Every cycle the election campaigns are completely overanalyzed, with everything the loser doing being labeled "idiotic" (though Kerry put together a losing campaign like fewer others could) and everything the winner did being "visionary." Look, campaigns are important, and it's important that both sides play well. But just like soccer, most of the game is a wash, except for a few huge plays. So why did John McCain lose? Here it is, in four easy steps:
1. George W. Bush
Barack Obama certainly deserves credit for associating McCain with Bush nonstop. It's a great move and where it's really helping is downticket, because it's just hurting the Republican party all over. But listen. What this factor is really all about is every time you said to yourself "how is this race so close?" If these two are running in 2000 (even if it is McCain 2.0) I see McCain with a slight advantage. But Bush is on the verge of being the least popular president ever, so the deck was stacked before the campaign even began.
2. Economic Meltdown
Democrats' best issue is the economy. Republicans' best issue is national security. Imagine if 9-11-01 had happened on 9-11-04? Bush may have carried every single state. Of course an economic crisis is less emotionally acute than a national security crisis, but in essence that's what we have here.
3. Sarah Palin
The first two factors are things John McCain simply couldn't control. But he did control his VP pick. Now, these things are always analyzed, and the losing canididate will always be scrutinized for his VP pick. But if McCain won you wouldn't see Joe Biden on this list. John McCain really blew it with this pick because he did not vet her and because she's not competent. All the other people on the list - Romney, Lieberman, Huckabee (not Pawlenty) were at least vetted and competent. So they might not have helped, but they couldn't have brought down the ticket. He violated the first rule: do no harm (Bart and Carly - you guys remember my endless VP emails). As I said the other day, (1) Obama deserved praise for keeping this in mind and resisting the Hillary temptation, and (2) I think the idea of appealing to the base is nonsense (unless there's reason to believe you will face significant third-party opposition). I need to stop because you can go for years about Sarah Palin, but there's one other important thing: when he picked her, he instantly lost all credibility with the words "Maverick" and "experience."
4. Wasted Time
Could you imagine if the Red Sox won an ALCS six days before the NLCS wrapped up, and they spent the in-between time partying? That's essentially what John McCain did. He more-or-less locked up the nomination in January. In the seven months until the RNC, the only thing he really did was put out an ad saying "Barack Obama is Paris Hilton." He sat by idly for months. And not knowing who the nominee would be was no excuse. He should have been distancing himself from George W. Bush and saying things like "Well, no surprise here. We don't know who the Democrats are going to nominate, but we do know it's going to be yet another tax-and-spend liberal."
And that's it. That's all there is to it. There were small things like McCain's age, or Obama's debate performances, or the recent line about "spreading the wealth" (which I would guess is actually pretty effective on the six undecided voters left), or Obama's poor response time on the energy issue, or McCain's poor resource allocation decisions, but none of them were game-changers like the four listed here.
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This was really interesting to read, and on the whole, I agree with your analysis. But you seem to purport that many of the factors leading to the current polls are situational – an economic crisis, lack of a national security crisis, the Bush effect, etc. While this is all true – and key, no doubt – I also think that Obama is exceptional candidate in several ways – some important, some not – and that transplanting the race to 2000 or any other period in time wouldn’t necessarily guarantee a McCain victory. Not to Obama-worship, but I think that things like his race, background, intellect, discipline, and ability to surround himself with the right people are strengths that would carry over and have a profound impact on any election.
ReplyDeleteI don't know if anyone else will even realize I responded to this so late, but I found this post while looking for a different one.
ReplyDeleteYou're totally right, Obama is an exceptional candidate, and that contributed greatly. From the beginning, I thought he was a stronger general election candidate than Hillary would have been.
The thought I had in the back of my head when I wrote this, but unfortunately did not say explicitly, is that I think by default Republicans have an advantage in presidential elections. Current circumstances aside, I think "Democrat" is a dirtier word in American than "Republican." And even in the current circumstances "liberal" is a much dirtier word than "conservative." (Don't believe me? Watch some debate clips from each set of primaries)
Put another way, in "normal" circumstances with two "average" candidates, I think the Republicans win. In 2004, I don't think Obama beats Bush in an election (2008's Obama of course). So to make way-too-long of a comment short, to win a presidential election, Democrats most likely need the help of external factors, which, in this case, I listed above.
OK, I revise that comment. Wait, no I don't. Dammit.
ReplyDeleteAs I thought about it, I forget how close the 2004 election really was. Had Kerry had more charisma than a stinky trash can, he would have beaten Bush, so Obama probably could have ...
except for his name, and possibly his race. You'll recall 2004 was a "national security" election. If Barack Obama's name had been plainer, he could have won. (Remember that the "other" Hussein was captured less than a year before the election and thus about a month before the Iowa caucus)