Facing tough sell, McCain takes his case to voters
14 Jul 2007 18:50:16 GMT Source: Reuters
By John Whitesides, Political Correspondent CLAREMONT, N.H., July 14 (Reuters) - Dismissing dire forecasts of his political future, Republican presidential contender John McCain promised on Saturday to mount a comeback by taking his campaign directly to voters in the states that kick off the 2008 race. In New Hampshire, which holds one of the first contests in the nominating race in about six months, McCain said he would outwork his rivals in the influential early voting states and win with the same formula that produced his victory in the New Hampshire primary in 2000. "We will do as we did in 2000, we will campaign all over this state, doing the town hall meetings, having questions, having answers," the Arizona senator said in Claremont, where he took questions for more than an hour. "You will have your input directly with me and I will have my response directly to you and there is no way that can be distorted," he told about 100 people at a veterans' hall. McCain appeared at the end of a two-day trip to New Hampshire, his first campaign foray since his top advisers left in a staff shakeup and his organization reported he was down to $2 million in the bank -- and faced debts of nearly that much. A heckler in a McCain mask stood outside, holding a cup for spare change and wearing a sign reading: "My campaign spends like a drunken sailor." That's the description McCain often uses for the spending habits of Congress. McCain chastised the media for its focus on the missteps of his campaign instead of his position on issues, but later told reporters he didn't mean to complain. "It's just a reality of political life ... When someone has overspent as we did that's a dominant issue and I understand that," he said. McCain also faced questions from voters on his relationship with President George W. Bush, his stance on the Iraq war and immigration reform, and on how his campaign managed to spend all of its money. FALLING BEHIND McCain, who began the year as the Republican front-runner, has fallen behind rivals Rudy Giuliani and Mitt Romney in polls, in part by alienating moderates with his staunch support for Bush's unpopular strategy in Iraq and conservatives with his backing for the president's overhaul of immigration laws. McCain has plotted a path back based on strong showings in the early voting states, particularly New Hampshire, where independents can vote in the Republican primary. McCain said on Saturday he would compete in the first contest in Iowa, which he skipped in 2000. "I can out-campaign any of these guys," he said of his rivals for the nomination. "We'll be just fine, here and in Iowa and in South Carolina." Analysts are far less positive about McCain's chances, questioning if he can recapture the energy of his ultimately unsuccessful 2000 presidential run -- when he lost the nomination to Bush after a bitter battle in South Carolina -- given his stance on Iraq and immigration. "There are just too many wheels coming off the bus all at once," said Peverill Squire, a political analyst at the University of Iowa. "He's got himself in a box. He needs something very positive to happen in Iraq and that seems unlikely." Dante Scala, a political scientist at the University of New Hampshire, said McCain's support for Bush's immigration package, which was very unpopular with conservatives, sunk all the work he had put into wooing the party's conservative base. "McCain has a message that not only doesn't resound with the base, it angers the base," Scala said.
