McCain 3.0
EmailFROM GUEST-BLOGGER RICK KLEIN, from ABC’s The Note.
Maybe it’s something about the July sun that gets the Arizona going in Sen. John McCain.
Almost exactly a year after retooling his campaign when it hit rock-bottom, there’s a new McCain makeover. Start with a new campaign honcho, sprinkle in some outside help, top it off with a lucky break that allows him to return home like an action hero, hostages released — and all of a sudden you’ve got a new narrative for a campaign that desperately needs it.
That’s the focus of today’s Note: This series of mostly independent events contributes to the ability of the McCain campaign to start telling a different story, and perception can easily become reality.
Mostly it ensures that people like me in the mainstream media have a new story to tell; watch, for instance, for stories that focus on the newfound “discipline” of the campaign under Steve Schmidt, a straight-from-central-casting (does every story on him have to mention his shaved head and barrel-chested build?) bulldog of an operative who has wide respect among both Democrats and Republicans.
McCain was getting close to a dangerous place in the campaign. Polls have had him down narrowly yet consistently (and sometimes not narrowly). All the energy has seemed to be with Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill. More worrisome still, Republican operatives have been buzzing about the McCain campaign’s problems in public — in the type of second-guessing/grumbling that John Kerry grew too used to in 2004.
So here comes the new McCain, again. Last year around this time, bankrupt and flailing, he ditched the Cadillac for a Neon (or, more precisely, a battered bus) and got back to what fueled his original rise — more direct voter contact, less of an entourage, more McCain, less filter.
The parallels with what’s happening now have their limits. He only has four months before the general, compared to the six months he had before the primaries. There’s far less time for direct voter contact, and far more voters to contact. It all happens at once, nation-wide, this time; there’s no New Hampshire to boost him back into the game, living room by living room.
And Obama still has the enthusiasm, the money, the sense of history — all significant obstacles for the GOP this year.
But suddenly, operatives all around Washington and beyond who’ve been looking for a competitive race have new justifications for seeing one. As I said, perceptions become realities.
– Rick Klein
USS Gabrielle Giffords Honors Courage 
Mitt Romney's Full Speech at CPAC 2012
obama also has the empty suit and the hot air and the bs….
Posted by: al | July 3, 2008, 9:08 am 9:08 am
Well you can spray a 300 dollar bottle of perfume on a steaming pile but at the end of the day you still got..you guessed it… a steaming pile.
Posted by: fd | July 3, 2008, 9:14 am 9:14 am
so you are basically telling us how you will be interpreting the John McCain shakeup without even seeing the results of it yet? Is this what passes for journalism?
Posted by: so... | July 3, 2008, 9:29 am 9:29 am
The truth is that i cannot tell is ABC News is carrying water for McCain or just trying to paint a picture that shows this race as very clsoe so they can make money off of it. I am not so sure about their motives, but the NOTE and their blogs, lately, have been so pro-McCain, it raises several questions about journalistic ethics and intergrity. I know Fox News is blatantly anti-Obama (pro-McCain). I know MSNBC is pro-Obama. I know CNN, for the most part, is neutral. But ABC News is an enigma. I will not put them in the same category as Fox News, but they are sliding dangerously close to that level.
Posted by: Kevin | July 3, 2008, 9:32 am 9:32 am
McCain lied on your own network just yesterday, you have the video to prove it. He even told the same lie the sainted late Tim Russert caught him on, and you guys are singing his praises for firing his campaign manager and being in Colombia when hostages were rescued with no help from any action taken by McCain. Go back to blaming the Clinton administration for 9-11.
Posted by: Ricky | July 3, 2008, 9:34 am 9:34 am
I was with you until the comment, Obama has a sense of history? As it pertains to what? International war, American History, personal family history, or Democrats in elections. All, in my mind, have created serious problems for the orator.
Posted by: EyesOpen | July 3, 2008, 9:36 am 9:36 am
Well the next news story that ABC carries on Obama will be negative or with a negative slant.
Big Comeback with a new campaign? what was wrong with the old? Didn’t work, without direction, ineffective, what is is he going to do as president? Try untill he gets it right?
He is moving further and further to the right
Posted by: Thinking | July 3, 2008, 9:37 am 9:37 am
McCain’s votes the last 8 years have led the Straight Talk Express to a dead end. Now, he’s trying to back up the bus.
