More Than A Good Bio?

Bill McInturff, McCain Campaign Pollster: What's happening in 2000 (is) we have an Amercan war hero with a powerful personal story that's the exact opposite of Bill Clinton, who's talking about dramtic structural change in the way Washington works. Well, guess what swing voters like? That's the model of who they like, that's the kind of stuff that turns them on, and it is working. John McCain is turning on a generation of voters.

Eric Engberg, CBS News Correspondent: Who is it that McCain is finding that hasn't voted in past Republican primaries?

McInturff: First, it's important to remember that John McCain won registered Republicans and in all the stuff we talk about New Hampshire, let's keep that in mind. That triumph was built on holding Republicans and winning Republicans and layering on and adding to the party.

In terms of who's coming in, they are moderate conservatives. They are people who are Republican swing voters, they are people who voted for George Bush, for example, in 1988 and maybe left in 1992 to tinker with Bill Clinton. But these are moderate centrists who are younger - baby boomers and younger - they're affluent and college-educated and they are turned on by John McCain's story and his message about campaign finance reform and changing Washington. And they see in McCain somebody who is not a typical politician - and it's working very strongly right now for John McCain.

Engberg: Am I correct that these are people who we would say have been turned off by traditional politics or just never been interested in it tend to view Washington as a place where everybody's all the same?

McInturff: Well, I think that's one statement too far. Believe me, these, if they vote in our primary, these are activist voters they've voted before, but they've waited to vote kind of reluctantly, between what's left in the general election. What they haven't done is been turned on enough to come out and vote in a Republican primary and that's what's hapening this time.

Engberg: Well, that's the softball I'm pitching to you, what is it about McCain that is causing them to now get activated?

McInturff: John McCain is an American war hero who has a powerful personal story that suggests personal integrity that is very, very different from the current president. And finally, and most importantly, he is talking about shaking up Washington. Stopping the special interests and shaking up Washington - well, believe me that's what these folks want. They are tired of the status quo.

In our verbatims, when people tell us in a survey what do you like about John McCain, what they say is hes got the guts to stand up to the special interests and what he went though in Vietnam tells us that believe me if he got through that he can stare down your typical mad committee chairman.

And that's the linkage between John's personal biography and whats appealing about now why these people ant to vote for him. Because unlike a typical politician, they might have heard before that were going to change Washington and were going to be against the special interests, but they don't think someone's had the real spine to go do it. With John McCain, given what John McCain's been though, that's a guy they think has got the spine to really get this done and be tough enough to get this finished.

Engberg: Now, what your saying here sounds a little bit like the dynamics of the Perot voters from '92.

McInturff: Yeah, I think this is the non-wacky, this is Perot before it all went wacky. It is a powerful story, we can combine the Republican party which John can hold, with the non-wacky part of the Perot message of political reform, fiscal responsibility, paying down the debt, and changing Washington.

Engberg: Do you notice consistencies, Bill, in the demographics of these voters - the Perot voters were always spoken about generally by the pollsters as people who were middle class, lacking college education, lacking technical skills - you know that stuff?

McInturff: That stuff, that was Perot was by default. The non-wacky Perot by the spring of 1992 was somebody who was appealing to people who were college graduates, upper to middle income, people who were in the $30-to-70,000 or $80,000 salary range, people not generally connected to our political system who saw in Perot a kind of change - and liked the idea of paying down the debt and liked the idea of political reform. That was Perot before it all turned wacky. And, thats part of the Perot element, those part of the people, that part of the message, is being grafted onto the McCain Republican appeal.

Engberg: You know, back when that non-wacky group was being started, these were the people that were pushing the city manager form of government in big cities against political machines, against poltics as usual as better government.

McInturff: Well, you know, that's another thing about John's background that is important, is that they see him through a very different filter than they look at other politicians. Becuase of what he went through in Vietnam, because of that life story. In a lot of our early focus groups, where he met with voters in small groups, last February and March, we would kind of show them some of the things that today have become John's basic talking points and they'd say "Yeah, Yeah, Yeah," and then we would show them John's biography and they'd say "Oh, I get it, I get it, this guy's different. He's not a politician. He's been tested through like the world's worst experience and if he can survive that, and if he tells me he's going to get it done and he tells me he's tough enough to take these guys on, I believe him."

And so when right now, people are trying to write this a personal triumph for John's biography, they don't get it, they don't understand that it's not biography, it is the mesage, it is simply that his biography is what makes the message compelling and believable. And they're missing the boat if they think this is just John's biography.

Engberg: It's not that the voters are making a movie star choice of a glamorous war hero, it's what he says about getting rid of the special intersts, that's the key?

McInturff: The key is that he's saying it and they believe, because of his biography, that he means it and he can get it done.

Engberg: What is it that makes you believe that there are enough of the voters out there that can change the shape of, the outcome of the national race?

McInturff: Look, in 1992, before Perot went wacky he was beating George Bush and Bill Clinton. There is a huge constituency for change in this country. And if we can again combine and merge the Republican Party, the strengths of that party with the non-wacky part of the Reform Party message, and those two things are combined in one candidate, that's really powerful and that's what were sitting on top of.

Engberg: (Are) Clinton Problems the reason why integrity and personal honor are important this year?

McInturff: I think they always were, I think they always are, but Clinton magnifies it and gives it an emotional resonance that makes them stronger today.

But look, anytime you are running a campaign and says look, this is a guy who's different, he really believes this stuff, he stands up for stuff - you are going to see this poweful reaction. But clearly in the post-Clinton environment, it is more powerful than ever before.