I believe McCain will lose to Obama for two reasons.
First, many Republicans do not like him — and vice versa. I cannot recall another Presidential candidate so out of synch with his Party’s base.
Second, he does not want the job with the intensity necessary to win this most intense of personal contests. The way we select our Presidents is deeply irrational, almost guaranteeing the winner is unsuited for the job. It requires a maniacal drive to win, and I doubt he has it.
Peggy Noonan is IMO one of the most experienced and insightful political commentators working today. She’s an intuitive genius. Here she looks at John McCain.
“Let McCain Be McCain“, Peggy Noonan, Wall Street Journal columnist, 27 June 2008 — Excerpt:
His {McCain’s} campaign is still not in great shape, his advance operation is not sharp — the one thing Republicans always used to know how to do! — he has many aides and few peers, and aides so doofuslike they blithely talk about the partisan impact of terror attacks.
And there is another problem that is bigger than all of that, and he is going to have to think himself through it. And that is that there is a sense about his campaign that John McCain has already got what he wanted, he got what he needed, which was to be top dog in the Republican Party, the party that had abused him in 2000 and cast him aside. They all bow to him now, and he doesn’t need anything else. He doesn’t need the presidency. He got what he wanted. So now he can coast.
This is, in the deepest way, unserious. JFK had to have the presidency-he wanted that thing. Nixon had to have it too, and Reagan had to have it to institute his new way. Clinton had to have it — it was his destiny, the thing he’d wanted since he was a teenager.
The last person I can think of who gave off the vibe that he didn’t have to have it was Bob Dole. Who didn’t get it. And who had a similar lack of engagement in terms of policy, and philosophy, and meaning.
November is many months away, with many opportunities for the election to take unexpected turns. But as it looks, I will stick with my February forecast (aka guess) that Obama will win.
Please share your comments by posting below (brief and relevant, please), or email me at fabmaximus at hotmail dot com (note the spam-protected spelling).
Other posts about the election
1. How the Iraq and Vietnam wars are mirror images of each other (7 February 2008) — Now we have McCain, the leading Republican Presidential candidate, talking of an open-ended commitment to victory in Iraq.
2. What do blogs do for America? (26 February 2008) — As our problems reach critical dimensions and our economy sinks into what is (at best) a severe recession, our national leadership will likely move into the hands of someone with astonishingly little capacity to govern.
3. A look at the next phase of the Iraq War: 2009-2012 (1 March 2008) — What is next in Iraq? None of the leading candidates have expressed any intention of leaving Iraq – except in the distant and vague future. McCain intends to fight so long as (or until) we suffer few casualties, then stay for a long time (perhaps a hundred years, as McCain said here and here) ). On the other hand, Obama has been quite explicit…
4. Our metastable Empire, built on a foundation of clay (3 March 2008) — We can elect leaders with vast ambitions (foreign for McCain, domestic for Obama), but can no longer afford them.
5. How long will all American Presidents be War Presidents? (21 March 2008) — The Presidential campaign rolls on in the seventh year since 9/11, with the only debate about the Long War being in which nations America should fight. We see this even the speeches of the most “liberal” candidate, Senator Barack Obama.
6. American history changes direction as the baton passes between our political parties (18 May 2008) – Importance of the November 2008 political landslide.
7. President Obama, an Muslim apostate? (2 June 2008) — Nope.
8. Is Obama running for the office of Chief Shaman? (6 June 2008) — Weirdness from our next President. Perhaps this is what we want.