McCain starts general election phase at decided disadvantage

March 6, 2008

Obviously, it’s early March. We’re nowhere near knowing who the Democratic nominee is going to be, and the candidates have barely begun trying to destroy one another. The Republican Attack Machine is still sharpening its fangs. The Republican nominee is just now starting to consolidate his party’s various factions.

But with all of those caveats in mind, John McCain nevertheless starts the general election phase of the campaign at a decided disadvantage.

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) kicks off his general-election campaign trailing both potential Democratic nominees in hypothetical matchups, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll.

Sen. Barack Obama (Ill.) leads McCain, who captured the delegates needed to claim the Republican nomination Tuesday night, by 12 percentage points among all adults in the poll; Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (N.Y.) holds a six-point lead over the GOP nominee. Both Democrats are buoyed by moderates and independents when going head to head with McCain and benefit from sustained negative public assessments of President Bush and the war in Iraq.

About two-thirds of Americans disapprove of the way Bush is handling his job and think the war was not worth fighting, and most hold those positions “strongly.” A slim majority also doubt that the United States is making progress toward restoring civil order in Iraq, even as McCain and others extol recent successes there.

A lot can and will change over the next eight months, but this national poll points to a landscape that isn’t favorable to McCain at all. Americans are deeply unsatisfied with the war in Iraq and a faltering economy — and the GOP candidate is on the wrong side of both.

And then there’s the awkward subject of McCain’s age.

It hasn’t really drawn too much interest in the campaign, at least not yet, but McCain, at age 72, would be the oldest president ever elected. Americans don’t seem to love the idea. For example, poll respondents were told that Hillary Clinton would be the first female president. 20% said that makes them more enthusiastic about her candidacy, while 11% said less. They were told that Barack Obama would be the first African-American president. 16% said that makes them more enthusiastic about his candidacy, while 11% said less. And when told about McCain’s age, 4% said that makes them more enthusiastic about his candidacy, while 27% said less.

Certain fundamentals in this campaign can shift in the coming months, but McCain isn’t going to get any younger.

McCain also appears to have an ideological problem: “McCain is losing three in 10 conservatives to either Obama or Clinton, far more than he likely could stand to see slip away. Democratic presidential candidates since 1988 have won 15 to 20 percent of conservatives, not 30 percent.”

On a related note, 56% of Americans said Obama is “about right” ideologically, while only 41% said the same of McCain.

As for the Dems, the fight over electability will surely continue unabated. In general, most recent polling shows Clinton and Obama leading McCain in general-election match-ups, and in nearly every instance, Obama enjoys a stronger margin. The WaPo/ABC poll is no exception — Clinton beats McCain by six; Obama beats McCain by 12. Make of this what you will.

Bottom line: assuming Dems play it smart in the coming months, the party has to be considered the favorite to win the White House. Of course, the likelihood of these guys playing it smart is remote, so I’ll keep my optimism in check.

McCain’s campaign strategy, in it’s entirety:

1) Fear
2) Smear

  • Yesterday, I e-mailed another blogger my thoughts on a long primary where we don’t know the nominee for a few more months. I started to think it was the one advantage McCain comes into the general with right now. I’m going to copy this e-mail because, well, it expresses what I want to say and because I’m being lazy right now:

    A few thoughts on long, divisive primaries. The first is that–and this is just a guess, but I think it’s fairly logical–if the party cannot win in the end, no matter how long and nasty the primary is, it probably only had a minor shot at winning in the first place. Exactly what sort of divide are we expecting the Democrats to have? Short of Clinton having no legitimate claim at all for the nomination but still being the nominee because of backroom dealings (the most likely scenario I can imagine where the party really is divided), I don’t see what’s going to happen that is going to make huge sections of the party stay home. Even with so many bloggers seemingly down on Clinton at the moment, I expect, or at least hope, that they will come around in November, should she be the nominee.

    Second, we need to consider fund raising as it relates to McCain. Somebody made the point on TV last night–on either MSNBC or CNN–that McCain’s ability to organize and raise money for the general election is greatly weakened, at least right now. He essentially needs time to try to play catch up with the Democrats. So with our party being without a nominee for the next three months, he has that…or at least more of an opportunity to get his act together. Perhaps it was the late hour, but the idea didn’t seem so ridiculous. If come July or August, he’s still behind by tens of millions compared to either Clinton or Obama, like he is now, it might not make a difference how much time he had. But like I said, the thought isn’t so ourtrageous that it needs to be rejected outright. That’s why I hope both Clinton and Obama spend a lot of their time attacking McCain and the rest of the Democratic party and its allies pick up the slack until the primary process is settled. I respect Clinton’s right to stay in the race, but I have to say, I’ll be kicking myself if we realize in hindsight that we blew the enormous advantages we had early on the race.

