How McCain Lost in PA

julia · 04-28-2008, 02:15 AM

How McCain Lost in Pennsylvania

By FRANK RICH

Quote:

Published: April 27, 2008
IT’S a nightmare. It’s the Bataan Death March. It’s mutually assured Armageddon. “Both of them are already losing the general to John McCain,” declared a Newsweek columnist last month, predicting that the election “may already be over” by the time the Democrats anoint a nominee.
Not so fast. If we’ve learned any new rule in the 2008campaign, it’s this: Once our news culture sets a story in stone, chances are it will crumble. But first it must be recycled louder and louder 24/7, as if sheer repetition will transmute conventional wisdom into reality.

When the Pennsylvania returns rained down Tuesday night, the narrative became clear fast. The Democrats’ exit polls spelled disaster: Some 25 percent of the primary voters said they would defect to Mr. McCain or not vote at all if Barack Obama were the nominee. How could the party possibly survive this bitter, perhaps race-based civil war?

But as the doomsday alarm grew shrill, few noticed that on this same day in Pennsylvania, 27 percent of Republican primary voters didn’t just tell pollsters they would defect from their party’s standard-bearer; they went to the polls, gas prices be damned, to vote against Mr. McCain. Though ignored by every channel I surfed, there actually was a G.O.P. primary on Tuesday, open only to registered Republicans. And while it was superfluous in determining that party’s nominee, 220,000 Pennsylvania Republicans (out of their total turnout of 807,000) were moved to cast ballots for Mike Huckabee or, more numerously, Ron Paul. That’s more voters than the margin (215,000) that separated Hillary Clinton and Mr. Obama.

Those antiwar Paul voters are all potential defectors to the Democrats in November. Mr. Huckabee’s religious conservatives, who rejected Mr. McCain throughout the primary season, might also bolt or stay home. Given that the Democratic ticket beat Bush-Cheney in Pennsylvania by 205,000 votes in 2000 and 144,000 votes in 2004, these are 220,000 voters the G.O.P. can ill-afford to lose. Especially since there are now a million more registered Democrats than Republicans in Pennsylvania. (These figures don’t even include independents, who couldn’t vote in either primary on Tuesday and have been migrating toward the Democrats since 2006.)

For such a bitterly divided party, the Democrats hardly show signs of clinical depression. The last debate, however dumb, had the most viewers of any so far. The rise in turnout and new voters is all on the Democratic side. Even before its deathbed transfusion of new donations, the Clinton campaign trounced the McCain campaign in fund-raising by 2.5 to 1. (The Obama-McCain ratio is 3 to 1.)

On Tuesday, a Democrat won the first round of a special Congressional election in Mississippi, even though the national G.O.P. outspent the Democrats by more than double and President Bush carried this previously safe Republican district by 25 percentage points in 2004. A Gallup poll last week found Mr. Bush’s national disapproval rating the worst (69 percent) for any president in Gallup’s entire 70-year history. For all his (and Mr. McCain’s) persistent sightings of “victory” in Iraq, the percentage of Americans calling the war a mistake (63) also set a new record.
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(bolding mine-j)

How McCain Lost in Pennsylvania - New York Times

BillCosby · 05-02-2008, 11:19 AM

like niXon before him he will fix it all..........

Not the war that is stupid & wrong.. It is how it is being done............

Just elect me & I can fix it all........

Trust me................

He flew a plane............ He was a pow for lots of years he knows all about war...........

julia · 05-03-2008, 11:48 PM

Good 'toon.

05-02-2008, 11:19 AM	#2 (permalink)
BillCosby The party of the pissed!! Join Date: Oct 2007 Posts: 4,504 My Mood: Thanks: 183 Thanked 119 Times in 92 Posts	like niXon before him he will fix it all.......... Not the war that is stupid & wrong.. It is how it is being done............ Just elect me & I can fix it all........ Trust me................ He flew a plane............ He was a pow for lots of years he knows all about war........... __________________ Preventive war is not war!!!!Counter-terror is not terror
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05-03-2008, 11:48 PM	#3 (permalink)
julia Sassy Lipstick Maverick Join Date: Nov 2007 Posts: 3,795 Blog Entries: 7 Thanks: 271 Thanked 272 Times in 164 Posts	Good 'toon. __________________ The candidate does not speak for the campaign.
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