John McCain

Presidential candidate John McCain leads opponents Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton in hypothetical head-to-head contests among Arizona voters, according to a Rocky Mountain Poll released today, Thursday, May 22.

In a McCain-Obama match-up, the Republican senator from Arizona has an 11-percentage point edge against the Democratic senator from Illinois. The results: McCain 50 percent, Obama 39 percent, and undecided 11 percent.

In a McCain-Clinton election, McCain has an even greater 15-percentage point advantage against the Democratic senator from New York. The specifics: McCain 51 percent, Clinton 36 percent, undecided 11 percent, and someone else 1 percent. 

Survey director Earl de Berge noted that the election is shaping up to be intensely partisan with 84 percent or more Republicans siding with McCain against either Democratic challenger; and conversely, 70 percent or more Democrats close ranks and align with either Obama or Clinton against the presumptive GOP nominee.

 “It appears that much of the GOP hope that Democrats will remain divided after the nomination process is over may be wishful thinking on their part,” de Berge wrote in an analysis.

The real campaign in Arizona will be for the votes of registered independents. McCain polls slightly ahead of the Democrats among independents, with a 2-percentage point advantage against Obama and a 3-percentage point lead against Clinton.

However, independents comprise a disproportionately large segment of the undecided voters. A full 16 percent of independents have yet to decide in a McCain-Obama race, while an even greater 23 percent have to make a choice in a McCain-Clinton race.\

The survey of 630 registered voters was conducted by Phoenix-based Behavior Research Center, a nonpartisan polling firm, from May 12 through 20. It had a margin of error of 4 percentage points, according to the pollsters.

Cindy and John McCain/Photo by Tim Hacker, Tribune

John McCain spent a considerable portion of his press conference in Phoenix on Monday discussing his renewed efforts to reach out to Hispanic voters.

It was no coincidence that Monday is Cinco de Mayo, a Mexican holiday that commemorates the Battle of Puebla in 1862 when a small group of Mexican troops overcame overwhelming force during that country’s struggle for independence.

McCain announced the launch of a Spanish-language page on his campaign Web site. It can be accessed at http://espanol.johnmccain.com.

Then, as he did following his Super Tuesday victories on Feb. 5, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee declaired that he wasn’t overly worried about the reaction from the most conservative members of his own party.

“My party is the party of Abraham Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt and Ronald Reagan. My party is an inclusive party. My party reaches out to every citizen, every American who shares our views and our optimism and our belief in the principals of this great nation,” he said.

“I will seek the vote of every American. I will make sure we go to places where we might not get the majority of the votes. But the job that I have is to re-unite America and to make sure that people know that I will be the president of all the people, whether they vote for me or not,” he said.

“Americans are crying for us to work together. I notice that Sen. Obama and Sen. Clinton are touting their work in a bipartisan fashion. I will match my record for reaching across the aisle and working with the other party with them any day of the week. It’s far more extensive and far more substantive – and I’m proud of that work,” he said.

For more on McCain’s outreach to Hispanics and his plans pump up the campaign with discussion of energy issues, check out my story on the Tribune’s main Web site here.

John McCain

Republican presidential candidate Sen. John McCain would beat either of his Democratic opponents by fair margins in his home state, according to a statewide survey released Tuesday, April 29.

In a hypothetical head-to-head race against Sen. Barack Obama, the results were: McCain 47 percent, Obama 38 percent, and undecided 15 percent, according the poll conducted by Arizona State University/KAET-TV (Channel 8). That gives the home-state candidate a 9 percentage point edge.

In a head-to-head contest with Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, the results were: McCain 53 percent, Clinton 37 percent, and undecided 10 percent. That gives McCain an even more comfortable advantage of 16 percentage points.

The survey-takers probed further and identified the top reasons the respondents sided with their candidate. A sizable portion of the electorate apparently plans to vote against a particular candidate, rather than vote for a candidate.

For example, in the McCain-Obama race, the top three reasons voters said they were supporting McCain were: 1) They don’t like Obama, which turned up 22 percent of the time; 2) They always vote for the Republican candidate, at 20 percent; and, 3) McCain’s experience, 15 percent.

In the same McCain-Obama match-up, the top reasons respondents cited for favoring Obama were: 1) They always vote for the Democratic, which was important for 37 percent; 2) Obama’s message for hope and change, 16 percent; and, 3) They don’t like McCain, 14 percent.

