Today’s “one year ago today” feature brings us a flashback that is highly relevant to the current political situation. On October 22th, 2007, new national polls released by Rasmussen led me to write the following:
“Rasmussen came out with national match-ups between Barack Obama and two Republicans. He finds Obama leading Romney 48% to 39%, but trailing McCain 45% to 44%. This might seem like an inconsequential shift, but consider that Obama-McCain is now the only one of the twelve potential match-ups polled by Rasmussen that the Democratic candidate loses. Edwards and Clinton lead all four potential Republican nominees in the most recent Rasmussen poll, and Obama leads against three of the four - only losing to McCain…
McCain’s strength was also noticeable in most of SUSA’s state polls over the past week. Democrats should feel relieved that McCain is so far down in the GOP nomination race.”
In the election’s current narrative, the economic crisis propelled Obama to a wide lead after months of a toss-up race. What better reminder than this post that Democrats have been in a dominant position for more than a year, and that this election was a dead heat was the first half of September, in the immediate aftermath of the GOP convention? The best a Republican candidate could muster in October 2007 in twelve separate match-ups pitting three Democrats against four Republicans was a one point lead.
It is ironic, of course, that the one match-up in which the GOPer was in the lead happens to have been the McCain-Obama one (which was far from being the most likely general election line-up at the point), but that should not obscure the fact that any Republican was bound to face long odds against any Democrat this year, and while Obama was slightly underperforming during the summer he has been in the driver’s seat since the day he wrapped up the Democratic nomination.
If McCain were to somehow storm back and win the election, he would not just be defying the trends of the past five weeks, he would be defying the trends of the past three years.
That said, my post last year suggested that McCain was the one candidate who could perhaps defy those trends and get himself elected. (Of course, McCain’s improbable rise to the top of the Republican field did not start for at least another month; in my November 26th assesment of the Republican race, McCain was still ranked fifth.) And it was not just based on this one Rasmussen poll; nearly every survey that was released for months confirmed that McCain was far more electable than his competitors (witness this post written on January 25th).
Now that McCain is struggling to keep a dozen of red states, however, should we revisit last year’s assessment? Was McCain not the most electable Republican candidate after all?
If McCain loses, this question will surely be debated at length - but I remain convinced that McCain was the candidate with the most potential to address the GOP’s structural problems, and most probably the only one who could have done so at all. Sure, Mitt Romney would have been (far) more at ease talking about the economy, but would he have even been competitive by mid-September?
For any presidential or congressional Republican to win in 2008 requires him to convince voters that he is not a typical Republican and that he would represent a change from George Bush’s version of the GOP. To even be considered, the GOP’s presidential nominee would have to pass the change hurdle, prove that he is enough of a break with the Bush Administration to even merit being considered by voters.
Romney or Thompson could have been strong candidates in another cycle, but neither had what it took to distinguish themselves as atypical Republicans. Rudy Giuliani revealed himself to be a deeply flawed candidate, and he never even had that much of a shot of winning the nomination (his national lead obscured a catastrophic early state strategy).
By contrast, McCain had the brand, the reputation as an enemy of Bush and the appeal among independent to pull that off. But McCain never really did what he should have done; his campaign was too focused on winning daily news cycles to lay the groundwork for a broader message. Had McCain tried to actively distance himself from Bush starting in early June, national polls might be far tighter today; had he tried to seize on a few symbolic and high-profile issues to break from the president, he could have protected himself better from anti-Republican sentiment.
This was nowhere more evident than in McCain’s convention speech. As I wrote that night, McCain’s goal was finally strategically sound - persuade the electorate that McCain can belong to the GOP while still representing a true break from the past eight years. But the speech lacked the scope and the delivery to make a lasting impression, as McCain took no dramatic step that would stick in voters’ mind as a repudiation of Bush - just as he has not done so throughout the campaign.
That McCain failed to take advantage of his potential to run as an atypical Republican doesn’t mean that his former opponents would have done a better job. And given how bad the environment is (and has been) for Republicans for months, that McCain isn’t completely out of striking distance yet and was highly competitive as of mid-September is a testament to what might have been.
Interesting perspective, Taniel. I wonder if the same thing would have happened - McCain still being more electable at this point - had he not picked up Palin? I believe part of the reason for his current struggles is his selection of a neo-conservative who is so inexperienced and has made plenty of gaffes to bring McCain constant embarrassment. I think that if he had picked up a moderate Republican, he might still pull off this election with the help of independents. But then there is the question of organizational and financial gap between Obama and McCain.
The McCain of 2000 is what people were thinking of in that 2007 poll. Since then, he has morphed into the mud-slinging, incoherent, testy, blame-fixing, Sarah Palin-picking creature we see today. I wouldn’t lay the entire Obama miracle on the implosion of the economy. John McCain has had more to do with his own deteriorating chances than any other factor.
A laughable sidenote–in Monday’s New York Times William Kristol spotlights an inability to “get his message out” as the source of McCain’s trailing performance in the polls. Only the blind and deaf who are without access to any form of media can be unaware of McCain’s “message”, however fractured and bizarre it may be. The message is loud and clear; people just aren’t buying it.
