Reply #9: He's caught the GOP's attention too....

[Catchawave]

From a GOP blog:
http://race42008.com/2006/12/14/nbcwsj-poll-mccain-would-lose-to-edwards/

In this new NBC/WSJ survey, Edwards leads McCain by a margin of 43% to 41%. Obviously, two things immediately come to mind: A). Edwards’ victory is still very much within the margin of error; and B). Poll results just less than two years out from the election are subject to great changes and fluctuations as campaigns progress. However, this poll and others like it can not be merely tossed aside and dismissed–these polls pose a serious, serious problem to the very basic core reasoning of a McCain candidacy. For the past many months, and years even, McCain has had as much presidential support amongst Republican voters because they think he can win. Were it not for his perceived electoral power, McCain would be a nobody in terms of the presidential election–he would simply be a much older and feebler version of Chuck Hagel. The fact that John Edwards, someone with nowhere near the experience and qualifications of John McCain, can win at this point, considering that McCain is already at or near 100% name recognition and has very little wiggle room to change/develop opinions, is detrimental to the very fundamental logic of McCain’s run for the White House.

As we here have been predicting for weeks now, ever since the monumental change of dynamics created by the Democrats’ Senate takeover, McCain as a minority member is now stuck between a rock and a hard place. He has to, on the one hand, try to appease the same conservatives and Republicans he’s been infuriating for the past decade, but by doing so bleeds moderate/crossover support. On the other hand, he has to retain his image as a moderate, but by doing so bleeds conservative/GOP support. The major problem with this teeter-totter strategy is that as he flips back and forth, constantly trying to appease both ends of the political spectrum, he’s not actually making headway with either side. He’s only damaging his relationship with each side by constantly running back and forth to appease each one’s opposite side.

Where once McCain was the GOP’s “Ace,” now McCain is beginning to become a liability. For someone so immensely unpopular amongst grassroots conservative America, who also happens to be losing serious ground in the general election matchups, I just don’t see how McCain winds up with the nomination when all is said and done.