Going down in blazing glory

McCain has done it again. Two years away from the actual election, and the Arizona Senator has stepped in it big: McCain apologises for 'wasted lives' Iraq slip.

Worse, still, he repeated the same mistake Obama did just weeks ago. How can this be? I've written here and here about McCain's flip-flop tendencies, his serial pandering to whichever audience he happens to be in front of. However, these latest comments about American lives "wasted" in Iraq take the cake.

Dick Morris and Eileen McGann wrote yesterday that McCain's Campaign Collapses, and with good reason.

Fundamentally, he failed to heed the Shakespeare's admonition "to thine own self be true." The John McCain of the 2000 campaign is nowhere in evidence in 2007.

Now he has been identified with two issues, neither popular in the Republican Party: The Iraqi troop surge and amnesty for illegal aliens.

Panderer:

Republican strategist and Reagan campaign manager Ed Rollins makes an interesting point about McCain: He has switched roles. He has gone from being the McCain of the 2000 race, challenging the party orthodoxy, offering new ideas, and demanding reforms and changes to the Bush of the 2000, toeing the party line and only timidly venturing different ideas if he advances them at all. And this is no way to win the presidency or even the Republican nomination. But where it has counted, on the two core issues that move Republican voters these days — tax cuts and immigration — McCain is badly out of step with the GOP base.

The Rudy Effect:

Rudy also surges at a time when the other candidates are disappearing from the Republican nominating process. In addition to McCain's swoon, the other possible top contender, Mitt Romney has stalled and is falling backwards. His flip-flop-flip from pro-life to pro-choice and back to pro-life again is not winning him any converts.

Hugh Hewitt also writes:

Rudy The Liberal Slayer: Will The Big Three Be The Big Two Soon?

So, you should be asking, if it is all about the war, why isn't John McCain surging in his GOP support given his very vocal commitment to the war for all these years?

The GOP base has a trust issue with McCain, one that flows from the 2000 campaign, McCain-Feingold, the Gang of 14, the McCain-Kennedy immigration bill, the September 2006 derailing of the Republican end-game strategy. McCain is fading, and not because of his age or energy level, but because the GOP electorate has to absolutely believe that the next president will be as committed to victory as Bush has been. Senator McCain's avoidance of new media has been reinforcing the impression that he is unwilling to provide the assurances he needs to in order to regain the trust he has repeatedly broken with the GOP electorate over the years. There is time to turn that around, but Senator McCain is not making the effort, an effort that would begin by a relentless courting of the base rather than the Hardball/Meet The Press audience. Every week that Senator McCain delays launching that effort is a week in which the mayor and the governor gather more pledges and momentum. The big three could be the big two by Memorial Day.

McCain's most obvious problem is his inability to stick to one story on an issue. Even or Iraq, which he has strongly supported, of which he's advocated repeatedly for adding more troops - how can he claim lives were wasted? Wouldn't he, then, also be wasting lives by voting for more troops? McCain simply can't have it both ways: Pro-Surge or "Wasted" lives, Pro-life or Pro-choice. The Senator once known for his bold stands on issues has now become a sad semblance of his former self.