McCain has to shake the race up

TGF UKIP

McCain has certainly lost ground over the past few weeks and shot himself royally in the foot with his toing and froing on the bailout.

All is not lost, however, just as in the closing stages of the promaires Hillary wrested the momentum from Obama, so McCain can do that now.

Unfortunately that means being a lot less scrupulous than he has been up to now and going after Obama to show him up for exactly what he is - an ultra liberal left winger from Chicago with a lot of sleazy Chicago baggage round his neck.

In the debate McCain also has to go after the media and make this a McCain v Obama and the media election. He does this by asking for a start why weren't there media teams crawling over Chicago like there were over Alaska and why there are dual standards of media scrutiny.

Just like Dave over here with Gordon, it's time Old John got stuck in.

Augustus

Will the white working-class voters, known in parlence as the 'Bubba vote', come out for Obama? Many suspect that they are simply not ready to vote for a black man. It seems that the polls are suggesting that McCain's convention bounce has been destroyed, probably due to the economic crisis. But if Obama is going to win he will need a sizeable advantage in the polls. 5.7% may not be enough.

Craig Strachan

According to The Times last week, the McCain campaign is really hoping that Palin's daughter will marry her baby-daddy before election day. Evidently, that's just the "change of subject" they think they need. Which is why McCain is going to lose like Goldwater.

MartinW

Why on earth aren't McCain and the GOP hammering into Obama on his very dubious long-term friends, allies and political fixers (including the Chicago 'mafia'), and on the question of whether he is in fact ineligible to be President because he is not a "natural born citizen". The latter has been discussed on the blogs for months but, of course, never mentioned by the BBC.

Hal

Yes, McCain needs to shake things up. But how? What should he focus on, what tone should he adopt?

Sarah Palin knows the answer. She must know. That's because she reads everything. She told us as much. Somewhere in the infinity of her reading is the answer to McCain's political woes, the one sure method to stave off defeat. I don't know what it is, but Sarah has read about it. If only she can recall it, and the McCain people listern to her.

It's a bit like putting 10,000 monkeys in front of typewriters, only perkier.

Ganpat Ram

Jim Hoaglnd has explained best why McCain is being beaten:

".....the Sept. 26 presidential debate....helped start McCain's slide in the polls. For long stretches viewers had no cause to recall that they were watching the first black presidential nominee of a major party in American history. Obama himself did not call attention, even indirectly, to this achievement until the very end of the debate, when it would no longer distract.

That night, and even more so in his appearances afterward, McCain confirmed that he had decided to run this race as a Republican, not as an independent-minded maverick with a program different than Bushonomics 101.

Instead, McCain hammered away on tax cuts and restricting government spending as cure-alls. His choice of Palin was an offering to the party's conservative base. It worked for that group, but her presence has begun to cost him dearly with other parts of the electorate who are focusing on pocketbook rather than social issues.

With flashes of humor and spunk, Palin survived Thursday evening. But she did little to dispel the serious doubts about her readiness to be vice president, much less president. America's economic implosion has put issues more urgent and important than culture warfare on the electorate's agenda.

It is far too early to say that just as there are no atheists in foxholes, there are no racists or sexists in bankruptcies. But for the moment, by choosing Palin and sticking with Bushonomics, the Ancient Mariner seems to have tied the albatross around his own neck."

I had hoped McCain would run a different campaign, drawing on his reputation as a leftwing Republican who could make common cause with Democrats.

He could have left his Republican right-wing to support him or accept Obama, and really plugged the line that Obama is an unknown, while McCain will deliver the good things in the Democratic economic basket with a reliably patriotic leader. That would have secured support from many working class people who are suspicious of Obama and supported Clinton.

McCain should have challenged his own party, warned them that they had only one real choice this bad year for the economy: to follow him or let Obama in.

Instead, as Hoagland rues, he chose to butter up the Reublican Right.

His loss of the elections now seems a done thing.

Doug

A few points. RCP doesn't average all polls and arbitrarily selects polls. There is clear evidence of them excluding a particular firm if they have big Obama lead but then including the same firm if it has a big McCain lead. Go to pollster.com (Obama +7.6) for unbiased poll averaging. There is no empirical evidence of the Bradley effect (white voters who will never vote for a black person despite telling pollsters that they would due to fear of being branded racist). Not in the primaries. The evidence shows it ceased to have any effect way back in the nineties. For that matter the polls also exclude voters who primarily use cellphones which is estimated to under report Obama's support by 2.5-3%. Obama is entirely eligible to run for the presidency. His birth certificate has been verified by the Hawaiian authorities and the press. However it is interesting to note that the courts have never clarified that being born in the Panama Canal Zone qualifies a person to run for the presidency. And don't get me started on all the shady characters McCain is personal friends with let alone passing acquaintances.

CG

McCain is aware that he has lost all the arguments. He is now about to fight an entirely negative campaign in the hope that the can frighten enough voters into changing their minds. He has forfeited any moral claims to leadership that he ever had.

Ian C

McCain could win so long as the election was about Obama. It no longer is, so he is unlikley to. He has two chances: 1) hope he can bring the subject back to Obama. This means much negative campigning (and keeping Palin away from tricky interviews). 2) that a narrow lead will not be sufficient for a mainly white electorate to tick a box for a black man on the day.

McCain not only missed all sorts of opportunities to put the boot into the Democrats as a whole over Fannie/Freddie and Democrat legislation induced sub-prime lending, but he got involved when he could do nothing, leaving the space open for Obama.

What could yet happen is that Obama wins but the Democrats get hammered in the Congressional elections due their support for an unpopular bailout. That would be some justice.

But neither presidential candidate have acquitted themselves well since the conventions.

Ganpat Ram

McCain is "not going negative" as the brainless would have it.

When you tell the harsh truth about someone aspiring to rule the country, you are doing a great public service.

It's too late, probably, to save the McCain presidential bid, but I salute the man for having,however belatedly, tried to warn the poor gullible US public what a sleazy and utterly dishonest man Obama is.

Obama has merrily associated with a terrorist, Bill Ayres, who has expressed pride in bombing the Pentagon. McCain is now hammering on this, but he should also point to the preposterously shameful fact that Obama sat in the pews of a church for 20 years where a racist hate-preacher, Jeremiah Wright, spewed hatred of the US - took the man as his "spiritual mentor", for crying out loud.

These horrific facts about Obama should be told to the American people loud and clear. Even if it cannot prevent Obama's victory.

Well done, McCain !!!!