Oct Surprise!: McCain to Endorse Obama?

Oct Surprise: McCain Endorsing Obama?

By C. Edmund Wright

So, will this election's October surprise be John McCain's endorsement of Barack Obama?

What's so funny? I mean, almost all of the other McCain type moderates have done so - or come close - so why not McCain himself? That would be the ultimate "reach across the aisle" don't you think? Even in McCain's own words to his volunteers this weekend, he indicates he is still running against Republicans. 

Consider: Moderate Colin Powell has endorsed Obama. Ditto William Weld. Let's not forget Christopher Buckley, Lincoln Chafee, Rita Hauser, Scott McClellan and Jim Leach. Meanwhile, flaming moderate Chuck Hagel all but has announced for the big O though he has not done so publicly. And does anyone want to make book on the ballots of David Brooks and Peggy Noonan? When Charles Krauthammer has to call his McCain endorsement, even sarcastically, "contrarian" you know something is wrong.

You might say that McCain found his base, and they are all endorsing Obama.

The funny thing is, many of these Obama endorsers are the same people who have assured us for lo these many months that "McCain was the only Republican who could win" and that "his ability to reach out to moderates and independents" was the reason why. If any of that were true -- and many conservatives never believed a syllable of it -- then the folks jumping ship today would be named Limbaugh, Coulter, Boortz and so on. But they are not. If anything, the continued unmasking Obama as the socialist that he is has entrenched the efforts of conservatives to get McCain in the White House, even if solely for the purpose of keeping Obama out. 

Meanwhile, checking those national polls, it looks like the magnificent moderates and undecideds are still going Obama by somewhere in the 10-18 point range. This is what always happens when a campaign tries to lure moderates by being one of them, instead of inviting them to become one of you. The McCain message has been more "moderate seeker sensitive" than any in history and it is failing spectacularly. (google "Reagan" and "pale pastels" for perspective.)

What is working better than anything is Joe the plumber and the "s" word. Nothing or nobody has unmasked Obama the socialist as Joe's question and the subsequent national discussion on just what "spreading the wealth around" means.  This totally unscripted and unpredictable insertion into the national campaign has put business reality front and center more than McCain - he of absolutely no free market experience in his lifetime - possibly could have on his own.

So how is the McCain campaign capitalizing on this? Not very well actually. Much like the Sarah Palin appeal, Joe's appeal is foreign to most of the decision makers in the campaign and they are making a mole hill out of a mountain.

Take the North Carolina campaign for example. In Raleigh at the State Capitol, the campaign organized a march of small businessmen culminating with a press conference at the McCain headquarters. The organizer, a 20 something New York bond trader (perfect choice to run the N.C. campaign, don't you think?) rounded up a few business people a local small business consultant hand picked as perfect ambassadors for - if not the McCain cause - at least the anti-Obama cause. The idea was to replicate and multiply the Joe the Plumber dynamic with other business people who had actually already achieved something as business owners and to get their messages out via the media coverage of the march and the presser. You know, if one Joe out there talking is good, then many Joe's would be better.

Oops.  These experienced entrepreneurs tend to have opinions and like to take charge. This sounds dangerously unscripted.  So at the last minute, the campaign switched things around, had the business owners speak before the march started (and before the press arrived) meaning they spoke only to each other. There was worry that some might "go off script." Exactly. Like, say, Joe the plumber? Oh, that would be a tragedy.

When the press came, they were treated to a conference call from McCain where he continued to attack Republicans and minimalize Sarah Palin. It was all very neatly scripted. And boring. And ineffective.

In answering his first question, he managed to attack Jack Abrahmoff and mention that he was a Republican. I am not sure what the question was, but even if it was "what party is Jack Abrahmoff in and what do you think about him" he should not have answered that way. This was supposed to be a conference call about rallying the volunteers and on small business for crying out loud.

He then spoke about Sarah Palin and only mentioned her work and speech about "special needs children" saying it was her best speech and that she would work hard in his administration on this issue and of course would spend tons of federal money.  Give me a break - is she running for First Lady? There was no mention of her small business experience or her governorship at all. It's a good thing no one mentioned she was a Republican or McCain might have attacked her. Kathleen Parker must have been proud.

He then went out of his way to mention "what a terrific warm up act Lindsey Graham was" which can only mean that the best way to make McCain's stump speech look good is to have it follow Graham's.  The Graham mention likely did not enthuse the volunteers in the Palmetto State, many of whom are itching to get Graham whipped in his next primary. This could explain why Graham is in New Mexico and not South Carolina.

A question from volunteers from York County, PA asked if the national campaign might not follow a strategy  that  had been successful with "moderates" in PA by mentioning the "Bermuda triangle of a President Obama with Speaker Pelosi and Leader Reid" as being very leftist and dangerous.  Apparently, this rather partisan tact had been resonating with undecideds in PA - who we now know from both Jack Murtha and Ed Rendell are racists.

McCain, who seems much more bothered by the bermuda triange of say, Bush, Cheney and Limbaugh, muttered something about it not being desirable to have a "lack of checks and balances" with Obama-Reid-Pelosi in charge but did not share the Marxist fear of those in York County. I guess the only problem would be there is no need to "reach across any aisles" in such a situation.

At that point, I had to leave. Afterall, I figured that any minute now the bipartisan urge would hit McCain and he would make the move to endorse Obama. I could not bear to listen to such.  Here he was, talking to the base of the base - the small business crowd - and he could not resist his centrist anti-Republican urges.

Of course we know that somewhere Noonan and Brooks will be happy.