Black Box Report

(Pictured L-R: American Public, Media, John McCain)

The Dead Collector: Bring out yer dead.
[a man puts a body on the cart]
Large Man with Dead Body: Here's one.
The Dead Collector: That'll be ninepence.
The Dead Body That Claims It Isn't: I'm not dead.
The Dead Collector: What?
Large Man with Dead Body: Nothing. There's your ninepence.
The Dead Body That Claims It Isn't: I'm not dead.
The Dead Collector: 'Ere, he says he's not dead.
Large Man with Dead Body: Yes he is.
The Dead Body That Claims It Isn't: I'm not.
The Dead Collector: He isn't.
Large Man with Dead Body: Well, he will be soon, he's very ill.
The Dead Body That Claims It Isn't: I'm getting better.
Large Man with Dead Body: No you're not, you'll be stone dead in a moment.

The reports of John McCain's demise have been greatly exaggerated. With a mini-surge in some polls and less than spectacular fundraising results from his rivals, the Straight Talk Express is off of life support and moving from critical to merely serious condition:

It's a long shot, I grant, but it does make me wonder whether it's really over for McCain. He is ill-suited to being a front runner but makes a brilliant insurgent. Circumstances have forced him back into that role.

When you look at the Republican race and see Rudy Giuliani out in front, you have to calculate that there is at least one shock out there before we get to convention time.

Why not a resurgent McCain?

Insurgent...resurgent... I'm sure John McCain has it in him to Surge! back to mediocrity in the GOP pack. The media's early coronation of McCain, Serious Voice on Iraq, was baffling in its failure to understand both the candidate and the condition of the Republican base. As a candidate, McCain is as gaffe-prone as they come, hardly a week going by without him verbally stepping in it (although Fred Thompson seems determined to give him a run for his money). While his Iraq position is still in line with GOP primary voters, his positions on virtually every other issue are not. And while Mitt Romney will not win the nomination (my opinion), he did articulate where the mood of the base is right now:

"Some people have said we ought to close Guantanamo. My view is we ought to double Guantanamo."

Which is why it was always Rudy Giuliani's race to lose. If you're going to go authoritarian, you're going to go with the real deal.

Which, getting back to the "McCain comeback" meme, is not to say that McCain can't get back to a competitive position. The reality of the Fred Thompson Experience was less ZOMG! AWESOME! than his supporters had imagined, Mitt Romney's top fundraiser, supporter and fan is still Mitt Romney, and Rudy...well, the band's just warming up on him. While he may personify the authoritarian 9/11 9/11 9/11 candidate, both his poersonal and professional backgrounds are, shall we say, target rich environments. Unlike his fellow GOP candidates, McCain has been thoroughly picked over already and has nowhere to go but up.

With the pressure - and added focus - of being the presumptive frontrunner off his shoulders, McCain clearly seems more comfortable with the role of Comeback Kid. Strangely, his campaign is even drawing comparisons to John Kerry's 2004 campaign, when Kerry was presumed to be unable to catch up to surging populist Howard Dean. But that comparison only goes so far:

There is little or no analogy between Howard Dean and Rudy Giuliani, and even if something happened to make Giuliani implode, Republicans would not default to McCain in a panic. So perhaps there is little point in trying to compare Kerry to McCain--except as a reminder that things can change very fast in politics.

Not to mention, of course, that Kerry lost.

If John McCain were a friend of mine, I would counsel him on the coming disaster that is his campaign, and how to most gracefully exit and back another candidate that would best further his ideas and the fortunes of his party. But he's not, and as a political junkie his continued presence is far too entertaining for me. His what-will-he-say-next quality is valuable for its slow-motion-train-wreck fascination. But to the Straight Talker's credit, he has disobeyed Reagan's 11th Commandment early and often, getting in some very pointed criticisms of his rivals. Giuliani being unqualified to conduct foreign policy, for example. Poetic in its irony.

Surge on, McCain, surge on.