Too bad it’s well documented that McCain voted right with Bush on policies that have cost thousands of American lives, tens of thousands of Americans to be physically and mentally injured, and millions of American jobs.
Just this week, we learned McCain allowed a terrorist supporter to hold a McCain fundraiser.
After 9/11, I never would have imagined a presidential candidate taking money from someone who finances terrorists.
Posted by: Dan | July 3, 2008, 9:41 am 9:41 am
“Mostly it ensures that people like me in the mainstream media have a new story to tell”
Have you tried this new story to tell?
“Enjoying craps opens up a window on a central thread constant in John’s life,” says John Weaver, McCain’s former chief strategist, who followed him to many a casino. “Taking a chance, playing against the odds.” Aides say McCain tends to play for a few thousand dollars at a time and avoids taking markers, or loans, from the casinos, which he has helped regulate in Congress. “He never, ever plays on the house,” says Mark Salter, a McCain adviser. The goal, say several people familiar with his habit, is never financial. He loves the thrill of winning and the camaraderie at the table.
Only recently have McCain’s aides urged him to pull back from the pastime. In the heat of the GOP primary fight last spring, he announced on a visit to the Vegas Strip that he was going to the casino floor. When his aides stopped him, fearing a public relations disaster, McCain suggested that they ask the casino to take a craps table to a private room, a high-roller privilege McCain had indulged in before. His aides, with alarm bells ringing, refused again, according to two accounts of the discussion.
Posted by: Thinking | July 3, 2008, 9:52 am 9:52 am
What happens to Michelle Obama’s makeover? Unlike McCain’s makeover, I don’t think you can decorate Michelle with something she cannot be. Her being is so rooted in the old way of thinking about race, something Obama express about Wright, but hypocritically he never express it about Michelle.
Posted by: country_voter | July 3, 2008, 9:59 am 9:59 am
Hey try this story.
The nation’s top military officer said yesterday that more U.S. troops are needed in Afghanistan to tamp down an increasingly violent insurgency, but that the Pentagon does not have sufficient forces to send because they are committed to the war in Iraq.
Posted by: Thinking | July 3, 2008, 10:09 am 10:09 am
Here is another story Good news for McCain
Employers cut payrolls by 62,000 in June, the sixth straight month of nationwide job losses, underscoring the economy’s fragile state.
Posted by: Thinking | July 3, 2008, 10:10 am 10:10 am
“Mostly it ensures that people like me in the mainstream media have a new story to tell”
How about shining a bright light on John McCain’s plan to have health insurance companies regulated by the state OF THEIR OWN CHOOSING?
History is repeating itself.
When the law was changed to allow credit card companies to be regulated by the state of their own choosing, the result was that Delaware eliminated ALL pro-consumer regulations. This is why virtually all of the credit card companies chose to reincorporate there.
WHAT DOES THIS SAY ABOUT JOHN MCCAIN?
It says that he doesn’t give a fig about hard working, and sometimes struggling Americans, that’s what.
* * * * *
Don’t you CARE that this means the end of all consumer protections? Don’t you CARE if all disputes will be sent to industry owned “arbitrators”?
WHAT DO YOU CARE ABOUT, THEN?
Posted by: John's conscience | July 3, 2008, 10:11 am 10:11 am
Hey “country voter”, did you catch Michelle Obama on the View?
Posted by: John's conscience | July 3, 2008, 10:14 am 10:14 am
The media is bored and it’s a slow news cycle hence the media induced “resurrection” of McCain. Soon to be followed with the next so called “resurrection” of Obama, just in time for the election. If the lamestream media were and more transparent they’d be GHOSTS…
Posted by: pity | July 3, 2008, 10:14 am 10:14 am
Boy I am not having any problems finding a story and I am not even in the business
few months ago, Ben found that the McCain campaign is exempting foreign aid to Israel — among other places — from the candidate’s threat to veto earmarks.
As McCain comes back from Colombia, the sticky problem with McCain’s pledge to veto bills with earmarks has cropped up again: Aid to Colombia — the kind that allows the Colombian government to purchase the kind of drug interdiction boat pictured above — is funded by a similar mechanism, as detailed by former Democratic staffer Scott Lilly.
