USA Today
07-29-07
McCain's campaign woes spark tactical shift
By Dan Nowicki and Mike Madden, Gannett News Service
COLUMBIA, S.C. — No longer burdened by lots of campaign cash and staff,
Sen. John McCain is stumping for votes the old-fashioned way, trying to remind
voters of the maverick personality that won him fans in the 2000 presidential
race.
Instead of addressing crowds from podiums at expensive rallies, the Arizona
Republican is hitting minor league ballgames, diners and house parties, which
aides say are low-cost ways to let McCain talk with voters.
"We've got to live off the land," said Trey Walker, McCain's South Carolina
strategic consultant. "(McCain) is free to be McCain."
That notion — that McCain is now liberated from the pressure and high
expectations of being the front-runner — is a frequently repeated talking point for
the campaign's supporters here. And the idea that McCain will break free of the
crowded GOP field if he speaks directly to voters as he did in his "Straight Talk
Express" 2000 campaign is key to the new strategy.
The goal is to win at least two of the three early 2008 battles and ride the
momentum to victory in other important states.
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Among his challenges: His support has dropped in the key states of Iowa, New
Hampshire and South Carolina; his campaign staffs in those states have shrunk;
and after spending nearly all of the more than $24 million he raised in the first
half of 2007, he has virtually no money for advertising.
But the still-unsettled 2008 Republican field gives McCain hope.
"I never was going to rely on money to win this campaign," McCain said at a
recent town hall meeting in Claremont, N.H. "I'm not a very good fundraiser, and
I'll admit it. But I can out-campaign any of these guys, and I will, and I can, and
we're going to be doing just fine, both here and Iowa and in South Carolina."
Facing big hurdles
Polls show McCain trailing in each of the three early states. His cash crunch
resulted in massive staff cuts at not only his national headquarters but also his
operations in the three states.
His continued support of the unpopular Iraq war and perceived closeness to
President Bush puts him out of sync with the moderates and independents who
swooned over him in 2000. And his participation in the drafting of the Senate's
failed immigration bill antagonized conservative activists already wary of his past.
Perhaps most significantly, McCain has lost the image that made him a cult
national political figure seven years ago.
"There isn't an establishment candidate in the world that can climb out of this
hole," said Dan Schnur, a California-based political strategist who was McCain's
communications director in 2000. "What it takes is an outsider and a reformer."
Schnur and other analysts agreed that while McCain's three-state emphasis is
smart given his financial predicament, his real hope lies in restoring his identity
as a Republican who tells it like it is.
"The odds are still against him, but he's got a better shot running as himself than
as a conventional politician," Schnur said.
Even if McCain does well in the early states, he still will have to compete against
better-funded foes in expensive television markets.
This year, more than 20 states are expected to hold primaries or caucuses Feb.
5, just weeks after the Iowa caucuses and the New Hampshire primary.
"It'd be nice to have advertising and some staff on the ground in some of these
downstream states, and we may have some," said Charlie Black, a senior
McCain campaign adviser. "But if you don't win among the first three, it doesn't
matter what you do in the other states."
Iowa
The weakest link in McCain's comeback strategy is Iowa, which he skipped
during his first presidential run in 2000.
Since June, McCain has consistently run fourth in the polls in Iowa.
Money woes and campaign upheaval have cut McCain's full-time staff in Iowa by
more than half, which Chuck Larson, a McCain adviser, dismisses as "inside
baseball."
But McCain's overspending and campaign infighting were no doubt noticed by
party activists crucial to success in Iowa's first-in-the-nation caucuses.
"It just doesn't look like a lot of management competence," said Steffen
Schmidt, a political science professor at Iowa State University in Ames.
New Hampshire
McCain won the 2000 primary in New Hampshire and he has focused much of
his campaign on the state with the nation's first primary.
McCain said he intends to court the state's independents, and he has gone out of
his way to highlight policy and style differences with Bush.
At a July 14 speech at an American Legion Post in Claremont, his first campaign
appearance after the resignations of his campaign manager and chief political
strategist, he didn't mention the Iraq war or immigration reform, two areas where
he agrees with Bush.
He instead called for action against global warming, reducing greenhouse gas
emissions and harnessing alternative power sources.
But McCain might have a difficult time overcoming his support for the Iraq war.
Anti-war sentiment in New Hampshire is high, and in 2006, Democrats won
historic victories in the traditionally Republican state.
"I have been very, very upset by the way he has attached himself to the Bush
administration during the past six-and-a-half years or so," said Frank Fahey, a
Claremont Republican who voted for McCain in 2000.
South Carolina
At McCain's South Carolina headquarters in Columbia, desks sit empty after six
of 13 aides quit.
But McCain still sits second in South Carolina polls, not far behind former New
York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, and his supporters swear the organization they built
earlier this year will help keep him in contention.
"Hopefully, this is the low point of the campaign here," said Nick Kenworthy, an
Arizona native and McCain volunteer who works for a bank in Myrtle Beach.
"Sometimes you've got to hit the bottom to make it to the top."
More than half the Republicans in the state Legislature have endorsed him, and
none of his backers publicly walked away from the campaign despite a furor over
his support for comprehensive immigration reform.
In a state with a huge number of military retirees, the campaign is counting on
McCain's own military record and his support for Bush's surge strategy in Iraq to
help.
McCain still has devoted fans, like Barbara Leonard, a real estate agent from
Myrtle Beach who is helping organize the campaign's volunteers there. She was
a McCain delegate to the 2000 GOP convention and wears McCain stickers
whenever she leaves the house.
"I can't imagine calling anyone else my commander in chief," she said, "except
John McCain."
Dan Nowicki writes for The Arizona Republic