boldest attempt to game voters, John McCain has announced that he will be in Mississippi tonight for the first presidential debate.
McCain reversed field after having declared that he couldn’t face off against Barack Obama unless a deal was reached on the Wall Street financial aid bailout. A campaign spokesman cited progress in bailout negotiations as the reason McCain relented, but as of this writing no progress has been reported.
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How many days like Thursday must pass before it becomes obvious that John McCain has peaked as a political force and is an increasingly-addled and cynical old man who isn’t even able to figure out what his own message is at a time when Americans are crying out for decisive leadership.
McCain declared on Wednesday that he was throwing down the gauntlet: He would suspend campaigning, pull TV advertising and ride Holy Crusader-like to the rescue of the foundering $700 billion Wall Street bailout plan. And would not appear at tonight’s inaugural presidential debate, as well.
The upshot was that McCain continued to campaign and the ads continued to run, but the debate is still off.
When McCain did arrive in Washington, his knight’s armor tarnished after weeks of slash-and-burn politics that along with the unmasking of Sarah Palin as a resume without a woman had sent the ticket’s poll ratings spiraling southward, he sat like a lump on a log at an hour-long White House meeting with President Bush, Barack Obama and congressional leaders and, when he finally did speak, offered only bromides about the financial crisis.
As the sun came up this morning . . . oh, sorry, it was raining in Washington and throughout most of the Northeast . . . the big question was why McCain had made such a big deal of pretending to step away from the campaign trail when he had nothing to offer when push came to shove. The obvious answer: The entire affair was a cynical ploy to try to distract attention from his imploding campaign.
The presence of McCain in Washington — and Obama as well after Bush extended an invitation to him — had the effect of doing exactly what the Democratic challenger had warned after McCain’s surprise announcement:
“What I’ve found,” Obama said, “And I think it was confirmed today, is that when you inject presidential politics into delicate negotiations, it’s not necessarily as helpful as it needs to be. Just because there is a lot of glare of the spotlight, there’s the potential for posturing or suspicions. When you’re not worrying about who’s getting credit, or who’s getting blamed, then things tend to move forward a little more constructively.”
McCain, in turn, offered gibberish like this:
“I understand how important this debate is, and I’m very hopeful. But I also have to put the country first.”
Perhaps he couldn’t be more coherent because he hadn’t even read a summary of the bailout plan until Tuesday, four days after it was released to congressfolk, and even then wasn’t able to grasp what it was all about.
With bailout plan negotiations now in turmoil, McCain — or rather his handlers — have outsmarted themselves at what is shaping up to be the most crucial juncture in the most important presidential election in decades. This unintended consequence is entirely of McCain campaign’s own making, yet another cheap fabrication that collapses under the most cursory scrutiny.
McCain has sustained a deeply embarrassing injury. It’s as if he punched himself in his groin. Hard.
He has hurt himself not because of Obama or events that demanded that he make a bold gesture, but because of an infamous compulsiveness that led to the selection of Palin, who remains wildly popular among Republicans for her surface glamor but has become a drag on the ticket in its quest to draw in other voters as she keeps flubbing the few appearances that she makes.
(An aside: Could someone please tell Palin that saying “Yeah” is okay when you’ve just shot a defenseless animal from a helicopter, as in “Yeah, I got that bugger right between the ears.” But it is not appropriate in chatting with world leaders or responding to questions from the rare interviewer. It is not merely un-presidential. It’s un-vice-presidential. And further reveals Palin to be not a work-in-progress, as her handlers would like to believe, but just crude and hopelessly unrefined.)
McCain, a champion of the very financial deregulation that is a core cause of the financial meltdown, has tried to be all things to all voters during the campaign. He now finds himself between a very big rock and a very hard place as the scorching reviews roll in on the backfire from his decision to get all leadershippy on Wednesday and then fail to deliver on Thursday.
The conservative Republicans who make up McCain’s political base have found their voices. They are vehemently opposed to the Bush/Henry Paulson bailout package because of the obscene amounts of money that it throws at big financial institutions. The White House, as well as many Democrats and some Republicans, insist that the package has to be passed quickly and with few restrictions if the U.S. isn’t to sink deeper into a recession and possibly worse.
Where does McCain stand? Beats me. And I suspect he himself is at a loss as to where he stands as well.
McCain seems to have difficulty doing even one thing well, let alone multitasking. (God, how I hate that word). Obama correctly noted after McCain’s own bailout on Wednesday that a president has to do many things simultaneously, and the notion of shuttling to Washington for deliberations, preparing for a debate and campaigning at the same time should not be daunting.
