McCain Sets Sights On Clinton Voters

Washington Post: GOP Candidate Has Started Wooing White Working-Class And Women Democrats

(Washingtonpost.com)  This story was written by Michael D. Shear and Jon Cohen.

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Republican Sen. John McCain envisions a November victory built in part around attracting a large number of the millions of voters who turned away from Sen. Barack Obama's promise of change during the historic Democratic primary campaign.

Buoyed by polls showing a quarter or more of Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's supporters planning to back McCain, his advisers have already started wooing the white working-class voters and women who made up the bedrock of her coalition. They plan to echo and expand the former first lady's critiques of Obama: that he is out of touch with Middle America and too unseasoned to be president.

"There's a lot of Senator Clinton supporters who would support me because of their belief that Senator Obama does not have the experience or the knowledge or the judgment to address this nation's national security challenges," McCain told reporters Wednesday.

Nonetheless, to succeed, McCain will have to upend firm partisan voting patterns that have held for the past four presidential elections.

In those contests, only about 1 in 10 Democrats cast a ballot for the GOP candidate, according to network exit polls. In the 2006 midterm election, 93 percent of Democrats voted Democratic in their House districts. That party loyalty -- matched by Republicans' fidelity to their party's candidates -- came despite voters' occasional protestations that a nomination defeat would send them scampering.

On the issues, it is unclear how McCain would appeal to Clinton's female or working-class voters. McCain's record is not much like Clinton's, as the Republican repeatedly pointed out during his primary battles. He opposes government-run health care, supports continuing the war in Iraq, wants to extend President Bush's tax cuts and is a committed foe of abortion rights.

His position on the war, in particular, puts him at odds with Clinton on what is a top issue for many Democrats. For months, McCain mocked Clinton's desire to withdraw troops from Iraq.

Obama advisers think the expressions of support for McCain among Clinton voters is a general byproduct of a passionate and sometimes heated primary process that will quickly fade. "We're confident that when voters from all walks of life have a choice between a candidate who last year voted with George Bush 95 percent . . . they will choose change and elect Barack Obama president," said Obama spokesman Hari Sevugan.

McCain strategists predict their candidate will do a better job of siphoning away Democratic votes because of two factors: what they say is Obama's inability to connect to some key parts of the Democratic coalition, and McCain's reputation as a maverick.

Republicans plan to describe Obama as an elitist from the Hyde Park section of Chicago, where liberal professors mingle in an academic world that is alien to most working-class voters. They plan to make sure Clinton's voters do not forget about Obama's comments that working-class people are bitter and cling to their guns and religion as a way of dealing with the economic uncertainty they face.

"The cling-to part about religion and guns is where the McCain campaign is going to hammer home on," said Kevin Madden, a GOP analyst who was the spokesman for former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney's presidential bid.

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In recent days, the Republican campaign has held focus groups in the Rust Belt and Appalachian states where Obama's messages of hope and change failed to translate into votes, including one session in Pittsburgh -- Obama lost in Pennsylvania to Clinton, and it will almost surely be a critical swing state in the fall. McCain advisers said they found a palpable unease with Obama among those groups.

The point, key Republican advisers said, is that Clinton's voters see more of themselves in McCain than they do in Obama. In recent weeks, McCain advisers have shared data with Republican activists backing up that contention, said one Republican strategist.

McCain's speech Tuesday night contained a direct appeal to Clinton's voters, calling her a "friend" and saying that her presidential campaign inspired his own daughters and "millions of women to believe there is no opportunity in this great country beyond their reach."

In addition, they say they will stress the areas where McCain's positions are different from Bush's. In his speech Tuesday, McCain went out of his way to highlight his belief in global warming, his opposition to Bush's energy bill and his criticisms of the conduct of the war.

"The American people didn't get to know me yesterday," he said. Speaking as much about Clinton's supporters as his own, he added: "They know I have a long record of bipartisan problem-solving. They've seen me put our country before any president -- before any party -- before any special interest -- before my own interest."

McCain advisers believe the polls back up their predictions.

