Optics Watch: McCain May Skip Own Victory Party

It’s generally considered poor strategy to telegraph your punches in a political campaign, but it’s not much better to announce your misses. In one of the more puzzling announcements to come out of the Straight Talk Express, John McCain may not be attending his own victory party on the night of Nov. 4.

John McCain’s election night watch party might be missing John McCain. Instead of appearing before a throng of supporters at the Biltmore Hotel in Phoenix on the evening of Nov. 4, the Republican presidential nominee plans to deliver postelection remarks to a small group of reporters and guests on the hotel’s lawn.

When asked for a reason, the campaign’s response was rather… unusual.

Aides said Thursday that the arrangement was due to space limitations and that McCain might drop by the election watch party at some other point.

Did you really say space limitations? You were printing out the tickets and forgot to save one for your candidate? Even if this plan is in the works, this is one story that you simply don’t let out to the public. In terms of visuals, this is about as bad as it gets. No matter the actual reasons behind such a decision, the perception is fairly clear. It makes McCain look like he’s already working on a concession speech and he doesn’t want to give it in front of a large crowd of disheartened supporters.

This is precisely the wrong time for this sort of message. McCain is in the final stretch of a marathon race and is going to need every ounce of energy out of his supporters and every dime he can scrape up to fight this battle to the finish line. This sort of story just lets the air out of your supporters’ hopes and energy just when you need them the most, assuming you still think you stand a chance.