June 10, 2009 10:34 AM
- Text
McCain Meltdown Months In Coming
(The Politico)
By The Politico's Jonathan Martin and Mike Allen
Six months ago, the consensus among many leading Republicans was that the party's presidential nomination was Sen. John McCain's to lose. By outward appearances, he has done just that.
Republicans inside and outside his campaign say his epic descent from front-runner to political life support was triggered by a poisonous political environment, an undisciplined candidate and a campaign with all the chaos and casualness of McCain's happy-go-lucky 2000 bid — but without the excitement and charm.
McCain, a war hero running in wartime, is effectively broke: His campaign reported a paltry $2 million on hand on June 30, and Republican sources say he has debt that wipes that out. McCain's fiscal straits highlight a basic flaw of his campaign: It was based on a high-power, high-cost strategy that would roll over the competition, but he never demonstrated the capacity to fund this approach.
But even if he can somehow raise meaningful amounts of cash in the months ahead, people close to the campaign point to intractable problems that could hobble any comeback.
This story is based on numerous interviews Wednesday with people with firsthand knowledge of the campaign, most of whom said they could share candid views only if they were not identified by name. Most McCain associates said the news that exploded earlier this week — the departure of McCain's chief strategist and other top aides — came as little surprise to them: They have known for months that the Arizonan's candidacy was in a perilous state.
"It feels at times that somebody has put a voodoo curse on us," said one McCain loyalist. "The timing has been consistently bad."
After starting the race leading in most every poll in the early primary states, McCain quickly staggered under broad opposition to his embrace of President Bush's Iraq policy, combined with intense conservative opposition to the senator's immigrant-friendly plans for overhauling the nation's border laws.
"He was being whipsawed," said a McCain associate near the center of the campaign. This aide described a candidate battered on one side by the moderates who fueled his 2000 run but who loathed the war while he was drawing the wrath of many core Republicans over his immigration stance. And as the nomination contest became engaged and the "amnesty" issue came to the fore, Republicans were reminded why they had long been skeptical of the maverick.
This sour tide might have proven fatal on its own. But McCain was in trouble even within the walls of his campaign headquarters, where personal rivalries, poor planning and excessive spending gave him little chance to defeat his external demons.
"The political department was such a mess that we couldn't get Sportsmen for McCain in Iowa to Iowa events when we wanted to talk about guns," said one former McCain staffer. "The chain of command was almost tenuous — you didn't know where to go. These problems were coming up — little ones — and they weren't being fixed."
Perhaps most damaging of all, no one was clearly in charge. There was a campaign manager, a chief strategist, a senior adviser and a chief executive — an unwieldy team riven by mistrust and rivalries.
"Without question, the problem was too many cooks in the kitchen," the former staff member said. "The history books will write this as a power struggle." Regardless of which side of the personal and political disputes they sat on, the McCain associates who were interviewed offered remarkably similar diagnoses of the campaign's overarching problems.
Many of his aides agreed that a daunting obstacle was the refusal of the most motivated activists to recognize him as one of them. Simply put, it's difficult to capture the Republican nomination when Republicans mistrust you.
"After 2000, there were such hard feelings about him from the Bush campaign," said a McCain adviser. "We were able to patch that up here in Washington. But out in the hinterlands, they didn't get over it."
"No," this aide concluded, "they didn't trust him."
McCain's most appealing and most self-damaging attribute has always been his propensity to shoot from the hip. It's what endeared him to so many in the news media in his 2000 campaign and what made him into the household name that he would become. But his willingness to offer "straight talk" that was critical of his fellow Republicans and his eagerness to partner with Democrats made him suspect in the eyes of many within his own party. Another McCain source pointed to an anecdote posted Wednesday on the blog TownHall.com in which McCain, speaking at a private event, accepted praise for his little-appreciated anti-abortion stance — only to remind the conservative crowd that he also supported stem cell research.
Six months ago, the consensus among many leading Republicans was that the party's presidential nomination was Sen. John McCain's to lose. By outward appearances, he has done just that.
Republicans inside and outside his campaign say his epic descent from front-runner to political life support was triggered by a poisonous political environment, an undisciplined candidate and a campaign with all the chaos and casualness of McCain's happy-go-lucky 2000 bid — but without the excitement and charm.
McCain, a war hero running in wartime, is effectively broke: His campaign reported a paltry $2 million on hand on June 30, and Republican sources say he has debt that wipes that out. McCain's fiscal straits highlight a basic flaw of his campaign: It was based on a high-power, high-cost strategy that would roll over the competition, but he never demonstrated the capacity to fund this approach.
But even if he can somehow raise meaningful amounts of cash in the months ahead, people close to the campaign point to intractable problems that could hobble any comeback.
This story is based on numerous interviews Wednesday with people with firsthand knowledge of the campaign, most of whom said they could share candid views only if they were not identified by name. Most McCain associates said the news that exploded earlier this week — the departure of McCain's chief strategist and other top aides — came as little surprise to them: They have known for months that the Arizonan's candidacy was in a perilous state.
"It feels at times that somebody has put a voodoo curse on us," said one McCain loyalist. "The timing has been consistently bad."
After starting the race leading in most every poll in the early primary states, McCain quickly staggered under broad opposition to his embrace of President Bush's Iraq policy, combined with intense conservative opposition to the senator's immigrant-friendly plans for overhauling the nation's border laws.
"He was being whipsawed," said a McCain associate near the center of the campaign. This aide described a candidate battered on one side by the moderates who fueled his 2000 run but who loathed the war while he was drawing the wrath of many core Republicans over his immigration stance. And as the nomination contest became engaged and the "amnesty" issue came to the fore, Republicans were reminded why they had long been skeptical of the maverick.
This sour tide might have proven fatal on its own. But McCain was in trouble even within the walls of his campaign headquarters, where personal rivalries, poor planning and excessive spending gave him little chance to defeat his external demons.
"The political department was such a mess that we couldn't get Sportsmen for McCain in Iowa to Iowa events when we wanted to talk about guns," said one former McCain staffer. "The chain of command was almost tenuous — you didn't know where to go. These problems were coming up — little ones — and they weren't being fixed."
Perhaps most damaging of all, no one was clearly in charge. There was a campaign manager, a chief strategist, a senior adviser and a chief executive — an unwieldy team riven by mistrust and rivalries.
"Without question, the problem was too many cooks in the kitchen," the former staff member said. "The history books will write this as a power struggle." Regardless of which side of the personal and political disputes they sat on, the McCain associates who were interviewed offered remarkably similar diagnoses of the campaign's overarching problems.
Many of his aides agreed that a daunting obstacle was the refusal of the most motivated activists to recognize him as one of them. Simply put, it's difficult to capture the Republican nomination when Republicans mistrust you.
"After 2000, there were such hard feelings about him from the Bush campaign," said a McCain adviser. "We were able to patch that up here in Washington. But out in the hinterlands, they didn't get over it."
"No," this aide concluded, "they didn't trust him."
McCain's most appealing and most self-damaging attribute has always been his propensity to shoot from the hip. It's what endeared him to so many in the news media in his 2000 campaign and what made him into the household name that he would become. But his willingness to offer "straight talk" that was critical of his fellow Republicans and his eagerness to partner with Democrats made him suspect in the eyes of many within his own party. Another McCain source pointed to an anecdote posted Wednesday on the blog TownHall.com in which McCain, speaking at a private event, accepted praise for his little-appreciated anti-abortion stance — only to remind the conservative crowd that he also supported stem cell research.
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