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September 26, 2008

Can McCain Deliver?

By Toby Harnden

John McCain's decision to "suspend" his campaign and return to Washington to help broker a bailout deal seemed at first sight to be reckless act of folly.

It struck some as political, and he risked sacrificing the first debate - a real opportunity for the game changer he craves- on his favorite topic of foreign policy.

A day and a half on, however, things look like they could be playing out for him quite nicely. That's not to say that what he's done has helped the prospects of an effective bailout package being passed swiftly on Capitol Hill. It probably hasn't. This is a presidential campaign, however - you check your morality at the door. Like it or not, McCain is prepared to do whatever it takes to win.

Having been firmly in control of the campaign narrative for more than a week and surging in the polls, Senator Obama has been knocked off his stride. Senator McCain stumbled in addressing the Wall Street crisis from the outset with his "fundamentals are strong" statement and then lurched first one way and then the other. Then, suddenly, he seized the initiative.

Obama was put on the defensive immediately after McCain's shock announcement when President George W. Bush - in a move that appeared to bee coordinated with the Arizona senator - called to invite him to Thursday's White House summit. The Democratic nominee could hardly refuse and it looked like he was following McCain's lead.

Polls show that Obama's biggest vulnerability is on whether he can be commander-in-chief and whether he's ready to lead. McCain's Achilles heel is his links to Bush. The acrimonious White House summit boosted McCain on both fronts.

Bush's lack of political capital - he's as bankrupt as Lehman Brothers - meant that he lost control of the meeting and of his own rescue package. Inside the room, McCain largely kept his own counsel but he ended up in the driving seat.

Strangely, rather than McCain being the one supporting Bush, it was Obama. Having based his campaign on running against Washington, it was the Illinois senator who found himself defending the package fashioned and championed by the Washington insiders at either end of Pennsylvania Avenue.

After a brief day or two of relevance, Bush will now fall back into the shadows, leaving the stage to McCain. As soon as the summit ended, it ceased to be the Bush-Paulson rescue package. There's a fighting chance now that the Republican nominee can make the final version the McCain rescue package.

Democrats have good reason to believe they were ambushed. We'll probably never know whether there would have been a deal if the two presidential candidates hadn't been parachuted into the middle of the negotiations. But McCain was content to vouch for the legitimacy of the rival plan of House Republicans - who had welcomed him back to Capitol Hill.

So who's now in the best position to deliver the House Republicans and therefore broker a deal? Step forward John McCain. Certainly, it's not going to be a cakewalk. He has to fashion an agreement that will satisfy conservative Republicans without alienating Democrats and the White House.

If McCain is viewed as the person who scuppered a deal or played politics with the Wall Street crisis - both plausible propositions - then he could sink like a stone in the polls.

But the imperatives to strike a deal are strong. There's a congressional recess in the offing - always a spur to swift action - and everyone's agreed that the worst possible response to the Wall Street meltdown would be to do nothing.

So the chances are that there is a deal there for McCain to be able to take credit for. But it's highly unlikely that would be before Friday evening - which means that McCain could well raise the stakes by not turning up for the debate in Oxford, Mississippi.

Conventional wisdom is that this would be a disaster for McCain. But it could turn out be the opposite.

If Congress is locked in frantic talks to hammer out a new rescue package then Obama will look foolish if he heads to Oxford to debate an empty chair or take part in a PBS town hall meeting - even if 40 million people do tune in. McCain's war service inoculates him against any notion that he's chicken.

Such an outcome would play right into the talking points of the McCain campaign - that Obama's a talker not a doer, he puts politics above country, his focus is self-interest rather than the common good. Fair charges? Probably not. But they'll damage the Democrat nevertheless.

Obama could well opt to stay in Washington. That would leave the impression that he was meekly tripping along behind McCain.

Could McCain spare 90 minutes to debate Obama without condemning Americans to a new Depression? Of course. But perception is often everything in politics and the image of McCain rolling up his sleeves on Capitol Hill while Obama floats about the fray is a winner for the Vietnam veteran.

Another scenario is that a deal is reached in principle and McCain is able to make a dramatic last-minute dash to Oxford as the hero of the day. Obama would be left to defend the original $700 billion Bush-Paulson package - not a good position for him to be in.

Economics may not be McCain's strong suit but the turmoil in Washington plays to his penchant for action and populism. In contrast, Obama's cool detachment looks like passivity. He's been sucked into the maelstrom against his better judgment and he's clearly uncomfortable with McCain's behavior.

The Republican nominee's gambit may have been irresponsible. If it had failed it could have left Obama cruising towards victory. Against all the odds, however, it just might be paying off.

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