mccain presses reset

After weeks of stories like this one and rising panic in Republican ranks, John McCain has responded to the general perception that he's floundering like an aged sturgeon washed up on an unfamiliar shore by shaking up his campaign.

He's put Steve Schmidt in charge. This is good, if only because until now nobody was in charge. McCain's team has been a small nest of competing egos with very different ideas about what to do, and the resulting confusion has been all too evident in the campaign's lack of focus. Schmidt is a veteran of George Bush's 2004 campaign, which was renowned for its discipline and efficiency, exactly the kind of reputation that the Obama team is acquiring for itself.

McCain has demoted Rick Davis, one of his oldest and most loyal aides, which must have been difficult, but was overdue. One of the first things Schmidt will do is dismantle Davis's crackpot scheme to devolve all responsibility for strategy and advertising in key states to 11 regional chiefs. This may have been a cack-handed effort at emulating the way the Obama campaign has supposedly empowered its people on the ground. But if so it failed to recognize that for all the Obama campaign's talk of a grassroots movement, it imposes very strict parameters on message and method from above.

McCain will be 'relaunched' after this week. Always an ominous sign. The whole affair is another indication of the basic problem with McCain as a candidate: he's happiest when running as the insurgent, on a shoestring budget, where everything he does is decided the day or the second before he does it. He craves spontaneity and chaos. Winning the presidency requires order and discipline.

Comments

[Lindsey]

I don't think this is the last shake-up in McCain's campaign. The problem lies with the canidate himself, but like other politicians, he will blame it on others and continually try and find the right people to get him on track.

These shake-ups can have a consequence of sending the wrong message to the American people. People eventually end up thinking, "If he can't manage a campaign, how would he be able to manage running the whole country?" We've seen this happen before.