But it is daunting for the septuagenarian McCain, or at least he has worked hard to create that appearance. With more than two-thirds of voters telling pollsters that they intend to watch the debate tonight, he has further done his dash by insisting that he cannot face Obama while the bailout package that he has done nothing to move along remains in limbo.
My guess is that McCain may yet relent because the alternative is 90 minutes of prime-time Obama face time with Jim Lehrer of PBS‘s “News Hour.” But even if he does relent, the fact remains that his wounds are self-inflicted. Washington may be broken, but so is the McCain-Palin campaign.
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34 Responses to “(Updated) Cynical Ride-To-Rescue Strategy Flops: McCain Campaign Still Imploding”
A different spin that Shaun's stanard moveon.org spin would be that Senator Obama is showing that he totally lacks leadership skills. More than likely his administration will be the one implementing whatever Congress is going to decide. Yet, Senator Obama is running from taking ownership of the problem, following instead of leading, and is more interested in covering his own ass instead of solving the problem.
I would also say that the political fixers and cronies from Chicago that surround Senator Obama need to demonstrate that they can function at the national level and that Washingtonis not the same as Chicago.
Of course, the way that Democrats are responding to Senator Obama makes sense for the party of Affirmative ACtion, quotas, and separate and unequal standards based upon race. I guess that the elite white progressives cannot really bring themselves to believe that blacks are really as capable as whites.
Once again SD launches an anti-Mullen pablum puking tirade. Hey SD who floated the whole bipartisan approach to McCain? Who made the first call? Who can handle his campaign AND address the financial issues?
btw McCain has not suspended his campaign, as evidenced by his appearances ( which are not deceiving anyone) on other TV venues, and of course he had time for some ego-stroking with Clinton.
McCain has become a shell of his former self. I pity him.
RememberNovember,
Senator Obama has campaign for a year of the idea that he was intelligent and farsighted enough to see that invading Iraq was a bad idea.
Now Senator Obama has a chance to once again demonstrate his intelligence and farsightedness by having the largest say on a credit bailout program. Yet, Senator Obama and most of the Democrats in Congress seem to be running away from the problem instead of taking ownership of the problem.
Could any good Democrat image President Clinton running away from a crisis like this? Of course the answer is No.
The actions of Senators McCain and Obama have demonstrated that both are not really fit to be president and has left the Democrat partisians with the last argument that at least Obama will not be as bad as McCain.
SD — I guess I'm just not seeing what you're seeing. Leaving aside the two presidential wannabes…. Could you explain how it is, exactly, the Democrats in Congress are running away from the problem? Who is “most of”?
Are you referring to Dodd and Frank? Or is it Pelosi, specifically?
Because while I see places where you argue that there are Dems playing politics (seems to be viral), I don't see how you can paint everybody — or even most of everybody — as “running away”.
Obama's stance was the correct one and McCain's was a strategic gamble that came back to bite him in the behind. Unless McCain was integral to the committees working on this plan, he should have stepped back, toned down the rhetoric and offered support to the House Reps and Senators working tirelessly to submit not only a timely solution but an equitable and appropriate one.
After all, they are the one putting their necks on the chopping block if We the People pay dearly for their haste (see: Patriot Act, War on Terror, etc.).
McCain's ploy combined with the crumbling facade of Palin was just about the last straw for this Republican last night. Micromanagement is not the solution in the 11th hour of a problem this massive. Throwing on the emergency brakes and then sitting at a table doing and saying NOTHING is not constructive nor is it helpful. I expect this kind of political showboating as Bush's pathetic swan song to salvage a legacy or remain relevant for a while longer, but neither Presidential candidate has the authority to declare that “The Buck Stops Here”, so it is futile to pretend you do.
The rest of us continue going to work, banking and shopping and are advised not to do anything hasty or rash and to let the process play itself out. To give into the panic only makes the situation worse.
Our President and presidential candidates should be leading by example with prudence, wisdom and patience. We've come to expect this kind of idiotic too-much-too-late approach from Bush — McCain willingly descending to this level of politicking and implicitly backing the injection of presidential politics into an arena where it is not only unwelcome and unhelpful but downright divisive is beyond disappointing.
We needed the President to lend a sense of urgency to this dilemma months and YEARS ago. An ounce of prevention is better than a pound of poison, Dr. Bush and Nurse McCain. Even us lowly taxpayers know that.
I find it humorous that so called progressive who want the government to take ownership of every problem that exist today are making excuses for Senator Obama wanting to run away from the problem.