In a McCain-Clinton race, the top reasons for supporting McCain were: 1) They don’t like Clinton, 45 percent; 2) They vote Republican, 18 percent; and, 3) They don’t like Bill Clinton and don’t want another Clinton in the White House, 8 percent.

Also in a McCain-Clinton race, the top reasons respondents told pollsters they selected Clinton were: 1) They vote Democrat, 31 percent; 2) Clinton will change President Bush’s policies and supporting working people, 15 percent; and tied for, 3) Clinton’s against the war in Iraq, and they like her stands on the issues, at 10 percent each.

Poll director Bruce Merrill said there are two reasons Obama did better than Clinton in the head-on-head contests with McCain.

“First, those who identify themselves as political independents divide their vote almost equally between Obama and McCain. Many independents are strongly opposed to the war in Iraq and they tend to oppose (McCain) on that issue,” Merrill said in a prepared statement.

“The second reason Obama does better than Clinton is that Arizonans simply have a strong dislike for Hillary Clinton, even though her husband won the state when he ran for reelection,” he said.

Well, some Arizonans have a strong dislike for her. Clinton beat Obama in Arizona’s Democratic presidential preference election 50.4 percent to 42.4 on Feb. 5, so she has her in-state support group as well.

Interestingly, age, gender and race appear to be only minor considerations for most voters, according to the survey. Or, perhaps, few people admit to pollsters that those factors are important to them.

Either way, among Obama supporters, just 4 percent said they supported him because he’s younger than McCain; while among Clinton supporters, the age issue didn’t register at all. Among McCain supporters, 3 percent said they supported him because he’s older than Obama. McCain supporters didn’t mention age when he was matched up against Clinton.

Regarding gender, 5 percent of Clinton’s followers cited her gender as their top reason to support her; while among McCain supporters, 2 percent cited Clinton’s gender as a reason to vote against her.

Race didn’t show up as a factor in any of the potential match-ups. The independent survey of 577 registered voters statewide was conducted between April 24 and 47. It has a margin of error of 4.0 percentage points, according to the pollsters.  

 While John McCain had strong support at his rally in Prescott on Saturday, there were some people in the crowd with different political agendas.

Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and Ron Paul supporters held signs and distributed literature about their candidates as well.

One particular Paul supporter was fairly entertaining. As a row of newspaper reporters typed madly at their computers at an outdoor table immediately after McCain’s speech, the Paul enthusiast kept walking back and forth in front of them carrying a Paul campaign sign. He kept saying, “Remember the revolution! Remember the revolution!”

According to Paul’s Web site, his, ahem, revolution persists. It says, “Dr. Paul is continuing his bid for the Republican nomination in order to spread the message of constitutional government and personal freedom, take the GOP back to its traditional roots, and continue the grassroots activism his candidacy inspired.”

So noted.

Meanwhile, El Mirage resident William Crum made the trip to Prescott specifically to oppose McCain. He held a hand-made sign that stated, “McCain = 100 Years of War With a Draft (Men and Women).”

Crum, a Vietnam veteran, said he differs with McCain’s approach to the war in Iraq.

“His opinion right now is basically stay the course,” Crum said. “You know what? We can’t afford that. Our country and our service guys can’t stay the course. I mean, why else would they be going back three, four, five times? That’s why I feel that if this war keeps going, we’re going to have to start a draft again, because where else are we going to get people? The reason I believe that we’re going to have to get men and women is because there are not enough men.”

I covered McCain’s speech in the Tribune and my story can be accessed here.

OK, and quick note on Paul’s puzzling campaign sign, in which the letters E, V, O and L within the word “revolution” are backwards and in red. If you read just the red letters backwards, it spells ”love.”

Trippy, man.

Also, if you play some of Paul’s campaign speeches backwards, it sounds like he says, “Number 9,” “I am the walrus” and “Coo-coo ca choo.” Really.

John McCain

Veteran campaign strategist Ned Barnett figures that John McCain is targeting two distinct audiences with his “Service to America” tour. The audiences: new voters and members of The Fourth Estate.

OK, no surprise concerning new voters. But, c’mon. The Fourth Estate? Isn’t McCain supposed to be a media darling? Isn’t he supposed to be every reporter’s best friend?

