McCain Pollster Explains Loss, Calls Frank Luntz A Moron

The chief pollster for John McCain's presidential campaign offered a candid diagnosis of how his candidate was done in, on occasion reserving harsh words for fellow Republicans.

Bill McInturff, speaking at a National Journal breakfast on Thursday, said the political environment for the GOP in 2008 was worse than anything he has seen in his time polling since former Soviet empires were breaking the shackles of communism.

"Reporters would call me up and say, 'have you ever seen this?'" McInturff said of George W. Bush's approval ratings. "And I say, 'yeah, Bulgaria 1992.'"

"We had a very unpopular war and the most unpopular president in American polling history," he explained, by way of summarizing the election. "We had a 70 percent wrong track and we were winning. We were winning. And what happened? We said that's not hard enough for John McCain. We should implode the financial markets. And what happens? We go from 70 percent wrong track to literally 90 percent."

Unrestrained by the formalities of the election, McInturff levied some sharps words at fellow GOPers who -- generally speaking -- never really were bullish on the idea of a McCain presidency. The most biting jabs were saved for communications guru Frank Luntz.

"I saw Frank Luntz," said McInturff, "who is a moron -- I want to make sure this is clearly on the record -- he was talking to Republican governors, making fun of John for not being able to use a BlackBerry. The man can't do it because he is much more disabled than people can imagine... I would like to take a hammer and start breaking bones in Frank's arms."

McInturff later noted that the Obama campaign ran an ad on this very topic, and vice presidential candidate Joe Biden criticized the spot because of its insensitivity.

In addition to going after Luntz, McInturff highlighted several factors that he credited with truly hurting the McCain candidacy. The first, and most obvious, was the crisis in the financial markets and the failure of the House of Representatives to quickly pass a bailout packaged.

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"We had the House not voting for the bailout," he said, "which kept that story going for another seven days and helped implode the campaign."

The second was McCain's age, which was a huge handicap in a change election.

"When you have a 70-year-old nominee versus a new generation candidate," he said, "it is very hard."

The final, and most surprising, was the Hispanic vote, which trended heavily towards Obama. McInturff said that the most effective commercial of the campaign was the Spanish-language spot, put up by the now president-elect, which claimed that conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh was a McCain ally on immigration. Mainly, however, Obama had a huge financial advantage that allowed him to make great inroads within this and other minority communities.

"If the other team has 700 million and they are spending five times as much on Spanish language media saying that crap," he said, "it has an effect."

Comments

[maggieshines]

Interseting that he didn't mention Palin's venom. Maybe he's hoping for a spot on her team

[fentondem]

It's ALWAYS someone elses fault!!!

[JEP]

This election was over the day after the Iowa caucuses.

Anyone who thinks there was ever even a slim chance McCain, or any Republican, could catch up with the tailwind that was pushing Obama is simply delusional.

McInturff was with the losing team the day they hired him. They never EVER came close to any sort of lead, despite the "close race" the MSM's pollsters promulgated to keep the ad revenues flowing from the naive R's.

365? Obama got one electoral vote for every day of the year.

It was never even close, and anyone who tried to pose such a scenario was either chronically naive or perniciously lying.

[DCinFrance]

Hind sight being 20/20, I couldn't mount a convincing argument. However, Barack...I mean Mr. President-Elect, had to earn this one nonetheless.

[florestanchi]

I like Obama, and voted for him, but your assessment of the election is revisionism run amok.

The election was far from over after Iowa. There was no "tailwind" of which to speak at that time.Obama didn't even have the Democratic nomination close to clinched at that time, and his ultimately victory over Hillary Clinton for the Democratic nod was hardly a decisive one.

Obama was neck-and-neck with McCain until McCain pulled that disingenuous "suspend my campaign" stunt in response to the bail-out. The tailwind started blowing at that time. And yes, from that point forward I agree with you that many of the pollsters were mischaracterizing the race as close for commercial reasons.

Many posters here have been marveling at 365 electoral votes as if it's a landslide. It's a mandate, perhaps, but let's not lose perspective. Clinton won more electoral votes than Obama in both 1992 (370) and 1996 (379). George H.W. Bush won almost 428 electoral votes in 1988, and Reagan takes the cake with 525 in 1984. Obama outperformed Clinton in one respect: he achieved a true majority of the popular vote, but Obama did not have any formidable competition from a third-party. Ross Perot nabbed 18% of the popular vote in 1992.

[StillIRise]

I agree with all of your points. But considering that Obama is the first black president in the history of our nation, and that the challenges he faced were unprecedented and unparalleled to the challenges faced by any previous presidential contender, and yet still won 365 electoral votes and a "true majority of the popular vote" is, in my humble opinion, a landslide! As far as I'm concerned, with this consideration in mind, not even Reagan's 525 electoral votes is comparable.

[ivillage]

John McCain to Seek Re-Election as Arizona Senator: http://www.sefermpost.com/sefermpost/2008/11/john-mccain-to-seek-reelection-as-arizona-senator.html

[DCinFrance]

What else is he gonna do? Retire?

[Miande]

Wasn't McInturff the pollster writing memos during the last week of the campaign that McCain was going to win because allt he polls showing Obama in the lead were flawed. When you point a finger, remember four are pointing back at you!

[greeniefromOH]

Or maybe you just ran a crappy campaign and had absolutely no idea who your fellow Americans are.

What a concept, eh?

[MissKaren]

You can't see it but I am standing and applauding.