If it is more important for the Democrats to avoid any responsbility for the solution (see the demand that Republicans vote for the bailout to give the Democrats political cover) than actually trying to solve the problem.
The Obama apoligist just need to admit that they are apoloigist or they need to explain why their presidential candidate does not need to demonstrate any leadership of an issue that will dominate his first year in office.
Interesting how Democratic Sen. Harry Reid just three days ago said that they were looking to Sen. McCain for leadership, then when McCain returns to lead, he blames him for doing so, saying his return to Washington spoiled the agreement. D***ed if you do, d****ed if you don't. Another day in crazy politics…sigh.
Polimom,
Let me take a swing at the question you posed to SD.
McCain has taken ownership of the solution to the problem. Pelosi and Reed are being seen as insignificant to the process, as the democrats could pass the Paulson plan if they had the political courage.
Obama is off to the side saying “Call me if you need me”. Not particularly a model of leadership.
Democrats are screwed no matter what. If they are able to pass the Paulson plan independently, republicans will characterize it as a giveaway to Wall Street fat cats. If a McCain alternative plan is passed, he and the House republicans are heroes that saved the world economy. If nothing is done while an alternative is on the table, democrats will take the blame.
This is 1994 relived. As Zogby said recently, this election will not be close. Watch for a 20 point swing by the middle of next week.
P.S. to Shaun — Sen. McCain's “imploding” campaign now stands even once again in the polls with Sen. Obama's. That inconvenient fact is left out of this predictably one-sided piece, though I agree that Gov. Palin's interview was poor. Lucky for her, her vice-presidential opponent looks equally maladroit in his comments.
The race is not “even” again just because of one Gallup tracker.
What I don't see from any of the McCain defenders here is how McCain is showing any sort of leadership by going to Washington. What exactly is he doing there?
Let's consider what happened at the White House yesterday.
The Democrats, ostensibly with the agreement of Senate and House GOP leadership and Administration support, had a plan that was ready to go. The talk was optimistic everywhere, including from GOP Senators like Bob Bennett and Mitch McConnell.
And then Boehner shows up with a conservative House GOP proposal that surprises everybody.
OK, so here's a real-time leadership challenge. What happens next?
According to observers Barack Obama himself asked Boehner for details of his plan. After an exchange where Boehner spelled out both GOP reservations and an alternative plan, Obama turned to Paulson and asked him if he thought it would work. Paulson said it would not work. At that point there was little else to do…unless a certain Republican Presidential candidate decided to step up and show some leadership.
McCain could have sided with Boehner and his plan and then we would have had a real basis for negotiation. Or he could have acknowledged Boehner's objections and offered support for the Dodd-Frank-Paulson plan. But instead McCain sat for 40 minutes and did nothing. He issued some bromide about how bad the crisis is, but gave no indication of what should be done.
So, who is showing leadership here? The man who wants detailed answers and then seeks the counsel of somebody who knows more about this than anybody else in the room? Or somebody who repeats outdated talking points in the corner?
If McCain thinks that skipping the debate and going to Washington will help reach an agreement, then let's see him do it! Right now he's doing nothing but getting in the way.
McCain has taken ownership of the solution to the problem.
The NYT, for one, doesn't see it that way:
Senator John McCain had intended to ride back into Washington on Thursday as a leader who had put aside presidential politics to help broker a solution to the financial crisis. Instead he found himself in the midst of a remarkable partisan showdown, lacking a clear public message for how to bring it to an end.
At the bipartisan White House meeting that Mr. McCain had called for a day earlier, he sat silently for more than 40 minutes, more observer than leader, and then offered only a vague sense of where he stood, said people in the meeting.
Oops, Elrod trumped me. Sorry about that.
Meanwhile, Obama's lead expands in today's Rasmussen tracker to 5. Obama leads 50-45 now. He led 49-46 yesterday and 49-47 the day before.
Rasmussen moves very slowly. McCain's response is not playing well.
Ricorun/Elrod,
This is politics. Perception is reality.
• Harry Reid – “No one knows what to do”
• Nancy Pelosi – A muddled mess with no answers.
• Public perception of Dodd/Paulson plan – giveaway to fat cats
• Obama – “Call me if you need me”
McCain will present his alternative, everyone will sign on and the world will be saved.
For the next 40 days, Obama and democrats will be hammered as the people who wanted to sell out to Wall St. and give away 700 billion so that fat cats can have multimillion dollar bonuses.
Democrats are watching the republican wipe off the blade of their stiletto, but they still don’t know they’ve been fatally cut.
