Residual Forces

Captain Ed is at the CPAC convention and has the latest on McCain’s blundering with the conservative base.

UPDATE: Apparently, it isn’t a scheduling problem, either. McCain tried to organize a reception for attendees at the Omni Shoreham duing the conference without engaging with the event’s organizers:

Sponsors of the Conservative Political Action Conference, which begins today in Washington and brings together thousands of conservative leaders and grass-roots activists, say the Arizona Republican has “dissed” organizers by attempting to schedule a private reception for attendees after rejecting invitations to speak at the event. …

I’m not surprised, McCain’s only shot at winning is by convincing the RINO voters and conservative Democrats who are on the anyone but Hill-Bama bus to show up or cross lines.

So he could make it for the party, but couldn’t be bothered to speak at the conference? Does anyone at Team McCain understand how insulting that is? Their official response says that “The senator has run, been elected and served as a conservative and looks forward to talking about his conservative record throughout the course of this campaign,” but apparently not with the conservatives he supposedly represents.

I’m still betting that someone buys a vowel at the McCain campaign and he winds up on the speaker list. No one can get something this basic this wrong for this long.

This is McCain’s last shot at POTUS. He’ll be too old in 2012, if he isn’t already. I really don’t believe he can win the Republican endorsement, conservatives just don’t trust him. I almost have to wonder if he’ll run as an independent.

Seriously, this is it for McCain. He’s got one last shot at his goal of being President. If he loses the Republican race, I think he’d strongly consider making it a three-way race. The Democrats I talk to, yes there are a few, along with the RINO-moderate Republicans, say they will only vote for McCain, period! Now they don’t make up the Republican base, heck the Democrats aren’t even in it, and the RINOs are as fickle as can be and most are not part of the grassroots delegation who have the power to decide.

So McCain’s only chance at the Republican nod may be in the Primary with the RINO voters and conservative Democrats, because when it comes to the actual GOP endorsement, these people don’t amount to a hill of beans. It is the conservatives who will nominate the Republican candidate, and McCain is just plain taking them for granted.

“Yes I am” is not an acceptable defense for a Senate career filled with salvos against the conservative base of the GOP. This is McCain’s last lackluster chance at being President, if the Republicans deny him the nod, I’m more than willing to bet he’ll get back at them by running as an independent. If he ran as a third party candidate, he’d be far more dangerous to than Perot ever was.

But I guess the question is, who would be more upset, conservative Republicans, or liberal Democrats?

McCain-Lieberman?

I’m just saying.