Could McCain Have Won?

Hello friends.

I confess to still being quite numb from last night's events. The scale of the victory, combined with all of the factors that make it so interesting - to the point of being unbelievable - is stunning, and I am stunned. I am also, incidentally, quite tired from E-day running, watching returns, and the emotional exhaustion that comes with getting internally interested in the most fascinating presidential election possibly ever.

There have been a great number of things written about the night, for which the overused word "historic" seems too small. A great number of them have been good, or even very good. I won't link ones tolling ecstatic about Obama, since there are no shortage of those, but I'll recommend you read The Guardian's editorial, for a foreign perspective, and the National Review's editorial, in case you need to be reminded that not everyone is thrilled.

In the coming days, when I can read a little more and wrap my head around this election, I'll deal with what I think this means, how great was the election season, my suggestions for Obama, and other fun little intellectual games. Today, though, it seems the only thing I can think about is how McCain lost, and all the blame that there is to go around.

So, if you're a McCain supporter, I promise I'm not dancing on the grave of your favored public servant's political dreams. It's just the only place I can think to start.

1. It's the economy, stupid blogger.

McCain - and more importantly, his senior staff of Rick Davis, Steve Schmidt, and Mark Salter - have a strong case to make that this election was essentially unwinnable, given low Republican favorables and an economy that was just stinking up the world. It is possible that there is just no one who was going to win this election, no matter what they did. Maybe a weak candidate, but Obama is a gifted politician (speaker, strategist, organizer), and lacks the polarizing weaknesses of Hillary (who I also think would have beaten McCain, just less convincingly).

I think it might be partially right. Who did the GOP have that was better? Mitt Romney? Maybe, but it's hard to see Mitt with the broad appeal to bring in the electoral votes he would have needed. I do wonder, though, if a different version of McCain could have at least made it different. I think this didn't need to be a blowout, at least, and blaming the lousy economy and talented opponent may be the most accurate, but it's also ignoring the serious errors made by the GOP in general and McCain in particular.

2. Palin.

As you know, I like Sarah Palin. At least, I'm interested by her. As far as I can tell, thanks to "Ted," this was the only blog in the world, outside of "Draft Sarah Palin for VP," that seriously talked about her before she was chosen. So I have a soft spot for Palin.

But for all her folksy appeal, ignoring the costs of Palin is something the GOP should do at its own risk. Her reactionary views, combined with her complete inability to get through even one interview without looking outclassed, were not a good thing. Yes, she fired up the base. But she turned off mainline Protestants (think of all those suburban mothers outside of Philadelphia), and she was a constant story for the media. She simultaneously overshadowed the top of the ticket and underperformed low expectations, which is just bad.

The problem with her was that she didn't help with anyone except the base. I'm not ridiculous enough to think that McCain could have chosen a real moderate, but what if he had chosen Romney? A youthful, attractive, moderate-sounding veep with Michigan ties might have done more for the ticket than Palin did. When the economy tanked, instead of hearing about Joe the Plumber or $150,000 dresses, we would have heard the voice of a successful businessman and executive. Maybe he wouldn't have fired up the base as much, but McCain was going to need more than the base anyway. When in doubt, I tend to think you should dare your base to stay home; they never really do. And he is more accepted than McCain amidst the conservative faithful; just ask the American Spectator. Anyway, he certainly would have captured more "Hillary voters" than Palin, who was so the opposite of Hillary Clinton that the very thought wound up insulting most women who supported Hill-dawg.

3. Strategery.

Robert Draper's NYT Magazine article I linked went through all the changes of narrative the McCain camp went through, so I won't dwell. But the campaign never got it together. They hammered issues that played to arguably their biggest weakness, which is that their candidate is old. Public financing? Association with the Weathermen? Calling Obama a Socialist? They kept running at issues that were cool in 1962. They never found issues that resonated, or a strategy that stuck. You can't win when you're constantly looking back.

4. Post-idealogy

In the same way that they never settled on a plan, the McCain camp never realized that the American people are done, for now, with ideologues. While they were fumbling around for 10-second answers and gimmicks (which, by they way, their candidate was staggeringly ill-suited to deliver), Obama was getting Americans comfortable with shades of grey. It gave Obama the appearance of having a steady hand, and McCain the appearance of being out of touch.

The worst example of this was the bailout, where McCain's "suspension" of his campaign was obviously a stunt that did nothing. Meanwhile, Obama just did what he did, and looked presidential doing it. As Roger Simon of the Politico points out, eight years of a "gut player" who was certain he was right about everything, paved the way for a liminal candidate who was comfortable with judgment, rather than ideology.

5. Si, se puede.

I put this last because it's the one thing where I have concrete evidence.

In 2000 and 2004, Latino voters went for George W. Bush. Latino voters, whose numbers are always on the rise, are socially conservative, and have historically been reluctant to trust black politicians. So a split among Latino voters should have been more than a gimme for McCain.

Instead, they went for Obama 66-31. And it was worse in close states. From CNN:

In New Mexico, Latinos constituted 41 percent of the electorate and voted for Obama by a 69 percent to 30 percent margin; white voters in New Mexico supported McCain 56 percent to 42 percent. In Colorado, Latinos comprised 13% of the electorate and broke for Obama 64% to 34% while white voters split evenly. In Nevada, Latinos comprised 16 percent of the electorate and supported Obama 78 percent to 20 percent. Fifty-one percent of Nevada's white voters went for McCain.

And from NALEO:

In Virginia, where the reported margin of victory as of this writing was 120,299, the NALEO Educational Fund estimates that about 67,000 Latinos voted for Senator Obama. In Florida, where the reported margin of victory as of this writing was 178,745, the NALEO Educational Fund's analysis estimates that about 548,000 Latinos voted for Senator Obama.

So that's bad, if you want to win. And there was reason to believe it didn't need to be that bad. What happened?

Tom Tancredo and Lou Dobbs. The GOP primary was a race to the insane when it came to immigration. All sorts of people who were reasonable to intelligent on immigration proceeded to jump on the deportation bandwagon. Romney, Giuliani, Huckabee... guys who never cared about the issue before, or at least who didn't think it was the end of the world, ran to the right. Even McCain, who was the guy who wrote immigration reform legislation, disavowed his own bill.

I was talking to my father today, and I was saying it was a little weird that this happened. Every power player in the party was not nuts on this issue. Bush, Cheney, McCain... they were all in favor of mild reform, and had never been crazy about deportation. Four years ago, Karl Rove made a point that Latinos needed to be kept in the GOP fold for Republicans to continue to have success. They knew this road led to disaster. So my question is... how did these guys, who, if nothing else, were adept at enforcing their views within their own party, let a couple nutjobs hijack the primary? Why didn't they get people together and put out the word that, if you make immigration a big issue, you are done in the party? Why didn't they bury Tancredo to send a message?

The bottom line is that this could have been the difference, the GOP saw it coming, and it wasn't (like abortion or gay marriage) an issue that was dear to the right-wing's heart. I will never understand why they let a group of idealogues they didn't even agree with cost them five swing states, and potentially the future.