    Your thoughts?

  • Although poll numbers regarding Democratic/Republican match-ups in November are encouraging, it is March after all. The meme that I would like to encourage the Democratic party to agree upon is that EITHER Obama or Clinton are better for the country than is McCain. Let the two of them battle out which voice, which policies, which philosophies, are stronger, more focused, or more comprehensive. In that way, the idea becomes reinforced in the minds of the voters, especially those in the middle–the independents and the moderate Republicans. It would create the added benefit of unity, a political y that Republicans have employed with considerable success. The “reality-based” stuff? Not so much. Overall, it would establish a foundation of rational, calm focus on issues Republicans have ignored and/or distainied for way too long. Let the country know that responsible adults with integrity will soon be in charge…

  • If Obama wins McCains campaign will be airing 20 second commercial showing Hillary praising thereby endorsing McCains experience above Obamas. Was Judas selling out Jesus for a few pieces of silver anymore treacherous than Hillary selling out the Democratic Party to advance her own ambitions.
    Sorry but I’m still pissed as hell at the Hillary Campaign.

  • I remember when everyone thought Michael Dukakis was a lock to win the presidency. He had a double-digit lead in late summer. He lost because he stopped attacking Reaganomics and had wimpy things to say about the hypothetical “if Kitty was raped,” looked foolish in a tank and allowed himself to be “Willie Horton’d.” By October I was so disgusted with him.

    Please, Hillary and Barack, keep the focus on failed Bush/GOP/McCain policies and positive progressive alternatives. Don’t attack each other – attack the real problems for our country (Bush/GOP/McCain).

  • “If Obama wins McCains campaign will be airing 20 second commercial showing Hillary praising thereby endorsing McCains experience above Obamas. Was Judas selling out Jesus for a few pieces of silver anymore treacherous than Hillary selling out the Democratic Party to advance her own ambitions.
    Sorry but I’m still pissed as hell at the Hillary Campaign.”

    If Obama goes down because of that, then he never really had much of a shot anyway.

  • The WaPo/ABC poll is no exception — Clinton beats McCain by six; Obama beats McCain by 12. Make of this what you will.

    I’ll predict that Mary sees this as a sign that Obama should drop out.

  • This is my take: Howard Dean and other party powers need to step in now and get the party on-board for the following:

    The two candidates stop attacking each other.
    They each start going after McCain as if they were the nominee.
    The superdelegates throw their support to the candidate that best pulls off this attack.

    You might have to wait until the primaries are over to make sure neither one has a straight majority, but from that point on, have two campaigns going after the Republicans. Consider the advantages for the Dems:

    No ugly internal fighting.
    McCain doesn’t get months of unopposed airtime.
    The Dems are automatically preparing for the general.
    The Dems get to use the candidates’ huge primary funds on the general. (And with each candidate having raised as much as the entire Republican field combined, that’s a lot of $$$.)

    The tricky bit is deciding who has “best” taken on McCain, but that could be hashed out. Smoke-filled backrooms do have some purpose. 🙂

    OK, so what’s crazy about this? ‘Cause it seems to me to be an amazing opportunity for the Democrats.

  • McCain is so over. What does he do on his 1st day with the nomination in hand? Get the blessing of W!! I don’t think even overt election tampering could put this guy in the oval office. That is almost a shame, since the economy is going to trash the reputation of whoever is elected.

  • Buzzmon – McCain-LieberZellMillerMan? All the more reason to be worried about McCain’s age, as in dying in office and having President Lieberman.

    I personally have no problem with McCain’s age at all – the problem is that he doesn’t exhibit the wisdom that normally comes with it.

  • Ohioan, re that link:

    Bubble above McCain’s head: “I wonder if she puts out?”

    Bubble above Hillary’s head: “I can’t wait to kick your ass, you old fart.”

  • 13.
    On March 6th, 2008 at 9:57 am, dalloway said:

    Ohioan, re that link:

    Bubble above McCain’s head: “I wonder if she puts out?”
    Bubble above Hillary’s head: “I can’t wait to kick your ass, you old fart.”

    Hey Dalloway In case you missed it she already put out for McCain.
    Quote”
    “I have a lifetime of experience that I will bring to the White House. I know that Senator McCain has a lifetime of experience that he will bring to the White House. And Senator Obama has a speech he gave in 2002.”