Barnett told me, “It’s not that they don’t know who he is, but they focus on, ‘OK, he’s the guy who did McCain-Feingold and he’s the guy who did McCain-Kennedy and he’s the guy who did these cross-over bills.’ So, they see him in action as what Obama has said what he would do in principal, but has never done in action, which is to cross over party lines and come up with bipartisan or coalition or compromise solutions to major problems and issues.”

So, if members of the media already know McCain in those terms, what exactly is McCain’s message for the press during his cross-country biographical tour this week?

Barnett explained, “He’s trying to say, ‘When you look at me, remember that Hillary is saying, “I’ve got more experience than Obama,” and her experience was eight years as first lady and she’s having to embellish what she did in Bosnia to even be taken seriously as having experience. So wait a minute. I have real experience. I had more experience in serving this country before Hillary was out of law school.’”

So McCain’s goal, according to Barnett, is to remind reporters that he’s not just a candidate defined by the issues of the day; he’s a candidate with a lifetime of experiences to prepare him for the job.

Hmmm… Well, as a member of McCain’s manipulated masses in the press, I’ll take that under advisement.

For more on McCain’s tour, which concludes in Arizona on Saturday, check out my story in the Tribune.

Congress.org’s latest annual Power Rankings of the members of Congress provides some interesting talking points concerning Arizona’s 10 member delegation.

First a little background: The deep thinkers behind the rankings score each member on a number of factors, including position, indirect influence, legislative activity, earmark passage and “sizzle/fizzle.”

Clearly, nearly all of that is subjective. For example, racking up federal expenditures for earmarks is considered a positive factor in the rankings. Congress.org’s deep thinkers associate earmark passage with political influence. Sure, there’s an argument to be made for that.

Of course, other deep thinkers associate earmark passage with self indulgence, wasteful spending and stains on congressional records. So, what of Sen. John McCain, and Reps. Jeff Flake and John Shadegg who specifically don’t request earmarks? The Power Rankings knock their scores for that. 

Furthermore, Democrats get an automatic edge because they comprise the majority party in both the Senate and House and as a result will score higher in the position and legislative activity categories. That’s to be expected.

So with that preamble…

On the Senate side, Congress.org ranked Republicans McCain is 10^th and Jon Kyl 18^th, or second and third overall among Republicans. Interestingly, McCain’s presidential rivals Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barak Obama place ninth and 11^th in the Senate respectively.

Congress.org attributes McCain’s ranking in part to position as a ranking party member of a committee, his frequent media coverage, positive sizzle and for successfully amending bills.

He’s knocked for running for higher office, because doing so allegedly reduces or defuses his power to help current constituents. Other deep thinkers could offer the argument that emerging as his party’s nominee for president may give him a certain amount of added clout, but, of course, it’s Congress.org’s rankings so their deep thinkers get the final word.

Kyl should climb in coming years with the real and perceived power associated with his new No. 2 position in the GOP leadership team.

On the House side, Congress.org ranked Democrat Ed Pastor 84^th; Republican Shadegg 211^th, Democrats Raul Grijalva 246^th, Gabrielle Giffords 277^th and Harry Mitchell 334^th; and Republicans Jeff Flake 372^nd, Trent Franks 387^th and Rick Renzi dead last at 435^th.

Also of note, Renzi was the only member in either the Senate or House to get a negative score.

A final thought on Super Tuesday…

My favorite dark horse candidates failed in their attempts to win Arizona’s presidential preference elections.

Democrat Sandy Whitehouse, a Tucson-area resident who ran on the platform that she would cut government spending by saving a line of type on all presidential correspondence, garnered 577 votes. That came just 200,814 votes shy of fellow challenger Hillary Clinton’s winning total.

Meanwhile, Republican Michael P. Shaw, a Glendale resident who said he ran to represent the ’hood and the God of Israel, attracted 59 votes. That was a mere 227,701 votes short of rival John McCain’s tally.

Alas, there’s always 2012. Remember that McCain didn’t do so hot the first time he ran for president either.

John McCain

Immediately after John McCain became the presumptive GOP presidential nominee Tuesday, discussion among party insiders immediately switched to what possible strategy the maverick Republican could use to unify the party.

