McCain Can Run, but Bush Won’t Hide

[cal04]

By FRANK RICH
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/18/opinion/18rich.html?_r=1&ref=opinion&oref=slogin

THE biggest gift President Bush has given his party this year was to keep his daughter’s wedding nearly as private as Connie Corleone’s. Now that his disapproval rating has reached the Nixon nadir of negativity, even a joyous familial ritual isn’t enough to make the country glad to see him. The G.O.P.’s best hope would be for both the president and Dick Cheney to lock themselves in a closet until the morning after Election Day.

Republicans finally recognized the gravity of their situation three days after Jenna Bush took her vows in Crawford. As Hillary Clinton romped in West Virginia, voters in Mississippi elected a Democrat in a Congressional district that went for Bush-Cheney by 25 percentage points just four years ago. It’s the third “safe” Republican House seat to fall in a special election since March.

Party leaders have been haplessly trying to identify possible remedies ever since. It didn’t help that their recent stab at an Obamaesque national Congressional campaign slogan, “The Change You Deserve,” was humiliatingly identified as the advertising pitch for the anti-depressant Effexor. (If they’re going to go the pharmaceutical route, “Viva Viagra” might be more to the point.) Yet for all the Republican self-flagellation, it’s still not clear that the party even understands the particular dimensions of its latest defeat and its full implications for both Congressional races and John McCain in November.

The Mississippi election was actually a runoff, required by law after a preliminary vote left neither candidate with the required 50 percent. In the last round, on April 22, the Democrat, Travis Childers, beat the Republican, Greg Davis, 49 percent to 46 percent. (The rest went to minor candidates.) On Tuesday, that margin increased dramatically: the Republican remained at 46 percent while the Democrat jumped to 54 percent.

[Donkeykick]

1. McCain Can Run, but Bush Won’t Hide?

And you know what? I hope it stays that way.:headbang:

[east texas lib]

2. You know they're freaking out when the talk show "hosts" start moaning about the recent GOP losses!

x(

[hokies4ever]

3. When McCain loses to Obama

the pundits will point out McCain's underestimation of how much Bush is hated by the voters. If I was McCain's campaign strategist, I would tell him that every time he mentions Bush, he loses 100 votes. Say something good about Bush and you lose some of those independent/left voters who are attracted to McCain's maverick brand (even if it is faulty to say that he's still a maverick when he's flip-flopped on so many issues). Say something bad about Bush and you lose some of that conservative base, which you haven't solidified, by the way. Bottom line is McCain's camp will be blaming Bush for their loss when the November election is finished.