Home
In this issue
Nov. 20, 2009
Rabbi David Aaron: How to make every second of your life come first
Caroline B. Glick: Whither American Jewry
Nov. 19, 2009
Binyamin L. Jolkovsky: Please Listen to this Godcast (5 minutes)
Jonathan Tobin: ADL Crosses the Line with Report Bashing Obama Critics
Nov. 18, 2009
Rabbi Yonason Goldson: What Judaism has to say about the secret of the Mona Lisa's smile
JWisdom.com: The (Jewish) Dating Game with Rabbi Lawrence Hajioff (8 minutes)
Nov. 17, 2009
Steven Emerson: How Does the 4th Amendment Impact Terror Finance Investigations?
JWisdom.com: If Frank Sinatra married Edith Piaf with Rabbi Y.Y. Rubinstein (2 minutes) Life lessons from what would be regarded as the most inappropriate lyrics ever sung
Nov. 16, 2009
The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir : When borrowing is stealing
JWisdom.com: Deconstructing faith with Rabbi Warren Goldstein (9 minutes)
Nov. 13, 2009
JWisdom.com Sarah's subjective reality with Rabbi Sroy Levitansky ( 6 minutes)
Caroline B. Glick: Obama's failure, Netanyahu's opportunity
Nov. 12, 2009
The Kosher Gourmet By Marialisa Calta : A sweet sweet potato treat
JWisdom.com Does God get tired? with Rabbi Harvey Belovski ( 5 minutes)
Nov. 11, 2009
Rabbi Avi Shafran: Jews and money: When anti-Semitism isn't
JWisdom.com Marriages are not made in Heaven with Rabbi Lawrence Hajioff (VERY fast 15 minutes)
Nov. 10, 2009
Michael Doyle: Author of book exposing CAIR ordered to remove supporting documents from Web
JWisdom.com If the creation so loudly shouts the existence of the Creator, why aren't more people believers? with Rabbi Naftali Brawer (9 minutes)
Nov. 9, 2009
Mark Steyn: Shooter exposes hole in U.S. terror strategy
JWisdom.com It's never too late to have a happy childhood with Sarah Chana Radcliffe (5 minutes)
Nov. 6, 2009
Rabbi Berel Wein: Choosing to hear
JWisdom.com Zero to 1/60th: How to Empower An Hour with Gavriel Aryeh Sande (7 minutes)
Caroline B. Glick The mullahs' big week
Suzanne Fields A Fallen Wall for Fallen Man
Nov. 5, 2009
The Kosher Gourmet: Three scrumptious -- but simple -- butternut squash dishes
JWisdom.com Hidden Hints: Unlocking Faith & Prayer with Rabbi Jay Yaacov Schwartz (10 minutes)
Nov. 4, 2009
Tom Hamburger and Kim Geiger: Should prayers be covered?
JWisdom.com When God played peacemaker With Rabbi Sroy Levitansky (5 minutes)
Nov. 3, 2009
Martin Peretz: Beware, Barack. Beware, Rahm. Beware, Axelrod
JWisdom.com Are you are closet idolater? With Sara Yoheved Rigler (10 minutes)
Nov. 2, 2009
Paul Greenberg: The Holocaust is now on Facebook
JWisdom.com Abraham's Strange Change With Rabbi Yitzchok Fingerer (5 minutes)
Oct. 29, 2003
Mortimer B. Zuckerman: Graffiti On History's Walls (MUST-READ!)

Jewish World Review Oct. 24, 2008 / 25 Tishrei 5769

McCain's last chance

By Dick Morris & Eileen Mc Gann


Printer Friendly Version
Email this article

http://www.JewishWorldReview.com | Today and the weekend are the last chance McCain has to get back into this race. To understand why, let's briefly recap what's happened since the conventions.


McCain left the back-to-back conventions with a lead for the first time in the presidential race. His strength was fueled by his designation of Sarah Palin and the enthusiasm she aroused in the Republican base. The Democrats, caught off guard, attacked her viciously which only reinforced the perception of a woman being victimized by a sexist left.


Then McCain lost the first two debates. Regardless of what observers think happened (we thought he lost the first and won the second), the fact is that his poll numbers deteriorated after each performance. The financial crisis extinguished any lead McCain may have had exacerbated by what must be seen, in hindsight, as the biggest mistake of his campaign - his decision to "suspend" his campaign and return to Washington to work on the bailout. McCain's subsequent docile support for the package, earmarks and all, destroyed the perception he had carefully built during his convention and subsequently of independence from Bush and of a populist antipathy to greedy Wall Street barons.


As a result of the debates, the crisis, and McCain's ineptitude, Obama surged to a lead of 7-9 points around October 13th.


Then, amazingly, McCain won the third debate. Using a populist appeal and fighting hard, he echoed the complaints of Joe the Plumber against Obama's plan to "spread the wealth around." From Wednesday, October 15 through Saturday, October 18th, McCain sliced the Obama lead to five points - an average of all the polling.


