McCain now has a message--but can he drive it home?

It has been obscured by the row over Bush supposedly slamming Obama in his speech to the Israeli parliament and a flap about the lobbying ties of various McCain aides, but yesterday the McCain campaign found its message. McCain’s speech outlining what the country would look like at the end of his first, and maybe only, term was the first time that his campaign had managed to successfully blend together a national security and domestic agenda.

McCain’s reformist domestic policy proposals should help him close the change gap....

Continue reading...

Email to a friend  |   Permalink  |   Comment

With Edwards going for Obama, another door closes for Hillary

John Edwards endorsing Barack Obama is another sign that this Democratic race—barring some political earthquake—is over. A possible Edwards endorsement had been one of those potentially game-changing events that Clinton supporters have clung to as they looked for ways to come from behind. But less than 24 hours after her big win in West Virginia, Edwards has thrown his weight behind Obama. (His wife, though, notably hasn’t.)

Edwards has had a significant impact on this race. He has dragged the field leftwards on both trade and Iraq while his...

Continue reading...

Email to a friend  |   Permalink  |   Comments (4)

John McCain, Reform Republican

The Democrats’ 54 to 46 victory in last night’s special election in the Mississippi First Congressional District shows just how damaged the Republican brand is. Just four years ago, Bush got 62 percent of the vote in this district. As Tim Montgomerie puts it, the Republicans losing this seat is akin to the Tories being beaten in a by-election in Kensington and Chelsea.

John McCain, with his reputation for being a maverick, is the only Washington Republican who could be competitive in this kind of environment and McCain is cleverly trying to...

Continue reading...

Email to a friend  |   Permalink  |   Comments (1)

Hillary wins to stay in it

Hillary met the spread in West Virginia, racking up 67 percent of the vote to Obama’s 26. It is an impressive win and should quiet calls for her to get out of the race for a while even if it makes little difference to the eventual outcome. Indeed, this victory will mean nothing unless Hillary can pull off another huge win in Kentucky and, against the odds, hand Obama a significant defeat in Oregon. 

It is normally dangerous to extrapolate from primary results to the general but Obama is clearly going to have trouble in West Virginia in the fall considering that 51 percent of Democratic primary voters there think that Obama shares Reverend Wright’s world view. But Obama can find a way to 270 without West Virginia’s five electoral college votes.

Email to a friend  |   Permalink  |   Comments (14)

The spread in West Virginia

Hillary Clinton is expected to win the West Virginia primary by a handsome margin. Indeed, Barack Obama has not only cleared out of the state having campaigned there in the most perfunctory fashion but is also not planning to make any remarks after the results come in tonight. 

Seeing as a big Hillary victory is already factored in, her margin tonight would have to be pretty stunning to have any effect at all on the process. Indeed, to really do anything to stop the press treating Obama as the de facto nominee, which he pretty much is regardless of what happens tonight, or give the ever shrinking number of undeclared super-delegates more than a moment's pause, she’s going to have to get more than two thirds of the vote or him less than a quarter of it. 

Email to a friend  |   Permalink  |   Comments (1)

Staffing issues

For all of Obama’s talk of the new politics, there’s one very old political dodge he’s rather fond of: blaming the staff. ABC’s Jack Tapper counts up 14 incidents in which Obama has claimed that some problem was caused not by him but by a staff member; Obama is particularly fond of this line when things show up suggesting that  he’s shifted his political positions towards the centre now that he’s running for national office. At some point before this is over, this excuse is going to wear rather thin.

Email to a friend  |   Permalink  |   Comments (3)

McCain's uphill climb

The new ABC / Washington Post poll makes for sobering reading for Republicans. Even after months of brutal Democratic infighting Obama leads McCain 51 to 44—a lead that is largely a product of the fact that the Democrats are trusted with the biggest issues facing the country by a 53 to 32 margin over the Republicans.

McCain can take comfort from the fact that he still leads Obama on the Commander in Chief questions. He has a 46-42 advantage on the strong leader question, though that gap has narrowed, a 55-34...

Continue reading...

Email to a friend  |   Permalink  |   Comments (4)

An advantage blunted

One of the most politically potent things that Barack Obama has had to offer is an opportunity to move beyond the culture wars. As he puts it, America doesn’t want to re-litigate the 1960s again. 

Obama’s speech in West Virginia today on veteran’s care shows how effective this theme can be:

“One of the saddest episodes in our history was the degree to which returning vets from Vietnam were shunned, demonized and neglected by some because they served in an unpopular war. Too many of those who opposed the war in

Continue reading...

Email to a friend  |   Permalink  |   Comments (1)

McCain is trying to make Obama walk his walk

The McCain’s campaigns idea of asking Obama to do joint town-halls with McCain—first floated by Mark McKinnon to New York Magazine back in2006—is a win-win for them and a lose-lose for Obama. If Obama refuses, he dents his own image of not being a conventional party hack and ticks off the press, not only would these events be good for democracy they’d be great to cover. But if he agrees, he’s just signed up to play on the turf that is most favourable to McCain and least favourable to Obama. McCain thrives...

Continue reading...

Email to a friend  |   Permalink  |   Comments (1)

Defining Obama

The battle to define Barack Obama is going to be brutal. Having only come onto the national scene four years ago, voters’ view of Obama are less fixed than they are of John McCain who has been around for far longer.  

One potential problem for Obama is his time in Hyde Park, the liberal enclave where the University of Chicago is. Hyde Park is like Berkeley or Cambridge, Massachusetts and definitely outside what would be normally seen as...

Continue reading...

Email to a friend  |   Permalink  |   Comments (2)