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McCain Gives Up on Michigan
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The Politico reports that John McCain has given up his hopes for winning Michigan, a move that would effectively make his hunt for his 270 electoral votes statistically more difficult.
John McCain is pulling out of Michigan, according to two Republicans, a stunning move a month away from Election Day that indicates the difficulty Republicans are having in finding blue states to put in play.
McCain will go off TV in Michigan, stop dropping mail there and send most of his staff to more competitive states, including Wisconsin, Ohio and Florida. Wisconsin went for Kerry in 2004, Ohio and Florida for Bush.
McCain’s campaign didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
Apparently, Barack Obama’s 50 State Plan, a Hat Tip to Howard Dean, is proving highly effective. His resistance to accept current public financing has contributed to this strategy, as he has effectively fought off smears and swiftboating, and has managed to gain a toehold in many states previously not considered battlegrounds. The McCain campaign is now working to reinforce states formerly considered solidly red, such as Virginia, a state that hasn’t gone blue since 1964, with LBJ.
Mark Ambinder at the Atlantic remarks:
The move away from Michigan reflects the abandonment of any pretense that McCain can spend freely to expand the map for Republicans this year, and it’s a sign that the campaign recognizes how the past two weeks have erased nearly all of McCain’s gains since August. Instead, McCain’s playing defense in states like Florida, Virginia and North Carolina, although his advisers do not consider the latter state as close as public polling suggests.
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