Markets start to reflect reality a little bit more
With Obama less than two points ahead of McCain, there was no way that McCain’s prices could remain in the low 30s. My guess is that after both the conventions McCain’s price will be above 45 and heading up (though it should be around 60 if he was properly valued).
Voters seem not to want Obama but McCain must close the deal
After wall to wall coverage in the press of Obama’s trip, and the shambles that passes for the McCain campaign, John McCain is less than two points behind. My take on the situation is that voters have decided that Obama is simply too inexperienced and too left-liberal for America. However, they do not want a third term of Bush and want some evidence that McCain is strong enough to chart his own course once President. Picking anyone whose second name isn’t Palin, Jindal, Fiorina, Romney or Pawlentry will probably do the trick but there is one choice that could seal victory – namely Joe Lieberman. Although some on the right will gag, if hardcore Republicans are prepared to make their peace with Clinton then they will in the end stomach Lieberman.
Why Obama might pick Tim Kaine
To my mind there are only two reasons why Obama might choose Kaine: 1. He will force McCain into choosing his running mate before the convention. 2. To make a pro-choice running mate (such as Lieberman or Giuliani) very difficult. My view is that McCain must stick to his guns and wait until the night of the Republican convention and choose either Lieberman, Ridge or Giuliani.
It looks like the betting markets are finally seeing sense.
I’ve been critical, make that extremely critical of the McCain campaign, but I’ve never wavered in the idea that McCain should be the favourite. It looks as if John McCain is enjoying a surge in the betting markets to accompany his better poll ratings.
A contrarian take on the McCain veepstakes
Adding the intrade prices of Mitt Romney (32-37.9) and Tim Pawlentry (30-35) together allows one to see that the market is pricing the rest of the field at 2/1 (or 3.00). I believe that Romney and Pawlentry and the constant, ‘McCain will choose Romney tomorrow’ or ‘McCain will select Pawlentry later today’, speculation are only smokescreens for someone like Lieberman, Giuliani, Bloomberg or even Rice. If McCain has any sense it would be one of those four and would be announced at the convention to force people to tune in. While the McCain campaign has as unfortunate capacity to shoot itself in the foot, betting against Pawlentry and Romney is a very good idea.
This is not the way to campaign against Obama.
As everyone knows I’m not a fan of Obama. Indeed, I think McCain needs to get in Obama’s face and hold him to account for his positions. However, this has the potential to badly backfire, or at least take the campaign into a place that would good for neither McCain nor America.
I can’t really add much to the analysis from Hot Air but this must be conclusive evidence that McCain has to make foreign policy the main theme of his campaign, rather than running away from it.
McCain continues to run Obama close
My new projections are:
Barack Obama 47
John McCain 45
(As per usual polling projections are based on samples of likely voters filtered through Samplemiser). It’s amazing, that despite the blanket coverage Obama is getting from his foreign tour (and McCain’s inept campaign), Obama’s lead is only 2%. I believe this demonstrates McCain’s innate strength as a candidate. If McCain could only decide on a few consistent lines of attack and select a running mate who appeals to independants, he could be comfortably ahead. Dick Morris’ advice about attacking Obama over a premature withdrawal from Iraq also sounds a better line to take than trips down memory lane, however tempting.
This pretty much sums up why McCain’s campaign team needs to be revamped from top to bottom. Pandering, trying to be too clever by half, surrogates shooting off their mouths and making up policy on the hoof, long term tactical advantage being surrendered for short term gains, an addiction to nuance and the complete inability to go toe to toe with Obama on Iraq, even when doing so would result in electoral gain. It’s a good thing that I’m betting on a candidate, not his staff.
UPDATE: Looks like the last sentance was too optimistic.
McCain Mitt-flops around on his VP selection
The VP speculation seems be all over the place, since people are saying; that Romney is being tapped, McCain has ‘narrowed’ his choices (whatever that means) and that McCain may not announce his pick before the Olympics. My view is that the closer it is to the convention the more likely it is to be radical, since if he announced Lieberman (or any controversial choice – including Romney or Huckabee) now there would be a concerted effort to dissuade him from that course of action. On the other hand, the emotions engendered by conventions might make a challenge more likely. After all, there were attempts to get Dan Quayle off the ticket in 1988, to say nothing of the chaotic attempts to find a running mate for Ronald Reagan at 1980 Republican conventions, as recounted in the American Spectator.
