Bush base key to McCain success in '08
WASHINGTON - Sen. John McCain's support of the Dubai port proposal is just the latest controversial issue on which the Arizona senator has backed President Bush. And that is no accident, political analysts say. Other Republicans can afford to distance themselves from a lame-duck president whose popularity has dropped to near record lows. But experts say that if McCain decides to seek the 2008 Republican presidential nomination, as many in the party expect him to do, he must show his loyalty in order to sway the distrustful Bush base. McCain has no choice, because "he's got reverse Hillary-itis," said Lee Miringoff, director of the Marist Institute for Public Opinion at Marist College in New York. While Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York is solid with core Democrats but not so popular with independent voters, McCain is "solid with independents but has trouble reaching out to the base," Miringoff said in an interview.
In the latest Marist Poll, conducted in mid-February by Miringoff, McCain was the only possible 2008 candidate who was named by more than 50 percent of voters as someone who should run for president. He did so on the strength of "crossover appeal" to independents and Democrats unrivaled by any of the other 25 politicians from both parties in the poll, Miringoff noted. Dante Scala, a professor at St. Anselm College and an expert on New Hampshire's first-in-the-nation presidential primary, takes his analysis of McCain's political appeal a step further. "McCain is unusual among politicians in that in some sense, independents are his base," Scala said in an interview. That's fine in a general election, but not necessary an asset in the Republican primaries, he added. McCain won the New Hampshire Republican primary in 2000, largely on the strength of independent voters' support. But not long after that, his bid for the GOP nomination ran aground in South Carolina against a rejuvenated Bush campaign and its motivated base of social and religious conservatives, the dominant force in the national party.
Not surprisingly, then, as he assessing his chances in a second run for the GOP nomination, McCain is actively courting key figures in the Bush political network throughout the country, but especially in South Carolina. In January, for example, he held a meeting in a Spartanburg hotel with Bush loyalists, including Bush's state finance co-chairman, Barry Wynn. Two months before that, he lunched in Columbia with Bush fund-raisers John Rainey and C. Edward Floyd. And the senator's political advisers are trying to sign strategist Warren Tompkins, who ran the Bush campaigns in South Carolina in 2000 and 2004. McCain also has the backing of the South Carolina's senior senator, Lindsey Graham, perhaps the most popular politician in the state. That will help a lot, said Jack Bass, a College of Charleston professor who has written extensively about Southern politics. But "just what the Bush superloyalists will do is unclear," Bass said in an interview. South Carolina's large veteran and military retiree population will be "a significant source of strength" for McCain, who spent nearly seven years as a prisoner of war in Vietnam, Bass noted.
But McCain's return to South Carolina after his loss in 2000 to apologize for not speaking out against the display of the Confederate flag at the state Capitol "won't help him with flag supporters," who overwhelmingly supported Bush, Bass added. Still, once Bush started running for re-election in 2004, "McCain has been mending fences with the conservatives almost as fast as Tom Sawyer," said Tom Schaller, a University of Maryland professor who is publishing a book this fall about Southern politics, "Whistling Past Dixie." Not only did McCain campaign aggressively for Bush's re-election, but in the 14 months since Bush's second term began, few senators have stood with the president as closely as McCain, even as the president's poll numbers steadily declined. Although McCain sponsored anti-torture legislation, he vigorously defended the increasingly unpopular war in Iraq. He brokered a deal that cleared the way for confirmation of the president's judicial nominees, including two Supreme Court justices, a top priority of religious conservatives. And amid GOP complaints about allowing a Dubai company to run the ports in six American cities, he urged caution and prudence. Moreover, he has spearheaded a compromise with Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., on legislation to rewrite America's immigration laws, an issue that divides both political parties. And as the scandal surrounding disgraced GOP lobbyist Jack Abramoff has threatened to derail the Republican Party's efforts to retain control of Congress in the election this fall, McCain has used his reputation as a reformer to press legislation aimed at cracking down on influence-peddling on Capitol Hill.
John Weaver, McCain's chief political adviser, dismissed the suggestion of experts that the senator is unpopular with a large segment of Bush supporters. "We don't see it," he insisted. In most public opinion polls in recent months, McCain typically has been at the top, and "surely that isn't coming just from people who are not supporters of the president," Weaver said in an interview. Besides, he added, McCain "doesn't make decisions based on who he needs to curry favor with. The word 'curry' is not in his vocabulary." Nevertheless, having skipped the Iowa caucus in 2000, McCain is planning a trip there next month to aid the gubernatorial campaign of Rep. Jim Nussle. That should help him curry, or rather cultivate, the favor of Republicans in one of the most important states in the presidential nominating process. Victories in Iowa and New Hampshire could provide enough momentum for McCain to weather any setbacks in South Carolina and other Southern states where he remains suspect. If so, "the main question national Republicans will have to ask themselves is whether they want to risk nominating somebody less prominent and popular (with independents and Democrats) than McCain," said Schaller. "People like (Bush political adviser) Karl Rove must decide if they are going to vouch for McCain among wary conservatives or let the conservatives go after him."