Posted by: Thinking | July 3, 2008, 10:16 am 10:16 am
I’m sorry but the release of those prisoners is just far far far too coincidental.
Somebody should be looking int if McCain and his campaign knew they were going to be released (no gunfire?…I smell a deal)
and McCain “happens” to be in the same country at the time of their release…when everyone was asking “why is he going to Columbia right now?”
It would be reminiscent of the arms deal and Ollie North …
which is the darkest side of American politics if this release of soldiers was planned to coincide with McCain…
these captives lives…and their freedom I hope …was not held or done because it was some whacked republican/Rovian/Charlie Black (who happens to be a lobbyist with connections to Columbia)
that would and hopefully will be discovered…
this overwhelmingly smells of a very dark side of politics (Cheney and the threat of Iraq anyone)
I hope someone has the decency to make sure that operations to fool the American public are not being used by the McCain campaign as they were over the past 8 years.
Posted by: dl | July 3, 2008, 10:20 am 10:20 am
Colombia’s successful hostage-liberating raid on FARC guerrillas allows McCain to play “action hero?”
Really?
I guess his primary “super power” lies in his ability to persuade the foreign leaders he visits to inform him in advance of high-stakes military operations. Well done, Senator!
Posted by: LESD | July 3, 2008, 10:25 am 10:25 am
McCain 3.0?
I think I liked 1.0 better. One never knows though by Nov we might have McCain 6.0
Posted by: Thinking | July 3, 2008, 10:31 am 10:31 am
any news division worth there salt would be asking the obvious questions…
how is this weird coincidence with Mccain, Columbia, his campaign head and and past Columbian lobbyist, Charlie Black, the release of these prisoners …suddenly…with no gunfire…
sounds like Col Mustard in the living room with Iran Contra.
Posted by: dl | July 3, 2008, 10:35 am 10:35 am
What else can McCain do beside less supposing that he helped in getting the hostages released from Colombia’s rebels. Something Jesse Jackson did for years, but he didn’t make it to the White House? Releasing the hostages was Colombia way of trying to get a “Free Trade Agreement” with us nothing else. We need another “Free Trade Agreement” like we need a hole in your heads.
John McCain’s best days are behind him.
Obama all the way!
Posted by: lookup | July 3, 2008, 10:47 am 10:47 am
You are missing the details. The Republicans know that the reason for the strong response to the mostly empty messages of hope and change is deeply rooted fear. Obama continues to stoke the fear while saying he has the initiative to create solutions. McCain is talking about solutions.
McCain is warming up to the public safety industry and understanding that homeland security is an ongoing task attended mostly inside the country.
Smart. These are the kinds of initiatives that are easy to explain and ones where Obama has zero footprint or credibility.
Posted by: len | July 3, 2008, 11:07 am 11:07 am
All John McCain’s ideas are warmed over reiterate from the Bush Administration nothing more nothing less. The Country is moving away from the Bush mentality. All the Bush Administration was about was War! War! War! Tax! Tax! Tax! breaks for the rich and $145.00+ dollars a barrel for crude oil?
Posted by: Lookup | July 3, 2008, 11:27 am 11:27 am
“All John McCain’s ideas are warmed over reiterate from the Bush Administration nothing more nothing less.”
Good political rant but bad day to day business thinking. There are opportunities in the public safety industry that McCain is smart to become wise about. The interoperability of broadband applications and the licensing of the spectrums are two. We’ve been putting band-aids on the holes in agency communications since 9/11 and we need to do some things that will be more stable and maintainable.
Believe it or not, Lookup, POTUS is a real job. McCain is starting to look like a man doing the job while Obama is looking like a man talking about doing the job. The difference in perception can be profound.
Posted by: len | July 3, 2008, 12:00 pm 12:00 pm
SINCE MACAIN IS ONLY 2 POINTS BEHIND OBAMA MAYBE HE DOES NOT NEED MUCH OF A MAKE OVER. EVERY TIME HE LIES THE MEDIA JUST CHALKS IT UP AS A SENIOR MOMENT, AND LOOKS OVER IT. AMERICA MUST NOT HAVE LOST MUCH FAITH IN THE REPUBLICAN BRAND ACCORDING TO THE POLLS
Posted by: DEMOCRAT FOR THE WHITE HOUSE | July 3, 2008, 12:18 pm 12:18 pm
“AMERICA MUST NOT HAVE LOST MUCH FAITH IN THE REPUBLICAN BRAND ACCORDING TO THE POLLS”
Maybe America is looking through the media and past the parties to the candidates. Maybe they have a sense of what they want to see done in the next term and are waiting to see who will give them the best results.