Over the past three months, Washington Post-ABC News polls showed an average of 25 percent of those backing Clinton in the primaries "defecting" to McCain in a hypothetical match-up with Obama. A new poll from the Pew Research Center conducted just before the final Democratic primaries put the number at 28 percent.

Other data in the new Pew poll may add to the concern among some Democrats. In that survey, the percentage of Clinton supporters holding a positive view of Obama continues to slide: Forty-five percent of them view Obama favorably, down from 58 percent in December, before the voting started.

The Clinton voters most open to switching sides this time in Post-ABC national data are white women, white voters without college degrees, older voters, moderates and those prioritizing experience over change. This is the most fertile territory for McCain to repeat the feat of one of McCain's heroes, Ronald Reagan.

Twenty-six percent of Democrats crossed party lines to vote for Reagan in 1980 after a bruising fight for the Democratic nomination between President Jimmy Carter and Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.) -- a battle that lasted all the way to the convention.

But even that number was significantly lower than the threatened crossover from early that year. In a late March 1980 Gallup poll, 47 percent of Democrats who wanted Kennedy to be the party's nominee said they would vote for Reagan if Carter were to get the nod; that is nearly twice the proportion who ended up doing so.

McCain's challenge in converting disappointed Clinton supporters into GOP voters this year hinges on his ability to ovrcome policy differences and improve his image with those voters. In the Pew poll, most of those who hold favorable views of Clinton view Obama positively and McCain negatively. And it is the anti-McCain view that may ultimately prove a stronger motivator.

Nearly 6 in 10 of those backing Clinton over Obama in the primary said they would support Obama in the fall, with about half of those voters saying they are motivated to do so primarily to vote "against McCain" rather than "for Obama."

Cohen reported from Washington. Polling analyst Jennifer Agiesta in Washington contributed to this report.

[pensacola88]

The only hope for McCain to successfully win Clinton supporters is to trade away his evangelical hardliners.

Many of those supporters will postpone universal health care for four years, if McCain can squelch out and disempower or kill off the evangelicals who seem to be more than arm chair foreign policy lobbyists.

[whitepicks2]

For McCain to siphon off Dems, he better keep women from hearing how he plans to stock up the Supreme Court with more right wing lunatics, and the older Clinton supporters from hearing how he''ll privatize social security.

Play the clips to the entire nation of McCain''s backsliding from 2000, when he might have been considered a maverick, to the most recent McCain clips where he is lockstep with the lunatic right fringe -- Agents of intolerance? ME TOO!

The way Obama has galvanized his voting base and ultimately won the primary is because he is a different kind of human being than the other two
clones, who are basically tools of the system. People like him are incredibly rare in the public light, and for every bit of slime our wonderful Hillary threw his way, he ALWAYS took the high road and took it in stride.

The GOP is pretty much finished at this point, and the handful of them who aren''t wound up in indictments and scandals will definitely be very soon. W not only has ruined their chances in this election but for a couple of terms. And there isn''t much talent there up and coming. The party and its ''ideals''(of selfishness and greed) are radioactive and bankrupt.

Obama is running for the presidency -- McCain is running for Commander in Chief -- and STILL doesn''t know the difference between a Sunni and Shia, and still thinks there is somebody over there we must be ''winning'' against, and against whom we can declare VICTORY! What a moron. And Americans finally know it.

[kansas1946]

Good luck. When these women get over being mad about Clinton losing, they will start thinking about issues like choice and gay rights, and they aren''t going to vote for Mcain. Not to mention being in Iraq for the "next hundred years."

[schatter003]

It is quite clear what the feckless, spineless and unprincipled leadership (specially the super delegates) of the democratic (lower case intended, not a typo) party has done, again - selected a loser. Just look at the fibs (Undivided Jerusalem, Iran Flap) that are already being reported in the same newspapers which were ignoring his prior ones, such as his mis-votes, 130 present votes, calling Reagan a transformative leader, his campaign manager''s claim that Benazir''s assassination was caused by HRC''s vote to authorize the war.
There is a lot of rejoicing today in the media. In case you did not notice, the Hillary trashing by the media, specially, by the Black journalists except for Jonathan Capehart at WaPo and Clarence Page of the Chicago Tribune. NYT%u2019s Bob Herbert was particularly vicious as was Eugene Robinson of WaPo.
I do congratulate yall for accomplishing what a McCain supporter had wished way back when, "How do we stop the ***?" Now we will, a lot of the 18 million of us, will fulfill the other wish of that McCain supporter, see McCain become POTUS.
Let them suck on all the insults they heaped on you and on us Hillary - but we don''t get mad, as they say; we get EVEN.

