Can't Anybody Play This Game?

Matt Yglesias has more evidence that the McCain-Palin campaign is simply not competent to run a Brownie troop:

Matthew Yglesias: No Sleep ‘Till West Virginia: Sarah Palin going on a bus tour to West Virginia is a puzzling move. Obviously, if West Virginia is in play, then the McCain-Palin ticket is doomed. There’s no point in focusing on the states that are actually close at the moment, you need to focus on the states that would be close if the election were close and then hope that events and your national media strategy can make the election close. And if you are going to play defense in non-battleground states, you may as well go places (Georgia, Kentucky) where you could be lending a hand to a possibly endangered Senate candidate. I’m trying to come up for a theory as to how this represents Palin pre-positioning herself for the 2012 primaries but that doesn’t really add up, either. Maybe she wants to take a bus tour of Iowa? Hint that she loves John McCain but disagrees with him about ethanol?

Comments

[Ken Houghton]

The process now isn't setting up for the election: it's energizing the base to impeach Obama, probably in 2011.

Krugman figured this out; why hasn't MY?

[NE1]

Let them eat cake.

[Ken]

Palin positioning herself for 2012? My personal prediction is that after the election she will fade back into obscurity. She might try to run in 2012, but I certainly can't see any of the powers that be in the Republican party actually supporting such an effort.

[Ken Houghton]

I just want to make it clear that I am NOT the tastefully-named Ken above.

I see Palin running as the favorite for 2012.

(Of course, I also believe that if the McCain campaign had wanted a Serious Woman, they would have chosen Kay Bailey Hutchinson, and would currently be leading in the polls.)

[Jonathan King]

OK, so I don't this is the *optimal* move by the McCain team, but I don't think it is hopelessly bizarre. People forget that West Virginia was a very reliably Democratic state until George W. Bush came along. Just because it wasn't touted as a battleground state doesn't mean it shouldn't be considered one.

At this point, McCain/Palin are facing a massively uphill battle, but the overall strategy should be clear: replicate the 2004 Bush map as far as it is possible. I cannot honestly think of a state Kerry won in 2004 that McCain has a good enough chance to win in 2008 to make *any* campaigning in those states worthwhile except insofar as it gives you plausible deniability to deny that you are bailing on them (it is conceivable that McCain could win New Hampshire if he put enough effort into the project, but it would likely cost him elsewhere).

If this is the strategy, the tactics are pretty clear: hope that something happens to raise your prospects generally, but then make sure you *don't* lose anything Bush won that would be preventable. It seems clear that there is not much that can be done by McCain to win Iowa, but he can still win the election if he finds a way to carry Florida, Ohio, Virginia, Colorado, Missouri, and two out of three of Nevada, New Mexico, and West Virginia. I personally think that Missouri will wander back into the McCain column, but it is possible that the only way he will carry all of the other big states is by some act of God. But he could be master of his destiny in Nevada, New Mexico, and West Viriginia, which have gone back and forth between 1992 and now, are small states, and states where either McCain or Palin could hold some actual sway. It could happen.

That said, I think there is a better strategy available. Palin should campaign in states where she might have some especially strong appeal as a culturally conservative moose-eating hockey mom. That's probably something like Colorado, West Virginia, Missouri, and parts of Ohio, Virginia and *maybe* Florida. McCain should campaign in states where he might have a better chance, which include Nevada, New Mexico, Ohio, Virginia, Florida, and New Hampshire.

The states that neither McCain nor Palin have any business campaigning (but where they have appeared recently) include Indiana, Minnesota, North Carolina, and Nebraska (unless they are need to start protecting senate seats, which essentially means they are conceding the presidential race). For the life of me, I can't figure out what they were trying to do in Michigan. Winning there would take perfect conditions, especially since the Obama ground game in places like Detroit is going to be completely formidable.

So overall, I think West Virginia is *exactly* the kind of place where Sarah Palin should be, but the scenario where they win is getting less likely by the minute. The interesting question is whether, should things continue as they are, they should go into "senator protection mode". I think it's weird that Yglesias is suggesting this is what they should be doing right now, since I really do think it's a clear sign they have conceded the election, much like it was when Bob Dole spent lots of time in California in 1996 trying (successfully, by and large) to stop the Republicans from losing too many house seats there.

jking

[ytterbium]

It was until about 6 months before the 2000 election when Karl Rove littered the state with "non-partisan" pamplets about gun control. Well those stupid hillbillies didn't want to give up their GUNS and W carried W.V 54%. Those hillbilly brains don't think well but they do hold a memory and W carried 54% in 2004.

[Thads]

Come on folks, it's just a rest stop between Pennsylvania and Ohio.

[John from Concord]

I don't see where there's any hope of her securing the 2012 nomination. I think that Palin is completely ruined as a professional politician. I predict that her future will involve the far-right-hand chair on one of the screamier pundit shows, probably on Fox. She'll be a Pat Buchanan without the intellectual rigor, and we can all safely change the channel.