- Aasis Vinayak

Why McCain flunked? The hero of the Vietnam war and an expert in foreign policy, lost his battle to a relatively inexperienced junior senator from Illinois! The Analyst Magazine investigates into this issue.

Republican candidate was known for his decades of service and was popular as a prisoner of war in Vietnam. And further his expertise in foreign policy lured a vast number of citizenry. But he was a “leaky boat, with limited fuel”, as rightly pointed out by Ricvote  Lister of BBC news. And here we dissect and examine the leakage points.

Funding: Certainly funding was a cock-a-hoop facet in the Democrat campaign. When his opponent Barack Obama spent a lump some $650m campaign juggernaut, McCain had only a quarter of the amount. He also failed to linger in the air waves of the TV channels.

Voters: McCain’s campaign couldn’t efficaciously win over the African-Americans and new voters. The statistical data released by The National Election Exit Poll shows this factor explicitly well. Most of voters felt that the economic meltdown was the most important issue in the ‘08 election. And many of them held the present Republican government accountable for this.

Obama was a staunch opponent of invasion of Iraq. He played this card, along with his favorite words – hope and change. While the Republican candidate failed abysmally to discredit this. This was another prominent aspect that shattered the image of McCain.

Thirdly, the ethnic prospect favored the black- (elect) president very much. The lion share (almost 90%) of the African-American voters chose Obama.

The powerful young senator was quite successful in delivering powerful orations that cooed (in fact wooed!) and cajoled the young voters of the nation. This also went against McCain’s campaign. Obama’s words projected him to be a proficient leader. The enticed people sent donations to the Democratic candidate and that became a good shaft for establishing his power over the old man!

Loyalty of McCain(?): Yes, of course, this too adversely affected McCain! The old diplomat forgot the fact that he was the candidate of the party to which one of the most unpopular presidents of United States belongs to. But the loyal republican never explicitly rejected George Bush’s presidency. Here also Obama kicked the ball right into the goal post.

Unsuccessful modes: Though the McCain campaign tried to publicize the alleged ACORN scandal, it didn’t work well according to his anticipation. But his rival, who has no national experience and foreign experience, portrayed his campaign to be Anti-Bush.

Palin Effect: Hilary’s nomination spurred some gender based bias among the voters. McCain, being a veteran politician who is skilled in his art, knew very well that many of his party members were unhappy about his candidature. These reasons might have made him to consider the Alaskan Governor. But this too turned out to be an incongruous discernment for success (in the midst of the campaign itself!).

Sarah Palin was not proficient enough when it comes to issues like foreign policy. This negatively affected the image of McCain; and subsequently his accusation of Obama being a novice in the field subverted. The former beauty queen terribly failed even in issues related to gender. And she always had some controversy to follow. Some issues like allegations relating to the misappropriation of power and funds lowered the high profile image of the Republican candidate.

These played a dominating role in the 52.77% votes. The young Democrat, the elect-President, was very fortuitous in getting ample amount of money for campaigns and luring the young minds by frequently using the words - Hope and Change. But the veteran Republican would have never anticipated such a change in the minds of the voters and its effect on his hope for the White House.

*The National Election Exit Poll is a sample of 17,856 voters surveyed on election day after they have left the polling booth on behalf of AP and the major US TV networks.