“Watch for a 20 point swing by the middle of next week. “
I've thought for a long time that this election may not be nearly as close as folks seem to expect (or the polls are currently indicating.) But I wasn't at all sure which way it would swing, and at the moment I'm even less convinced that it'll go toward John McCain.
And I think Elrod has a very valid interpretation of events in his comment. Thus far, McCain has presented nothing. Yes, you and I both see the possibility that this grandstand stunt is part of a larger attempt at an end run. But there's an equal (or greater) possibility that the public's current sentiment about McCain's motives will triumph, however carefully it's orchestrated.
But back to the “most of the Democrats”. Yes. Reid and Pelosi, and others in the House, are trying to avoid a possible setup, and it's making them look pretty danged spineless. But Reid and Pelosi ain't Congress, or even “most Democrats”.
Back to the bullet points to explain why the democrats have already lost this election by a landslide.
• Barack Obama, in a fit of unbelievable arrogance, didn’t take Hillary as his VP.
Although it was clear Hillary would have picked Obama, he passed on what would have been an unbeatable ticket. She and Bill had the support and the political savvy to counter McCain’s moves.
• McCain picks Palin.
Although it’s beyond the capacity for leftists to understand, Palin connects with the exact demographic that McCain needs to win. Palin is Macomb County in Michigan. Palin is the suburbs and rural areas of Wisconsin and Ohio. Palin is a wide swath of Pennsylvania. The McCain campaign doesn’t care what Manhattan and Malibu thinks of her, she plays well in the critical areas that swing the swing states.
• The financial crisis.
Because Obama can’t take control of the situation due to the lack of political courage of the congressional democrats, he will be cast in the role of an ineffective leader or someone who was backing the giveaway plan. Either way, he’s toast.
I realize it’s hard for some people to grasp the magnitude of what happened in politics over the past 24 hours, but the reality will be apparent very quickly. Argue the minutia of whatever plan you like, but know that the audience that matters cannot balance their own checkbooks. The only thing that will come out of this is:
• There was a big problem – McCain solved it.
People should remember that the Democrats could pass a bailout without a single Republican vote. If the Democrats are certain that it will work, then should leave the Republicans behind because Bush will sign whatever they pass.
However, the Democrats are not certain that it will look and are looking for others to share the blame. The Republicans (the minority and shrinking party) should let the Democrats have all of the credit for this.
As the U.S. becomes a one party state in the future, the Democrats are going to have to demonstrate leadership and seems to be lacking in their party. Much like inner city mayors avoid trying to solve problems but instead play to the core Democratic groups, it looks like the Democrats at the national lelve are doing the same thing.
I guess that Chicago based political hacks on Obama's staff have not figured out how they will get rich off the bailout so they are avoiding it. I wonder if the fixers and clout men from Chicago will enjoy being audited by the GAO, FBI, SEC, etc when they start working in the White House
SD- they would be extremely foolish to do that. They are remembering how they passed Clinton's tax hike in 1993 without Repub support, and paid for it by losing the majority in both houses of Congress. This close to an important election they should stick to their guns and insist on a bipartisan solution– so that the GOP won't be able to hammer them with it in November.
kritt11,
Then the Republicans would be smart to not gives them a single vote. Let Speaker Pelosi and Senator Reid go to the public and example how avoiding blame is more important than having complete control over the solution.
“…and paid for it by losing the majority in both houses of Congress.”
Look, this is what's really at stake here isn't it? Regardless of what happens, the people in Congress aren't going to be hurt one iota–Bill Clinton said this much. Everyone wants to rail on McCain for his stunt and the politics involved in it. That's fine, he deserves everything he's getting. But ALL of these folks are trying to figure out how to come out on top politically here and would have done so regardless if McCain or Obama showed up. These people in congress are acting just like all their partisan supporters are. They are looking for someone to blame and how to take credit for any good if any comes. See all the finger pointing? All this bickering is really helping the country out isn't it?
jchem–
lets face it– no one on either side is going to sacrifice themselves on the altar of doing what's right for the country. What makes doing nothing easier is that no one seems to be in agreement about what the right thing to do is.
There has been a leadership vacuum for quite a while — or steps would have been taken a long time ago to avoid this extreme action. This showdown is a result of longterm inaction as the problems with the subprime market deepened and spread through the financial system.
SD–
Let them try. The Democrats can point to how the GOP backed out of the bailout at the last second.
Its too late anyway- they are behind in too many races and dozens of Republicans have decided to retire (definition– move on to greener pastures with DC lobbying firms– now that's putting the country first!!)
