Where Did John McCain Go Wrong?

Everyone's seems to be adding their two cents about why McCain lost, so I'll go ahead and throw mine in as well.

Many people think John McCain lost because this was an anyone but a Republican election. To some extent, that's probably true. Throw in the fact that people got the chance to vote for an historic, charismatic candidate and I'm sure both of those things made a big impact. Those things are only factors though, because John McCain ran trying to out populist a real populist.

Most people dislike, distrust, or even downright hate the government. Instead of arguing with Obama about who was going to use the government to help people more, he should have differentiated himself by telling people how he was going to help them by heading to Washington and dismantling the government piece by piece. In the beginning, he kind of halfheartedly did that, but after the economy became such a big issue I guess he figured people didn't want to hear that and started to demonize Wall Street. A better route would have been to demonize the government, who really was to blame. McCain should have flooded the airwaves with clips from this video showing democrats talking about how safe and secure Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were.

The next Republican to win the presidency will be one who is not afraid to underline the basic ideological differences between conservatives and liberals.

More Blame Games From McCain Campaign Staff

Now 'insiders' from the McCain campaign are claiming that Palin didn't know Africa was a continent, went on huge shopping sprees, and threw temper tantrums. Stories like this show that McCain's campaign was run even worse than we thought. He obviously had no loyalty from the people working for him if they are going to come out and spread all these rumors, true or not. It says a lot more about the people telling these stories than it does about Sarah Palin. They are petty, sore losers.

While I still think he would have made a better president than Obama, simply for policy reasons, he obviously isn't a leader if he can't inspire more loyalty than this from the people working for him. I sincerely hope that if he is silly enough to make another run for the Republican nomination, Republicans aren't silly enough to vote for him.

Sarah Palin in 2012?

I don't see what all the hoopla about Sarah Palin is. At first I really liked her too. I had no real reason to as I, like most Americans, knew very little about her. Mainly I liked her because she added some excitement to what was becoming a snore fest of a campaign. It was also nice to see someone who appeared so genuine enter the race. She seemed to really represent conservative ideals, in stark contrast to John McCain.

But is it too much to ask for someone who is truly conservative but can also speak well? Sarah Palin needs to learn to speak in complete sentences before she even thinks about running for president. I'm not saying she's a bad public speaker. In fact, she sounds great when she's giving a speech. However, when she's making off the cuff remarks I'm constantly reminded of the youtube video of that beauty pageant contestant from South Carolina stuttering about 'the Iraq.' Whether this is a reflection of her intelligence or she just needs a lot more practice, I have no idea (although I suspect it's the latter). Barak Obama, with all his umms and uhhhs, at least managed to complete his thoughts when communicating.