    Probably the best JB McCain ever had.

  • I’m tired of having to sort out the truth from all the competing claims by both camps, and I’m tired of the “Just say it and hope you get away with it” BS.

    I think what we need is a “Democratic Campaign Truth Commission” to formally do what the blogs are trying to accomplish right now, sort out the truth from the claims. It should of course have equal numbers of people from both camps, and some kind of neutral tie-breaker who’s agreeable to both sides. The main thing would be to get both sides to back up their shit in writing and in a common format. A commission like that could fully debate the competing claims, and make determinations on issues of fact so that the rest of us can get an objective look at who’s distorting what and how badly, and make dishonesty a lot more costly.

    Put the whole shebang online, and let the chips fall where they may. Like others, I would like to see them attacking McCain more, and being judged on that, but right now there’s more incentive to tear down your primary opponent than McCain, especially for the trailing candidate.

  • I think it quite interesting that only about a week ago, in head-to-head polls, McCain was beating Clinton and within the margin of error on Obama.

    In the meantime, Clinton and Obama have beat on each other, while McCain got a joyous coronation from Huck and Bush.

    And his polling went down.

    Theory: people liked to use the threat of McCain to try and keep some discipline on the feuding Dems, but the reality of McCain is a deal-breaker. One he was for certain the Republican nominee, it cost him 10 points worth of Independents and flighty Democrats.

  • if memory serves, one exit poll reported by MSNBC indicated the biggest issue with mccain was his age. not that you would know it from the MSM — they love this guy and are glorifying his war record at every opportunity.

  • John McSame.

    Say it again. That’s all it’s going to take. Put a minute of yesterday’s public fellatio in the Rose Garden into a campaign ad, and John McSame is toast.

  • Anyone here think that McCain will choose Lieberman as VP?
    If not, then who?

    Governor Crist of Florida. I’d lay even odds on it.

  • 2. Brian said

    A few thoughts on long, divisive primaries. The first is that–and this is just a guess, but I think it’s fairly logical–if the party cannot win in the end, no matter how long and nasty the primary is, it probably only had a minor shot at winning in the first place. Exactly what sort of divide are we expecting the Democrats to have? Short of Clinton having no legitimate claim at all for the nomination but still being the nominee because of backroom dealings (the most likely scenario I can imagine where the party really is divided), I don’t see what’s going to happen that is going to make huge sections of the party stay home. Even with so many bloggers seemingly down on Clinton at the moment, I expect, or at least hope, that they will come around in November, should she be the nominee.

    I actually think many are underestimating the fallout that is going to occur when one of them is chosen as the nominee. I’ve drawn parallels to the 2000 general election in other posts, but I think there are a lot of similarities. Let’s suppose that instead of stopping the recounts in Florida, the FL SC allowed them to continue…and the final tally showed Al Gore winning by 200 votes. So for three or four weeks, George Bush was reported to have a 400-or-so vote lead, and his supporters had gotten used to the idea he won, and all-of-a-sudden the result flipped, and that was it. Well Republicans would have felt EXACTLY the same way that Democrats did…that they were robbed.

    The truth is that in any race that is this close, the losing side ALWAYS feels robbed, and they can get pretty pissed off about it. That could translate into an electoral earthquake, no matter who gets the nomination. If it’s Obama, Clinton supporters will claim it was unfair not to seat Michigan and Florida, and they might switch sides or stay home. If it is Clinton, you might see the massive numbers of young voters and black voters that supported Obama just staying home, because they feel that Hillary stole the nomination using superdelegates. But since it hasn’t happened yet, there is no way that the emotional letdown from the nominating convention is reflected in the general election poll numbers right now.

    So either way, I predict that once the nomination is settled, you will see a big shift in the poll numbers in McCain’s direction. This primary fight has just gone on too long and so many supporters are really emotionally invested in their candidate, that it will be impossible to avoid frustrating millions of Democratic voters at the convention. So then the question becomes, is there enough time left to heal the wounds?

  • Certain fundamentals in this campaign can shift in the coming months, but McCain isn’t going to get any younger. As a conservative, I’m told by “liberals” that I only believe in the rights of wealthy white males between the ages of 0 (conception) and 65 (retirement), and hate everybody else. The fact that a “liberal”, one of those for whom discrimination is hateful and has no place in America, would make McCain’s age a campaign issue, is discriminatory and hateful. And has no place in America. According to this conservative.

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