McCain/Romney seems (thankfully) unlikely.
If there was one ticket that could have undermined McCain’s chances, it was picking Mitt Romney. Not only would he have annoyed social conservatives (without the upside that Lieberman or Giuliani could bring to the ticket) it should also be clear that picking someone associated, fairly or unfairly, with the worst excesses of economic conservatism would not help McCain in either the Midwest or the North East. Indeed, even picking a run of the mill libertarian like Sarah Palin would be preferable, since a former CEO’s views are more likely to carry more weight than those of a former beauty queen. Of course this could be a bluff, but it is time to bet against Romney being on the Republican ticket. However, if the article from the American Spectator is correct, a McCain/Romney ticket is off the menu.
Majority of voters trust McCain more on Foreign Policy AND Iraq
Those of you that doubt that both foreign policy and Iraq (at least up until last weekend) is (or could be) a winning area for McCain, and one are where he should emphasise his differences with Obama, should read the following. McCain should simply stop dodging the question and make it clear that, despite Maliki’s attempts to ingratiate himself with Obama, there is no realistic way that troops can leave within sixteen months without destabilising the region.
If McCain is unwilling to engage Obama on the issues he needs someone (or some people) to do it for him.
As someone who has made money by betting on politics I am usually extremely sceptical of the conventional wisdom. However, John McCain’s campaign has been a wreck, both on an organisational and a strategic level. McCain has recently tried to fix this by putting the Bush veteran Steve Schmidt in charge to help with organisation and ground operations. However, this does not solve the fact that, in an inversion of the famous quote from the film Little Caesar, McCain is clearly able to take it but not to dish it out. Indeed, in the face of Obama’s slightly ‘refined’ stance on Iraq, McCain’s team actually congratulated the Democratic candidate for, ‘for accepting John McCain’s principled stand on this critical national security issue’, instead of questioning why Obama consistently voted several times in the Senate to, either de-fund the war, or to set timetables for withdrawal.
Although it is undoubtedly positive that even Obama seems to be recognizing that his previous views were untenable, though he seems now to have backtracked once more to a conventional antiwar position, one has to question the sincerity of his conversion given that only a few months ago he was calling the idea that America should treat a nuclear attack on Israel in the same as a similar attack on the United States, ‘cowboy diplomacy’. It should also be noted that Obama’s position hasn’t actually changed that much, he has just pledged to consult the generals on the ground on the timing of any withdrawal. Likewise his other newfound positions on faith, guns and other issues one can see similar caveats that would enable him to fall back to his previous positions. Unfortunately, one has to conclude that, if elected, Obama is more likely to travel to the road to Damascus to engage in unconditional negotiations with Syria and Iran than to experience a real change of heart on foreign policy.
So where does Bob Dole come in to all of this? Indeed, putting ‘Bob Dole’ and ‘John McCain’ in the same sentence bring back memories for students of American politics of the inept, and lifeless, campaign run by the then 73 year old Senator from Kansas against Bill Clinton in 1996. However, the model that McCain might want to think of following is of Bob Dole’s first campaign in 1976. In that campaign he was the running mate of President Ford. Because Ford’s advisors told him that the best thing he could do was to stay away from the campaign trail and hope that the ghost of Richard Nixon would stop haunting him (in much the same way that George W Bush’s ghost haunts McCain) Dole was forced to play the role of the attack dog, a role he played with aplomb.
In much the same way McCain needs someone, either as a running mate or at least a major surrogate, who is willing to hit the campaign trail and attack Obama. This person must be respected by the centre and the left of centre, which eliminates Romney and his ilk, he must have prominence on national security issues, which obviously Huckabee does not, and he must be someone who will hit Obama hard, but will not hit below the belt, or start racist dogwhistling about ’hardworking White people’. To my mind there are only three people who can do this; Condi Rice, Rudolph Giuliani and Joe Lieberman. Although Obama’s candidacy is groundbreaking, Condoleezza Rice’s story is equally compelling. Combined with her years of experience in foreign policy affairs there is no way Obama, or any of his surrogates, could somehow insinuate that any criticism of him from her was out of bounds. Similarly, given that Giuliani took on the mafia, corrupt cops and made New York’s inner cities liveable again, all of which benefited the poor, any criticism of Giuliani’s motives would backfire.