In the latest Marist Poll, conducted in mid-February by Miringoff, McCain was the only possible 2008 candidate who was named by more than 50 percent of voters as someone who should run for president. He did so on the strength of "crossover appeal" to independents and Democrats unrivaled by any of the other 25 politicians from both parties in the poll, Miringoff noted. Dante Scala, a professor at St. Anselm College and an expert on New Hampshire's first-in-the-nation presidential primary, takes his analysis of McCain's political appeal a step further. "McCain is unusual among politicians in that in some sense, independents are his base," Scala said in an interview. That's fine in a general election, but not necessary an asset in the Republican primaries, he added. McCain won the New Hampshire Republican primary in 2000, largely on the strength of independent voters' support. But not long after that, his bid for the GOP nomination ran aground in South Carolina against a rejuvenated Bush campaign and its motivated base of social and religious conservatives, the dominant force in the national party.
Not surprisingly, then, as he assessing his chances in a second run for the GOP nomination, McCain is actively courting key figures in the Bush political network throughout the country, but especially in South Carolina. In January, for example, he held a meeting in a Spartanburg hotel with Bush loyalists, including Bush's state finance co-chairman, Barry Wynn. Two months before that, he lunched in Columbia with Bush fund-raisers John Rainey and C. Edward Floyd. And the senator's political advisers are trying to sign strategist Warren Tompkins, who ran the Bush campaigns in South Carolina in 2000 and 2004. McCain also has the backing of the South Carolina's senior senator, Lindsey Graham, perhaps the most popular politician in the state. That will help a lot, said Jack Bass, a College of Charleston professor who has written extensively about Southern politics. But "just what the Bush superloyalists will do is unclear," Bass said in an interview. South Carolina's large veteran and military retiree population will be "a significant source of strength" for McCain, who spent nearly seven years as a prisoner of war in Vietnam, Bass noted.
But McCain's return to South Carolina after his loss in 2000 to apologize for not speaking out against the display of the Confederate flag at the state Capitol "won't help him with flag supporters," who overwhelmingly supported Bush, Bass added. Still, once Bush started running for re-election in 2004, "McCain has been mending fences with the conservatives almost as fast as Tom Sawyer," said Tom Schaller, a University of Maryland professor who is publishing a book this fall about Southern politics, "Whistling Past Dixie." Not only did McCain campaign aggressively for Bush's re-election, but in the 14 months since Bush's second term began, few senators have stood with the president as closely as McCain, even as the president's poll numbers steadily declined. Although McCain sponsored anti-torture legislation, he vigorously defended the increasingly unpopular war in Iraq. He brokered a deal that cleared the way for confirmation of the president's judicial nominees, including two Supreme Court justices, a top priority of religious conservatives. And amid GOP complaints about allowing a Dubai company to run the ports in six American cities, he urged caution and prudence. Moreover, he has spearheaded a compromise with Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., on legislation to rewrite America's immigration laws, an issue that divides both political parties. And as the scandal surrounding disgraced GOP lobbyist Jack Abramoff has threatened to derail the Republican Party's efforts to retain control of Congress in the election this fall, McCain has used his reputation as a reformer to press legislation aimed at cracking down on influence-peddling on Capitol Hill.
John Weaver, McCain's chief political adviser, dismissed the suggestion of experts that the senator is unpopular with a large segment of Bush supporters. "We don't see it," he insisted. In most public opinion polls in recent months, McCain typically has been at the top, and "surely that isn't coming just from people who are not supporters of the president," Weaver said in an interview. Besides, he added, McCain "doesn't make decisions based on who he needs to curry favor with. The word 'curry' is not in his vocabulary." Nevertheless, having skipped the Iowa caucus in 2000, McCain is planning a trip there next month to aid the gubernatorial campaign of Rep. Jim Nussle. That should help him curry, or rather cultivate, the favor of Republicans in one of the most important states in the presidential nominating process. Victories in Iowa and New Hampshire could provide enough momentum for McCain to weather any setbacks in South Carolina and other Southern states where he remains suspect. If so, "the main question national Republicans will have to ask themselves is whether they want to risk nominating somebody less prominent and popular (with independents and Democrats) than McCain," said Schaller. "People like (Bush political adviser) Karl Rove must decide if they are going to vouch for McCain among wary conservatives or let the conservatives go after him."
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