A Prediction from March 20th, 2008
Posted on August 20, 2008
I wrote this on The Hill's Pundits Blog 6 months ago
March 20, 2008
My Newest Prediction (John Feehery)
John McCain will be our next president, barring any unforeseen circumstances.
That is my newest prediction.
Because of the convoluted and stupid rules of the Democratic Party, enforced by the out-of-touch Howard Dean, Barack Obama will be the Democratic nominee, despite the best efforts of the Clintons to woo the superdelegates.
The superdelegates, who will realize too late that they have a weak candidate in Obama, will be forced to support him nonetheless.
Once Obama’s campaign is forced to sail outside of the comfortable waters of the liberal-dominated Democratic primary, it will sink in the more choppy waters of the general election.
There, his already listing ship will take on more water when confronted by real issues, issues his campaign has been able to easily sail past in safe Democratic water.
His message of higher taxes and more government spending, and his generally left-wing record, will come under more scrutiny from the media and from his opponent, Sen. McCain.
The uncertainty that roils the world today will play against Obama and for McCain, because at the end of the day, experience does matter.
Efforts to link McCain and Bush will fall flat, because let’s face it, McCain has been a pretty bitter critic of Bush for a while, despite efforts to patch up that relationship.
McCain appeals to white ethnics, the Reagan Democrats, far more than Obama does (as seen in the polls, and in the primary races with Clinton). Obama’s speech earlier this week, while getting rave reviews from most pundits, has not played well with this critical voting bloc. His association with the Rev. Jeremiah Wright will continue to hurt him with these voters.
McCain, who has a good reputation with Hispanic voters because of his efforts on immigration reform, will do much better with this bloc than most people want to admit right now.
McCain’s economic populism will make big business nervous, but not as nervous as Obama’s class warfare rhetoric.
The latest polls show Obama up a pretty significant margin, given the relative state of the Republican Party vis-à-vis the Democratic Party.
But McCain will run as John McCain, and his brand is much stronger than the generic Republican brand right now.
McCain will win the solid South, Florida, Texas, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, most of the Midwest states including Ohio and Michigan, and all the Western states. He will compete strongly in both New York and California.
Obama will win Illinois, Wisconsin, Iowa, perhaps Washington state, D.C., Maryland and of course, Massachusetts (although that will be closer than people think).
In other words, McCain will win fairly easily.
That is my prediction.