McCain Is Forced To Play Catch-Up As Support Ebbs

[question everything]

The Wall Street Journal

McCain Is Forced To Play Catch-Up As Support Ebbs
Poll Reflects Concerns About Age, War Stance; A Giuliani Boomlet
By JOHN HARWOOD
March 8, 2007; Page A1

(snip)

A new Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll1 shows the Arizona senator trailing Rudy Giuliani by more than 20 percentage points -- and encountering doubts in the party about his age and steadfast support for the Iraq war. Mr. McCain's support "is softening," says Democratic pollster Peter Hart, who conducted the Journal/NBC survey with Republican counterpart Neil Newhouse. Republican voters "are window shopping," Mr. Newhouse adds, and at this stage finding reasons to look past the familiar Mr. McCain toward the inspiring post-9/11 profile of the former New York City mayor. All told, 2008 is shaping up as the worst presidential year in three decades to be the candidate of the Republican establishment, the spot some in the party think Mr. McCain has assumed.

The senator's top political strategist, John Weaver, calls himself "quite serene" about the campaign's predicament, reflecting the McCain team's judgment that the Giuliani boomlet will fade. The Journal/NBC poll itself suggests that may well happen, as voters learn more about the New Yorker. But the "strong leader" wave Mr. Giuliani has ridden since the 2001 terrorist attacks has increased the pressure Mr. McCain faces from supporters and campaign donors to make that happen sooner -- and it has already accelerated a McCain campaign timetable that once anticipated a more leisurely early pace.

(snip)

The McCain team argues that national polls overstate Mr. Giuliani's power in the race, not only because the New Yorker's social views are out of step with Republican conservatives but because Mr. McCain is stronger in key early-primary states. Yet they insist they won't soon joust with Mr. Giuliani in an attempt to blunt his momentum; instead, they aim to protect Mr. McCain's reputation for positive campaigning while hoping the media and lagging Republican candidates -- former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee and Kansas Sen. Sam Brownback -- feel greater urgency to scrutinize Mr. Giuliani's record and stances on hot-button issues.

(snip)

Yet Mr. McCain has seen Mr. Giuliani race past him earlier than any of those Republicans faced serious challenge. In a two-way matchup of the best-known Republican contenders, Mr. Giuliani leads 55% to 34%; when also-ran candidates are included, Mr. Giuliani's lead is 38%-24%, more than double his margin from a December 2006 Journal/NBC poll. The telephone survey of 1,007 adults, conducted March 2-5, carries a margin of error of 3.1 percentage points. The poll shows Mr. McCain's problems are partly personal, and partly the result of the Iraq war's shadow over the broader political environment. After years in which his maverick stance on issues from taxes to campaign finance grated on the party faithful, one in five Republicans express negative views of Mr. McCain and a similar proportion vow not to vote for him. That is double the negative views about Mr. Giuliani.

(snip)

The poll shows Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton is also facing a stiffer early challenge than her advisers anticipated. Among Democrats, the New York senator's lead over Sen. Barack Obama now stands at 40%-28%, down from 37%-18% in December. In a two-way matchup, Mrs. Clinton leads her Illinois colleague by a narrower 47%-39%. Echoing Mr. McCain's situation, 16% of Democrats say they definitely wouldn't vote for Mrs. Clinton, twice the number who say that of Mr. Obama. And while seven in 10 Democrats embrace Mr. Obama's call to withdraw troops from Iraq, about half express discomfort with Mrs. Clinton's refusal to call her vote to authorize the war a mistake.

(snip)


URL for this article:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB117330442342630035.html (subscription)

[AX10]

1. Rudy is benefitting from name recognition and the fact that...

2/3rds of Repub voters do not know his views on social issues and his "colorful" past.

[question everything]

2. Or, that they really want to win

and they realize that mobilizing their base no longer works; that, at least in the recent elections, swing votes and centrist or moderates tilted the results in our direction.

I am afraid that if he gets the nomination, he will win. Our best hope is for the Republican base, that listens to what their pastors tell them, will reject him.

This is how Republicans in California lost the state - except for Arnold and he won because he is Arnold, not because he is a Republican. They wanted to "stand on principles" and continues to reject their moderate candidates in favor of rabid ones and to lose in the general elections.

(Also lesson for us..)

[AX10]

3. That too.

[enough already]

6. He would put New York into play

If that happens, it's a fucking landslide.

[TlalocW]

4. Too bad for McCain

But, as he's in the twilight of both his political and physical life, I hope that as both draw to an end, he realizes that it's all his fault for turning into one of the biggest republican suck-up, flip-flopping whores currently running.

TlalocW

[central scrutinizer]

5. How is he polling with the "gooks"

not too well, I imagine