Earlier in the day, I suggested the Republican campaign boiling down to two men and possibly becoming a referedum on McCain would be seriously bad news for the senator. Then again… According to a mid-January Pew Poll, McCain did the best among all the candidates in favorable/unfavorable ratings among Republicans. As of January 15, McCain was cruising along with a 71-23 rating. Interestingly, that showed a twelve point improvement from last August, which suggests McCain’s bettered his rankings by laying in the weeds for five months while the other candidates diminished themselves. In other words, McCain’s lack of funds and unwished for obscurity proved surprisingly beneficial. But even in August 2007, McCain’s numbers weren’t that bad – he showed a 61/25 rating, That doesn’t look good next to Rudy’s 74/15 and was a worse ratio than Romney’s 48/16 at the time, but it does show that even at his depths, McCain had more support than you would figure from listening to his critics. Then again… Perhaps favorable/unfavorable ratings are too crude an instrument to measure a figure like John McCain’s presidential viability among Republicans. It’s not hard to imagine a lot of Republicans who would have no desire to see John McCain as the party’s nominee still giving him a “favorable” rating as a reward for his steadfastness on the war and his admirable life story. Perhaps the most significant take-away from these numbers should be that even a referendum on McCain won’t be a slam-dunk for the Romney campaign. Romney’s supporters will have to make a painstaking case for their guy and against McCain, not necessarily in that order. Anything simplistic like shouting mindless imprecations like “Gang of 14” or “McCain/Feingold” (sort of the way McCain has taken to using the term “Rumsfeld”) probably won’t get the job done.