[youngblood360]

Regarding McCain's "handicap" with using a Blackberry, a computer, etc., we have a young man in our office who was born with shortened arms, deformed hands and fingers. He never complains, types faster on the computer than most of his co-workers and is about the most well adjusted person I've ever met. For McCain - or anyone else for that matter - to use his war injuries as an excuse for not being able to function in the 21st century is very disingenuous. I also know more than a few people in McCain's age demographic that are computer experts and work around the afflictions of arthritis, etc. McCain is just an idiot; he has no idea how to communicate effectively and showed very bad judgement throughout the campaign. Just look at his choice for VP! We really dodged a huge bullet with this guy, because if things had been different and he was elected, we would have been in a huge hole - buried for years to come. Thank God that the majority of the U.S. electorate woke up to the fact the stupid is not good and smart can really go a long way to help this country get back on its feet. There are no red states or blue states anymore - only SMART states and DUMB states (those who did not or would not vote Obama/Biden). History will show that in this election, the right choice was made.

[JerryTheAngel]

Anyone who seriously points to the post convention bounce as a "lead" knows nothing about polling or the history of so many candidates who "led" right after the convention only to lose badly 2 months later.
McCain never had a real lead through out the entire election.

[DCinFrance]

Neither did Obama...fo­r much of the election. Neither had statistical significance until towards the end, taking out a few bounces for either.

[StillIRise]

I agree. The bounces for both candidates were no more than that ... bounces that would inevitably dissipate. But overall, McCain and Obama were head to head, neither of them able to gain a significant lead ... until toward the end of the election, which coincided with McCain's campaign literally falling apart. Not so much because of the economic crisis, but because of the conduct of the campaign itself and the conduct of John McCain and Sarah Palin. While Palin was inciting hate and inflaming racial fears, McCain just seemed to be further and further out of touch with his purpose for being there. Meanwhile, Obama just kept on keeping on, and the momentum behind him grew. I think the choice became clear in the end.

[bazokbros]

I highly doubt the Spanish ad Obama made referencing Rush Limbaugh swayed a majority of the Latino vote. Obama is ethnic, young and relates better to the ethnic demographic more so than a 70 year old white candidate -- that's a simple fact -- plus the GOP went over the top demonizing undocumented workers as all being from Mexico or Latino.

[eltopo]

"Ethic"?

Isn't *everyone" ethnic?

[eltopo]

I meant ethnic, not ethic.

[postman606]

Please don't alert yhese Bozos. If they keep thinking this kind of erroneous crap was the problem, they'll never come up with solutions.

[SOLERSO68]

These goofs can go on rationalizing how "a center right" nation elected, apparently by accident, a center left government. I hope they keep up the hard denial for another 20 years. By then we can have obliterated every last vestigage of "the reagan revolution" and the "the bush doctrine" from the world. Ahhhhhh...­.a great goal to work toward.

[Kiabell04]

I'm also sick and tired of folks behaving as if Obama's win was a freakin fluke. You cannot blame the financial crisis on McCain loses alone....h­e lost because from jump street he was running his campaign right.

[igorz]

shado >>With all the bad news the GOP carried into this election - They sure didn't lose by much.

[bogglesthemind]

"They sure didn't lose by much."

Only proves how many ignoramuses there were voting for him.

[bogues]

John McCain lost because he and the running mate he chose, were ruthless and the American people have had enough of holier than thou thinking in the government. It is no longer going to work for candidates to run filthy campaigns against their opponents, in order to avoid telling the voters what they stand for. McCain did not lose because of the economy or his age, he lost because he played the game of politics at a time when the American people need real leadeship, not partisan politics.

[DCinFrance]

How I wish that will hold out to be true. For this election, I think it is true...eno­ugh was enough. But will that be a lasting change of heart both on the part of politicians and a formerly-b­lood-lusti­ng electorate? I guess we'll see. I don't expect the world to fall apart in four years. Six maybe. But not four.

[veganphoto]

If McCain is as disabled as McInturff says, then McCain is certainly not fit for President.

[StillIRise]

Strange that he didn't mention Palin! McCain's choice of Palin did more damage to his campaign than the financial crisis, Luntz's joking or McCain's age! She alone dwindled his base dramatically - moderate Republicans and real conservatives jumped that ship without looking back - and he couldn't win with the whackos that stayed behind.

McCain ran a horrible campaign, he chose a horrible running mate, and he turned out to be a horrible man. THIS is why he lost the election!

[DCinFrance]

Everyone is insisting that Palin did great damage. I don't see. Some yes, to very few true independents (as opposed to IINOs), and maybe a few principled republicans (did I just utter an oxymoron?). But enough damage to turn the election? Nope.

She'll be back. And dangerous as ever.

[StillIRise]

The way I see it, each candidate had to hold onto their base, and then had to appeal to those outside of their base to win the election. But without their base intact, they were doomed. When McCain picked Palin, he not only lost a substantial part of his base (conservatives, right-leaning Independents and moderate Republicans), but he even lost some of the Democrats and centrist Independents who may have supported him. I think even those who wanted to support McCain were frightened by the prospect of Palin as the potential president of our country, a prospect that was heightened by McCain's age and medical history of cancer. Even some of the "principled racists" (oxymoron for sure) were troubled by Palin and probably sat this election out rather than vote for a black man.

I believe that were it not for Palin, it definitely would have been a closer election result, and possibly a slim McCain victory.