However, I believe that the best running mate for McCain would be Joe Lieberman. As a someone with a left of centre record Lieberman is a visible symbol of the lost conscience of the Democratic party. He also has the ability to get the left of the Democratic Party, whom Obama has been trying to disassociate himself from, into a fury. Lieberman’s days in the Democratic caucus are numbered, while he is almost certain to face a serious challenge from both sides in four years time if he remains in the Senate. Of course he is deeply uncharismatic, but it is far easier for the Democrats to fend of the attacks of a rabble-rouser rather than a calm and softly spoken indictment. Although the Obama supporters have already tried to falsely accuse Lieberman of stoking the internet smears about Obama, it is going to be very hard to convince the public that someone who risked his life taking part in the Civil Rights movement in the 1960s has some underhand motivation.
So I believe that if McCain really isn’t going to attack Obama on national security and foreign policy issues in the next few weeks, although he should do so, the least he can do is to ask Rice, Giuliani or Lieberman to get out on the campaign trail (and to put one of them on the ticket). During the remainder of the campaign; in-between the press conferences, photo opportunities and rubber chicken fundraisers, they must clearly hold Obama to account for his positions over his political career. Because America is clearly willing to vote for someone with a Clintonesque willingness to move to the centre, they must make it clear that Obama was telling the truth about his positions previously and is pandering now, rather than the other way around. Personally, I believe that Senator McCain would make the better President, and I still view him as the favourite to win the election, but if he lets Obama move to the centre it could be a lot closer than is necessary. In any case, whatever one thinks about American foreign policy, America needs an honest and open debate on Iraq rather than the candidates trying to pretend that there are no differences between them.
McCain closes the gap, but Bush’s gesture presents a challenge
My new projections are:
Barack Obama 46.10
John McCain 45.87
As per usual they are based on samples of likely voters filtered through Samplemiser. Because of the Quinnipiac and the Zogby polls the fall in Obama’s rating was reduced, but the latest Rasmussen poll has pushed them downwards. However, McCain really needs to make sure that he gets ahead of the Iran issue and makes sure that he does not agree with Bush’s bizzare gesture towards negotiations with Iran.
Should McCain choose Linda Lingle as his running mate?
West Wing fans will remember a scene in the final series where the Republican candidate, the McCain like Arnold Vinnick, discusses with his staff how to deal with a surge in polling his opponent, for the Obamaesque Matt Santos. One of the ideas tossed around by a member of his staff is for him to go after a blue state, suggesting Hawaii. Although this idea was never acted upon, it was suggested in the comments that Governor Linda Lingle might be worthy of consideration. From a persue of the internet and Lexis Nexis, there are aguments in favour of this. Unlike Sarah Palin (or Bobby Jindal) Linda Lingle has six years of experience under her belt and she is extremely popular in her state. There is no doubt that if McCain wanted to choose a female running mate who could step into his shoes, if needed, she would be a solid choice.
However, choosing her would have quite a bit of downside and wouldn’t do much to help McCain. Her pro-choice record, her support for a plan that many have described as secessionist, the fact that campaigning in Barack Obama’s birthplace would be a huge waste of resources and her dour personality all militate against putting her on the ticket. Of course, my three favourites candidates are all all pro-choice, with Lieberman and Giuliani coming from deeply Blue States and Condi Rice coming from the deeply Red Alabama. However, even I admit that McCain will never win the home state of Barack Obama, while there are polls showing a McCain/Rice and a McCain/Lieberman ticket being competitive in the Empire State. In any case Lieberman has earned enough respect with his criticism of Clinton and his attempt to clean up Hollywood, Giuliani can talk about adoptions and Condi can modify her position enough to satisfy social conservatives.
Most importantly, Governor Lingle doesn’t bring anything to the table that other candidates don’t. Indeed, if McCain really wanted a popular female governor who was experienced enough to take over in an emergancy, he could do a lot worse that choose Jodi Rell of Connecticut. Using the terminology of the fictional Russell ‘Stringer’ Bell, Linda Lingle is the personification of a fifty degree day. Obivously, she’s not the Alaskan winter that Carly Fiorina (or Mitt Romney) would be but she doesn’t do anything for the ticket and her choice would be perceived as a attempt to dodge the fundamental question of what image McCain want to project.
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