McCain-Obama post-mortem: What went wrong and when?
by Jose | 9:32 pm, November 8, 2008 | Comments Off
Some former McCain campaign staffers have initiated a smear campaign against Sarah Palin. They are essentially trying to cover their own asses by scapegoating the election loss solely on Palin. This is a fairly easy claim to debunk by looking at the polling during the last several months of the election:
(Graph & poll averages from RealClearPolitics.com)
The jump in the polls resulting from the selection of Sarah Palin as running mate and her subsequent performance at the RNC was the only point at which McCain was ahead of Obama in the polls since Obama had clinched the Democratic nomination.
Obama’s swing ahead of the McCain-Palin ticket wasn’t because everyone suddenly turned against Sarah Palin, it corresponds exactly with the government bailout of A.I.G. and the Fannie Mae/Freddie Mac buyout several days earlier. This was about the public being alienated by the Bush Administration’s socialist-style economic policies.
Looking at the polls, it’s clear that the public was wary of Republican rule after these initial bailouts. McCain was down but not out. Then, on September 22nd, McCain let slip that he would support the Bush Administration’s $700 billion bailout plan. Look at the sharp drop in McCain’s poll numbers in the following days while Obama’s remained remarkably flat. McCain dug himself a hole he would not be able to get out of that day.
The October 15th debate that centered on "Joe the Plumber" gave McCain a 2-point bounce over the following days. Had McCain done the right thing and opposed the Bush bailout, he would not have experienced that precipitous drop starting on September 22nd and could have been in the 45-48% range following that debate.
John McCain’s loss can be traced almost entirely to his failure to offer any alternatives to the Bush Administration’s handling of the fiscal crisis. That is what ultimately did him in. Sarah Palin and "Joe the Plumber" were the only rays of hope in an otherwise bleak situation. The former McCain staffers engaging in a petty anonymous smear campaign against Pain should be ashamed of themselves.
