All McCain had to do, starting in the early summer, was define Obama as a traditional politician rather than an "agent of change" along this definitional template: Obama as a liberal partisan (contrasting with McCain's record of bipartisanship), Obama as inexperienced (contrasting with McCain's experience and record), and Obama as an executive extension of Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid's Congress. It's clear that Americans were skeptical of Obama for those reasons, giving McCain a foothold he failed to utilize, and it's also clear Obama planned on running a traditional campaign from the start, where if McCain ran an unorthodox campaign (calling for ten town hall style debates with Obama, for example) it would have served to doubly reinforce Obama as a traditional politician and forced him to play defense. When the economy is in dire straits and we have troops deployed overseas in unpopular, unending conflicts, voters simply are not receptive to the Ayers/Wright/unAmerican style of attack. In fact, it hurt McCain's favorability ratings more than Obama's. That's because people were looking for substance and solutions; making those attacks highlights the lack of substance and solutions. It may have worked in an election year like 2000, but not this one, clearly. If McCain ran his campaign according to the previous, he would have had a strong chance of winning (at least I thought he would win in April). As it stands, he spun his wheels with poorly devised character attacks and his selection of Sarah Palin and, well, he was ruined in both the electoral college and the popular vote.

 

 

 

:thumb::thumb::thumb::thumb::thumb::thumb:

You're right. McCain was the only chance for Republicans. The deck was stacked against them but if it could have been won, McCain was the one to do it. He just took some bad advice and ran a terrible campaign, epitomized by Sarah Palin, and it cost him what would have been a narrow victory. This much is indisputable as far as I am concerned.

 

Palin did not cost him the election but he did run a terrible campaign. One of the worst.

Palin did not cost him the election but he did run a terrible campaign. One of the worst.

 

I think that was the key. Obama's people outsmarted Clinton in the caucuses to gain monentum and he found a way to win the nomination. Then his people found a way to get the people to believe and get out the vote all the while telling him to just say change and tell the people what they want to hear. His campaign outsmarted McCain's every step of the way.

McCain is an honorable man, but I agree that his time passed to be the type of candidate that appeals to the nation. Just looking at him made me think "an old Republican, more of the same old stuff." He looked like someone a group of old powerful Republicans would pick. He lacked the fire that people wanted so much to see in a candidate.

 

The Republicans should have gotton someone younger, more enthusiastic, who appeared ready to tackle the problems this country has. It worked very well for the Democrats.