How did McCain lose?
November 09, 2008
As I have said before, I think it is a great pity that McCain ran his campaign the way he did.
Ann Althouse sets out 4 points on how McCain lost her...
1. Economics. The timing of the Wall Street collapse couldn't have come at a worst time for the McCain campaign. His decision to suspend the campaign came out as political grandstanding. What he should have done was reach out to the Obama camp, and make some sort of joint statement from both. Now that would have been classy.
2. He made the experience argument irrelevant in his choice of Sarah Palin. (And no, being a mayor of a small town, or Governor of a state, really doesn't help you much when you come across in interviews as being clueless on national issues.)
3. Ann talks about principled conservatism. Cough cough. I don't believe that McCain is a conservative, just as I don't believe that the current Republican party is conservative. What McCain should have done is move the party to the center to take advantage of the center left drift.
4. Erratic and incoherent. The McCain campaign didn't know what their message was - and couldn't communicate that to the voters.