 McCain, himself, said he planned to reach out to people in different factions of the party the same way he has for the past several months on the campaign trail. He intends to meet and greet people and look for points of agreement based on American principals.

 There’s nothing wrong with McCain’s approach, but there’s a more qualified person to unify the Republican party, said Nathan Gonzales, political editor of the Rothenberg Political Report, a nonpartisan newsletter based in Washington, D.C.

“Hillary Clinton will be able to unify Republicans better than any Republican can,” Gonzales said.

“I don’t think there’s going to be people who have disliked McCain for years who all of a sudden are going to say, ‘Oh, he’s a great guy!’ But, if they say, ‘Oh well, President McCain or President Hillary Clinton?’ I think for a lot of Republicans, President Hillary Clinton is scarier than President John McCain,’” he said.

Bill and Hillary Clinton

Former President Bill Clinton was on his best behavior during a campaign rally for his wife and presidential candidate Hillary Clinton on Thursday in Tempe.

After making a series of remarks that were considered hostile toward fellow Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama in previous weeks, he barely mentioned Obama at Arizona State University.And when Bill Clinton did mention Obama, either by name or inference, he had only positive things to say.

He started his hour-plus speech by giving a recap of the televised Democratic debate between Hillary Clinton and Obama, which was broadcast when everyone at the rally was standing in line waiting to get in.

Bill Clinton reported that they had a civilized discussion about the issues. He said, “They told some of the people in this country who have been using their positions to try to divide the Democrats that we are going to be united in November.”

Perhaps Bill Clinton was referring to himself as one of “those people.”

 At the end of his speech, he sort of mentioned Obama again.

 “Do I think it will be a great thing when we have our first woman president? Of course, I do,” he said.

“I have to tell you, I think it will be a great thing when we have our first African-American president, our first Hispanic president, our first Asian-American, our first Native-American president, our first Arab-American president, our first Jewish president, our first Muslim president, our first you-name-it president. America is not about catagories. America is about ideas and all of us ought to be part of a common humanity,” he said.

A couple of other observations…

Bill Clinton’s speech was something of a rerun of Hilliary Clinton’s speech the week before in Laveen.

They both covered healthcare, energy, global warming, education and foreign policy. They both took a couple of jabs at President Bush. They both asked members of the audience to raise their hands if they knew someone without health insurance. They both talked up Al Gore. They even told the same antidote about an injured Iraq war veteran that Hillary Clinton met.

 There were a couple of important differences though.

Hillary Clinton moved through her version of her stump speech in 37 minutes. Bill Clinton labored through his version of her stump speech in one hour, three minutes. And while I didn’t count, it seemed like Hillary Clinton got far more laughs than Bill Clinton managed. She also seemed to get more buy-in from the crowd.

Hillary Clinton gave a rally speech. Bill Clinton gave a policy lecture.

Whoever thought that Hillary Clinton could ever supersede Bill Clinton in the speech-making department?

Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton

Barack Obama and Bill Clinton announced plans to campaign in the Valley this week, moves that underscore the importance both Obama’s and Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaigns are placing on Arizona.

Arizona will conduct its presidential preference election Feb. 5, one of two dozen states that will stage primary elections and caucuses on Super Duper Tuesday.Obama is set to headline a rally Wednesday, Jan. 30, at Veterans Memorial Coliseum, at 1826 W. McDowell Road, in Phoenix. The former home of the Phoenix Suns accommodates 14,870 spectators.

The doors are scheduled to open at 3:30 p.m., though the exact time of Obama’s appearance has yet to be set. The senator for Illionois is slated to speak at a rally in Colorado, another Super Duper Tuesday state, earlier in the day.Obama last appeared in Arizona at Arizona State University in Tempe on Oct. 19. Meanwhile, Hillary Clinton campaign officials confirmed that former President Bill Clinton will campaign for his wife in the Valley on Thursday, the specific time and location have yet to be confirmed.

Bill Clinton will follow the public appearance with a private fund-raiser at the home of former state Democratic Party chairman Jim Pederson later in the evening.

Hilliary Clinton appeared for an overflow crowd at a high school in Laveen last week and spoke to Arizona reporters in a conference call today, Jan. 28. Hillary Clinton had a 6 percentage point lead against Obama in the lastest statewide poll in Arizona, but Obama is gaining…