But the effect of the debate began to wear off on Sunday, October 19th and McCain began to fall back again. By now, Obama has an average lead of 7.2 points, according to realclearpolitics.com. (The AP poll showing a dead heat is the only one to show such data, unfortunately).


Much of Obama's rise this week has been due to his domination of the paid advertising. With his coffers swollen by $150 million raised in September, he can buy any available advertising time. But McCain has considerable resources at his disposal as well. For the week that started this past Tuesday, October 21st, McCain is running about four ads to every five that Obama airs in swing states.


(Technically, McCain is airing about 2500 household rating points per week as against Obama's 3300. One household rating point means that one percent of the households are watching the ad. So 2500 points in a given week suggests that each household is seeing about 25 ads per week, or about four each day. While Obama is spending more money, the difference between seeing four McCain ads and five Obama spots each day is not significant.)


And, starting on Monday of this week, McCain began running an attack ad specifically aimed at the issues first raised by Joe the Plumber. Showing footage of his chat with Obama, the McCain ad hammers home the tax issue, noting that Obama's so-called tax cut for 100 million Americans is really a welfare check for the half of them who pay no taxes. The ad is hard hitting and effective. More importantly, it is running in the clear without other McCain media to clutter up the message.


So McCain has his best ad on his best issue with as close to financial parity with Obama as he is likely to get. If, in these circumstances, he cannot gain ground during the next few days, the race will be functionally over. But if the Republicans can get traction, it could become a competitive contest again.


Godspeed John McCain.

Every weekday JewishWorldReview.com publishes what many in the media and Washington consider "must-reading". Sign up for the daily JWR update. It's free. Just click here.


JWR contributor Dick Morris is author, most recently, of "Fleeced: How Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, Media Mockery of Terrorist Threats, Liberals Who Want to Kill Talk Radio, the Do-Nothing Congress, Companies ... Are Scamming Us ... and What to Do About It". (Click HERE to purchase. Sales help fund JWR.) Comment by clicking here.



Dick Morris Archives


© 2008, Dick Morris

Insight (Our Columnists)

 Arnold Ahlert
 Mitch Albom
 Michael Barone
  Dave Barry
 Tony Blankley
 Andy Borowitz
 David Broder
 Stratfor Briefing
 Mona Charen
 Linda Chavez
 Ann Coulter
 Greg Crosby
 Larry Elder
 Suzanne Fields
 John Fund
 Frank J. Gaffney
 Lloyd Garver
 Jonah Goldberg
 Julia Gorin
 Jonathan Gurwitz
 Paul Greenberg
 Lewis Grossberger
 Victor Davis Hanson
 Betsy Hart
 Nat Hentoff
 David Horowitz
 Laura Ingraham
 Cheri Jacobus
Jeff Jacoby
 Paul Johnson
 Jack Kelly
 Ed Koch
 Ch. Krauthammer
 Michael Ledeen
 John Leo
 David Limbaugh
 Kathryn Lopez
 Rich Lowry
 Michelle Malkin
 Jackie Mason
 Dick Morris
 Bill O'Reilly
 Jim Mullen
 Clarence Page
 Kathleen Parker
 Dennis Prager
 Wesley Pruden
 Tom Purcell
 Jonathan Rauch
 Celia Rivenbark
 Robert Robb
 Cokie & Steve Roberts
 Pat Sajak
 Debra J. Saunders
 Culture Shlock
 Roger Simon
 Michael Smerconish
 Thomas Sowell
 Mark Steyn
 John Stossel
 Cal Thomas
 Bob Tyrrell
 Diana West
 Dave Weinbaum
 George Will
 Walter Williams
 Byron York
 Mort Zuckerman

'Toons
 Robert Arial
 Chuck Asay
 Baloo
 Chip Bok
 Dry Bones
  Lisa Benson
 John Branch
 Gary Brookins
 John Cole
 J. D. Crowe
 John Deering
 Brian Duffy
 Everything's Relative
 Mallard Fillmore
 Jake Fuller
 Bob Gorrel
 Joe Heller
 David Hitch
 Jerry Holber
 Steve Kelley
 Jeff Koterba
 Dick Locher
 Chan Lowe
 Ranan R. Lurie
 Jimmy Margulies
 Rick McKee
 Michael Ramirez
 Kevin Siers
 Jeff Stahler
 Ed Stein
 Danna Summers
 John Trever
 Gary Varvel
 Kirk Walters

Lifestyles
 How 2
 Lori Borgman
 The Savvy Consumer
 Elder matters
 Fixit
 Dr. Peter Gott
 GET A JOB! by Marty Nemko
 Richard Lederer
 Tech Maven
 Every Monday Matters
 Nutrition Myths
 Bookmark These
 Bruce Williams
 How Stuff Works