But realistically, I think the red/blue divide is still quite real and just covered up by the campaign rhetoric and media polls. Maybe no one is asking the right questions.
It’s no good to put all the eggs in the baskets of church volunteers when they can’t afford the gas to take the warm meals to the seniors and shut-ins and the seniors and shut-ins can’t afford to drive where the food is.
Don’t ask us to volunteer to fix bridges while our grandparents are going without food to buy gas to get to the drugstore. We’ll be driving to the drugstore too.
Posted by: len | July 3, 2008, 12:26 pm 12:26 pm
As if we needed any further evidence that that McCain is Bush’s third term, a Karl Rove disciple has now joined the campaign. With any luck, he’ll be able to drive McCain’s approval ratings down into Busy territory.
Posted by: Brooklyn Democrat | July 3, 2008, 12:27 pm 12:27 pm
len
Mccain looks like an out of touch man with the modern world.
he lives by a cold war battle mentality…which is what has killed us for the past 8 years.
He does not understand the internet.
and I saw him speak 3 times. He over and over was honest back then about his strength not being the economy. and during all 3 times he focused on the “danger of Iran” and how we need to be “proactive” the exact same thignsa he said about Iraq… to help us be convinced we needed to go.
so stop this spin you created.
McCain is out of touch with the change we need to make from the processes and policies we have made over the past 8 years.
His change up in his campaign is further evidency he is going to rely more and more on Bush campaign strategists…who eventually will also run the country.
and if we have learned nothing else in the past 8 years that would be stupid.
Posted by: dl | July 3, 2008, 12:36 pm 12:36 pm
Len listen to Joe Biden
He was right at the beginning …
and he is right now.
McCain is going around saying we have achieved success in Iraq…
Limiting the amount of deaths by supersizing our military is not success…
the success that has been achieved has been achieved (and this is being reported from the people on the ground) becasue the insurgents know that a “change” is coming.
where do they get that idea…the candidate who says “we are leaving and it is time for Iraq to step up”
the political movement and quieting is from a pause as insurgents joined the “sons of Iraq” because they were overpromised wealth and power (yet with no way of securing loyalty to anything but the tribes that exist who have been warring for hundreds of years…adn are not going to change)…those tribes sunni and shia…still heavily have a good dose of hate for each other.
we are wasting money and lives holding back an inevitable civil war that has been going on since the 1300′s or so…
It is time for people to read…and see through the spin.
Posted by: dl | July 3, 2008, 12:43 pm 12:43 pm
mm….wonder why FARC (a known narco terrorist group) would be so easily ‘duped’ into releasing what are now being called POW’S at the precise moment the world’s most famous POW who happens to be running for POTUS is in town?. It all seems a little too perfect…perhaps Carl Linder called in this little favor for McCain..I’m just saying it’s all a bit too cozy for me.
Posted by: No Chaquita in the tailpipe this time.. | July 3, 2008, 12:56 pm 12:56 pm
@dl: “He does not understand the internet.”
I’m probably not the one you want to debate on the merits of that. The incredible amount of BS used to support the web memes astounds even me and my career background in hypertext systems pre and post web is pretty solid.
Try this: The internet is a black market. Black markets are the most efficient free markets possible. They are not good for the societies on which they feast.
Reagan slept through most of his term and I doubt he knew how to program his remote (even by 80s standards). Yet he is remembered as a wonderful president. I disagree with that but that is the way he is remembered. We may want to reevaluate this ‘modern world’ idea because my experience is that far too much of what the young claim as their own or new isn’t.
The web is a very good example of that. So Obama The Agent of Change isn’t a good starter with me. I know too much about how this sort of image is merchandised. I’m waiting for the party platforms and watching for the VP choices. Obama has a good line up if the pundits are to be believed. I’m waiting to see what McCain gets.
Posted by: len | July 3, 2008, 4:06 pm 4:06 pm