[obarnabyears]

I do not think Obama can win? After I saw this video?
http://www.youtube.com
/watch?v=3
_N1rqVo2W0

[watcher269-2009]

Now here''s news boys and girls:


McCain would like to see a man on Mars


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What - trying to meet Sen Craig in airport stalls too risky these days?

[mr_iknow1]

CONGATULATIONS TO BOTH Barack Obama and John McCain for winning a "fixed" PRIMARY! As you know, SOME of the MASONS want a WAR--NUCLEAR WAR! SOME of the MASONS want to play games with Barack Obama, and SOME of the MASONS want to have John McCain initiate the "TRIGGER"--IRAN! Furthermore, there is alternative "HOT SPOTS" that the MASONS have initiated for a "TRIGGER"!

QUESTION: Why did the "WHITE SUPREMISTS", in UTAH and IOWA vote for Barack Obama???????

[mr_iknow1]

MESSAGE:

You already know about the SEVEN KINGDOMS OF BABYLON (BOOK OF DANIEL CHAPTER 2). Currently, we are in the SIXTH KINGDOM OF BABYLON, which was started by CONSTANTINE during 312 A.D. (PAGAN ROMAN GENERAL/SUPPOSED FIRST CHRISTIAN EMPEROR). The SIXTH KINGDOM OF BABYLON is the ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH. The KNIGHTS TEMPLAR are a subdivision of the CATHOLIC CHURCH.

[mr_iknow1]

During the FOURTEENTH CENTURY, after the KING OF FRANCE and THE POPE declared a HOLY WAR on the KNIGHTS TEMPLAR, the KNIGHTS TEMPLAR went underground. Then, the KNIGHTS TEMPLAR went to England and Ireland. The KNIGHTS TEMPLAR called themselves, at this point, the FREE MASONS. While in England, they utilized HENRY THE EIGHTH to establish an alternative religion as to the CATHOLIC CHURCH.

The FREE MASONS hired NAPOLEON and started a WAR IN FRANCE, and then started removing the CATHOLIC strong hold over Europe.

The FREE MASONS/MASONS hired HITLER to finish the job in Europe to lay the foundation for the SEVENTH KINGDOM OF BABYLON.

The SEVENTH KINGDOM OF BABYLON is the "EUROPEAN UNION"/NEW ROMAN EMPIRE, under the anti-christ for seven years. For the said SEVENTH KINGDOM OF BABYLON to occur, three (3) "HORNS" have to be removed (BOOK OF DANIEL/BIBLE). First HORN is the UNITED STATES (REVELATIONS 17 and 18). The second HORN to go is Russia and the NEAR EAST/MIDDLE EAST (EZEKIEL 39). The third HORN is China that is partially destroyed in the interim to meet the anti-christ in ISRAEL--starting December 10, 2012. GOD will reappear sometime after 2013 in ISRAEL form the sky (seven years/BOOK OF DANIEL)! Only GOD knows the exact hour of GOD''S coming!

[mr_iknow1]

THE NEW STUFF:

The other key is from the PAGANS that acquired their information from the immortals. The MAYAN LEGEND states that, when the THIRTEEN SKULLS (representations of the COUNSEL OF 12 and GOD (JESUS CHRIST)) are reunited, the end will not come. The end as to the MAYAN CALENDAR is December 10, 2012. This is completely accurate. Six (6) years after the year of "DARKNESS", the anti-christ will initiate the end with the beginning of the war with China. The year of "DARKNESS" is 2006. The day of "DARKNESS" is June 6, 2006. This means that the FIRST HORN (THE UNITED STATES) had to be removed on or before December 10, 2006. The TRIGGER was IRAN! President Bush was going to invade IRAN with NUCLEAR WEAPONS during 2006!