Did you all see the new Republican plan? Apparently tax cuts will fix the financial crisis! Yay!
@jwest – “McCain has taken ownership of the solution to the problem.”
The ownership was not his to take. As it normally should work in our system, there are numerous solid minds working hard at arriving at a solution to this problem. McCain was being dramatic and vacillating wildly between doing nothing and doing the wrong thing, as he is wont to do, attempting to draw focus to himself and his so-called “leadership abilities”.
This morning on the radio, I heard McCain's economic adviser say that McCain would not support the bill as it stood now, but “the bill that passed.” You would be hard pressed to find a clearer, more transparent explanation of the McCain campaign strategy. He'll let others climb the mountain, then crow he got there first. He is not a maverick. He is compromised as a leader and he must not become president.
Moominpapa,
I was speaking in political terms.
Perception – not reality.
Pulease!!!!
SD and jwest are spinning so fast their gonna go into orbit.
Its obvious whats happened McCain even admitted as much by saying he didn't read the proposals yesterday.
McCain thought he'd take a chance when he heard there was a crisis and thought he could get some credit for it. Gambled that the public would think it “sacrificing” his campaign was going to come off as noble. When he finally did read the proposals and found out the true magnitude of this collosal economic disaster.
He realized that nothing he could propose or take credit for proposing would even remotely be popular or effective. Decided to not touch it with a 10 foot pole, and run back to Mississippi acting like nothing had happened.
He gambled and lost and its completely obvious.
Even Huchabee agrees
It is not my fault that a large proportion of the voters are cretins.
Even having said that, McCain looks like an ineffectual buffoon who tried to bamboozle the Voting public into thinking that he has the skills to lead and failed.
I cannot imagine the kind of intellect that would actually look at McCain's actions over the past few days and subsequently think, “Now, that's a man I want running this country.”
Elrod, I don't think you responded yesterday (if I missed it, my apologies) when I posted the quote from Bob Schieffer saying that it was Paulson who asked McCain to come to DC because of the reticence of House Republicans.
He went there to help negotiate through the stalemate- GOP in the House weren't signing on in sufficient numbers for Pelosi to feel that her party's a$$ was covered. They weren't budging, so McCain was called in to help move them toward a compromise. The meeting was to see where everyone stood, so McCain appropriately spent more time listening than talking.
Did McCain then turn it into a campaign stunt? Of course- just as Obama then countered with a different stunt (aided by the Congressional Dems who calculated to attempt to convince people that a deal had already been struck until McCain came in and mucked it up.)
is an increasingly-addled and cynical old man – Mr. Pot may I introduce you to Mr. Kettle.
CStanley: The meeting was to see where everyone stood, so McCain appropriately spent more time listening than talking.
That strikes me as something of a contradiction. If McCain was intending to be a positive force you would have thought he'd have known what the House GOP position was prior to the meeting. Wouldn't you? The meeting itself should have been the time to start leading (which was supposed to be his stated intent) not start listening. That should have happened prior.
The entire mess began when the Dems resisted a reform of their own personal ATM. Here's the lead of a New York Times story on Sept. 11, 2003: 'The Bush administration today recommended the most significant regulatory overhaul in the housing finance industry since the savings and loan crisis a decade ago.'
'These two entities — Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac — are not facing any kind of financial crisis,' said Rep. Barney Frank, then ranking Democrat on the Financial Services Committee. 'The more people exaggerate these problems, the more pressure there is on these companies, the less we will see in terms of affordable housing.'
Now BF is spinning like ca-raaazy trying to say McCain didn't contribute to the cabinet room meeting while Reid lied the day before saying that a deal had already been reached [using DNC house-organ MSNBC to spread the falsehood.]
[Obama as usual voted "present" at the meeting.]
BF comes across sputtering like an Elmer Fudd/Buddy Hackett SNL skit—-he thinks if he lies enuf, he can cover up his [and Chris Dodd's] original complicity in allowing the Meltdown to happen. [Unless the NYT above is factually wrong—not outside the realm of possibility given the Valerie Iseman affair[.
Oh, I forgot, the Dems are against accountability and want this to be a RICO scam as FanFred was.
“the Dems are against accountability”
And they eat babies too.
Rico: I'm not suggesting that McCain didn't know the House GOP concerns- but he attempted to bring everyone to the table to discuss those concerns since the Dems had been shutting them out. Apparently, despite Reid's earlier request for McCain to come back to focus on this, the Dem leaders later decided that they couldn't afford to let it look like McCain made a meaningful contribution to the process so they tried to set this up as though the deal had been struck and then blown apart by McCain.