If McCain Loses, It's Not My Fault - already a circular firing squad forming to assign blame.

[jefferson_dem]

If McCain Loses, It's Not My Fault
Campaign aides are optimistic but also starting to assign blame.
By Christopher Beam
Posted Monday, Nov. 3, 2008, at 10:08 PM ET

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McCain's aides are less successful at hiding their frustration. They exude optimism, too, but there's already a circular firing squad forming to assign blame. And in this firing squad, the guns point outward. The campaign pins the blame for McCain's struggles on an unholy trinity of factors: media (it's biased), money (Barack Obama has more), and milieu (politically, it's good for Democrats).

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It might be too early to call this venting blame. After all, McCain hasn't lost. But it's surely a preview of rationales to come if he does. Conspicuously absent from the scapegoats named above are two obvious ones: the economy and Sarah Palin. Blaming the economy would acknowledge McCain's perceived weakness on the issue. And blaming Palin would amount to questioning McCain's judgment.

Besides, there will be plenty of time for that kind of blame game later. In the meantime, the campaign is sticking with its comeback prediction: The polls are tightening, late deciders will swing heavily for McCain, and Obama tends to underperform in actual elections (as opposed to surveys).

That logic seems to be enough to keep McCain chipper. The senator has maintained an inhuman travel schedule, hitting seven states in 26 hours. He pulls this off by 1) leveraging the time zones to extend the day by three hours, and 2) holding most events at airports, thus justifying the Top Gun intro music. He also just added two 13th-hour stops in Colorado and New Mexico on Tuesday, despite the McCain tradition of going to the movies on Election Day.

If McCain feels like this is the end, he doesn't show it. The rallies feel remarkably normal. He's got his usual merry band, including Joe the Lieberman and court-jester-in-waiting Lindsey Graham. He's even rolling out new material. McCain warned the Pittsburgh crowd that Obama told the San Francisco Chronicle—McCain said San Francisco like you'd describe a turd—that "if somebody wants to build a coal-powered plant, they can. It's just that it will bankrupt them."

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http://www.slate.com/id/2203658/

[Lost-in-FL]

1. I'll be honored to take the blame.

:evilgrin: