Bringing Back the Bus

MASON CITY, IOWA, March 15, 2007 — -- In an attempt to reignite his steady but plodding campaign with some of the lightning in a bottle he captured ever so briefly in 2000, Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., has brought back his fabled campaign bus for a tour of Iowa -- a state he bypassed in his race seven years ago at least partly because of his opposition to ethanol subsidies.

But whether McCain, running a far more machinelike, establishment campaign, can energize voters the way he did when he seemed more independent and unpredictable -- and before the Iraq War -- remained an open question, even to the senator.

"It's early, we'll see," McCain told ABC News in an interview on the bus as we drove from the Des Moines Marriott to the state capitol. "This is the first time that we've really been on the bus, the first time we've really spent in Iowa, which we did not do in 2000. … I think we'll see. These are different times."

"It feels different, but it feels good," said the senator's wife, Cindy McCain. "It feels like an older child now."

The 70-year-old McCain -- who aims to be the oldest president this country has ever first elected -- said he has the same fire in the belly had had when he made his first White House bid at a mere 63. "This is the first time we've been on the bus — but we've been working at this for well over a year," McCain said. "We've been trying to lay the political and financial base. We haven't done a great job, but we've done a pretty good job to prepare for this."

But all that planning and MCain's somewhat more cautious nature today as a front-runner means his campaign has taken on a distinctly different tone -- less joyful, more severe, with more emphasis on his conservative credentials. While McCain professes more moderate views on immigration and other issues, what once seemed his greatest political strength -- his popularity with moderates and independents -- has dissolved because of his strong support for President Bush's re-election and for the president's war, a war he is linked to more than any other candidate.