The elephant, of course, remains in the room. Obama is black. If Barack Obama were the same person he is now, but white, this race would not be this close.
By the way, given the erratic nature of the polls at this ponit, can they really be trusted anymore?
Jarret, I am gonna disagree with you. Just because he is black doesn’t guarantee the race would remain this close at this point. Even in 1992, the economy was not doing well and a Southern Democrat (Bill Clinton, a popular governor at the time) defeated an incumbent Republican president, by a mere 6% point.
I may, however, agree that since over 85% of Americans think the country is on the wrong track and seemingly blame the GOP for this outcome, Obama should have been a bit ahead in the race. But even during the primary, Hillary Clinton was rarely shown in polls to have been able to defeat McCain even if the election favored Democrats (after all, Bill Clinton’s presidency helped the GOP retake Congress).
Point well made, but I think in some parts of the country, particularly in my home state of Ohio, race is THE factor. I’ve lived in Ohio all my life and there is so much racism there its unreal. This is important given that the state is often open to Democrats, especially in times of economic crisis.
It is interesting that “southern” states are more accepting of a Black President than parts of the mid-west. Hopefully the lazy national stereotype of North Carolina, Virginia etc being racist will fade away.
Guy:
The same point was made in an article some years ago (wish I could remember where-maybe NYT mag section), that despite its racial history, the basic relationship between blacks and whites was more relaxed in some ways, and once the legal barriers were eliminated and segregation was off the books, the races found it easier to establish a new dynamic of equality. To the contrary, working class groups in the North, and esp. some ethnic groups, had deeply ingrained animus to blacks, perhaps rooted in economic competition, even though there were no ostensible racial barriers, and that animus was more difficult to eradicate.
Zoot, even our many institutions are already racialized and it, too, is difficult to eradicate institutional racism. We have to eliminate institutional racism before we can be sure that economic and political competition among ethnic groups, notably Hispanics and whites pitted agaisnt blacks, may be causing deep divisions. People may utter racial slurs instead of other expressions that have to do with economic competition. For one, I often hear whites critcizing my Hispanic friends for “trying to take English away from us” and some blacks complaining that “hispanics are responsible for the lost jobs”. Whatever the underlying motives for not voting for a black person, we already know that blacks number far mroe than Hispanics in terms of political offices they hold.
It’s all very complicated but you Americans must realize that this country is the ONLY white country that would contemplate electing a black man as president. Sweden, Britain, Switzerland, France, Germany name it, It will NEVER happen over there. So it’s in keping with the trailblazing nature of this country.
We need to differentiate betweeen different kinds of racism, and also the degree that racism has been eradicated.
Basically, the rest of the country imposed desegregation, and integration on the HARD South. Now, I believe this was a GREAT thing to do looking back, but it is practically true for all intents and purposes that this is what we did. There particular brand of racism was overt and direct. It was not easy to take on, but it was obvious where it was.
On the other hand, the rest of the country has never, ever been forcibly integrated. Also, racism in the other parts of the country takes on a covert quality. People are never overtly racist, but hide it. Sort of a Bradley Effect, except not political.
I live in the Bay Area of California. When African Americans and (non-white Hispanics as well) move into neighborhoods or even just attend schools outside of their school districts, White, and I believe, to bigger degree, Asian Americans, tend to go to the schools, within the school district, where Hispanics and African Americans have a hard time reaching, going outside of the school district, or even sending them to private school.
I disagree with this practice, even though it’s their “choice”. Many of the parents of African Americans simply don’t won’t their kids to be in the local schools because of nearby gangs and/or violence.
My high school (I’m in collge now) used to majority white, but with the influx of enrolees, the combination of African Americans and Hispanics make up most of the school enrollees, while the other high school (which is harder to reach) has a majority of Whites and Asian Americans combined.
I believe there has been similar effect with housing as well.
It’s Racism, but not the overt kind. None of these people will ever claim to be racist, and most will probably vehemently deny it, and might be offended at the suggestion that they are.
But it’s the kind of racism, where instead of overtly denying African Americans and Hispanics services and resources, people take their resources and services and move further away.
I was the previous poster. Just to keep things straight, I’m Asian American.
Anon 11:48:
It is wrong to compare the USA with those of European nations in terms of whether they can elect a black man. For one, blacks are by far outnumbered by whites in Europe than in America (many European nations are made up of over 90% whites in their population), but I feel racism remains more widespread in America. Second, in the USA blacks had played significant roles in the development of this nation, for slavery was far, far mroe practiced here than in Europe and took longer to be eliminated her than there. Third, America is far more diverse than any European nation (and by 2050 whites will no longer make up a majority of the population here). Fourth, as a nation of immigrants, America is more likely to elect a person of color or a woman to reflect the diversifying and changing picture of America’s demographic makeup.
Once again, America has been historically and significant more racialized than Western Europe, and in my opinion, Western Europe is far more liberal.
Ok, I see your point.