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The events of the past 24 hours have revealed a great deal indeed about the current state of the McCain campaign. Faced with plummeting poll numbers, a growing scandal around campaign manger Rick Davis' ongoing lobbying relationship with Freddie Mac, and a full-on media revolt over lack of access to running mate Sarah Palin, McCain announced before the astonished eyes of America and the world yesterday afternoon that he was "suspending" his campaign and requesting postponement of this week's debate with Barack Obama so that he could return to Washington and save America from financial collapse. Admonishing the Obama campaign to act likewise, McCain strongly suggested that he would not show up for the Friday debate with Obama if a deal had not been reached on financial bailout legislation in Congress. Meanwhile, McCain cancelled his planned Wednesday appearance on The David Letterman Show
The trouble is, a deal on the bailout was nearing agreement yesterday even as McCain announced the suspension of his campaign, and grows nearer still without McCain even as he dons his shining armor, mounts his trusty steed, and rides for Washington. While Obama has been in close contact with Senate colleagues as the details of the deal are hammered out, McCain will likely have played little if any role in the final package likely to be presented today. Doubtless McCain will try to take credit for the deal, and his Republican colleagues in the Senate will almost as certainly claim that nothing could have been accomplished without him, but the facts of the matter stubbornly remain the facts of the matter, however McCain may wish them away. Even if a deal is not reached today or tomorrow, there is little to justify McCain's absence from the Friday night debate with Obama in Mississippi. After all, not much is likely to be taking place in the US Senate at nine o'clock on a Friday night, and American voters expect a debate.
McCain's attempt to have Friday's debate postponed looks like nothing more than an act of political cowardice, worsened by his proposal to reschedule it for the night of next week's vice-presidential debate between Sarah Palin and Joe Biden, which in turn would be rescheduled for a later date: a two-for-one deal allowing McCain to put off both debates. This ploy has not gone unnoticed by the news media, among whom calls for greater access to Palin are increasingly accompanied by a growing sense that she is simply not prepared to face the tough questions that a vice-presidential candidate ought to be prepared to face. Palin did submit to an interview yesterday with Katie Couric of CBS, which does not appear to gone well for Palin. Excerpts of the interview that have thus far been released show Palin unable to recall even a single example of McCain's "maverick reform efforts" from his 26 years in the US Senate ("I'll try to find ya some and I'll bring them to ya"), and making a garbled mishmash of statements on national security including a call for an impossible "surge" in Afghanistan (defense officials including Secretary Gates have made it clear that as long as current troop levels remain in Iraq no such "surge" is possible for Afghanistan). Asked about Rick Davis' relationship with Freddie Mac, Palin simply mouthed the same McCain talking points on Davis that have already been discredited. Palin's performance with Couric was easily as bad as her previous interview with Charlie Gibson: unprepared, unclear, and utterly lacking in specifics. No wonder they want to keep her under wraps.
Meanwhile, McCain took fire from David Letterman for cancelling his appearance on the show, particularly as Letterman learned that McCain was at that moment sitting down to an interview with Katie Couric following Couric's sit-down with Palin (damage control?). Letterman invited MSNBC's Keith Olbermann to appear as a replacement for McCain - poetic justice given Olbermann's long-running distaste for the manner in which McCain has been running his campaign. Letterman and Olbermann proceeded to rip Senator McCain a new one, taking issue with McCain's motives for "suspending" his campaign and attempting to postpone not one but two debates, and tying McCain's erratic moves to the sinking state of his campaign.
I hope you're enjoying all of this as much as I am.
Mark C. Eades
http://www.mceades.com
