HALPERIN’S TAKE: What John McCain Underestimates

Mark Halperin
Time

1. The astonishing enthusiasm that Obama inspires in his supporters — and how much it contrasts with the respect, but not passion, McCain enjoys from his own backers. (And the size of Obama’s crowds…)

2. The “Major League vs Little League” difference between Obama’s infrastructure and his own.

3. The inherent difficulty/sensitivity of running against two figures at once. McCain will have to 1) explicitly criticize a sitting Republican president before Republican audiences and 2) prevent the historic event of electing the nation’s first African-American president that many in the country (and the media) desire.

4. The ever-present danger on the trail that he might evoke Bob Dole with a Bob Dole-like misstep (fall off a stage, sound like a Washington fossil, seem angry and out of touch).

5. How little most Americans care about foreign policy (beyond the Iraq War) when the economy is in the tank.

6. How many voters (even Republican stalwarts) dread the idea of a virtual third Bush term.

7. How many members of the media dread the idea of covering a virtual third Bush term (and how much they buy Obama’s argument that McCain is an extension of Bush-Cheney).

8. The extent to which McCain’s lack of an economic message could make Obama (who also is challenged in adequately addressing the economy) seem like Bob Rubin, Bill Clinton, and Lou Dobbs all rolled into one.

9. That many of his party’s wiseguys and wisegals see polling data suggesting his chances of winning are no more than 30% (and how much it infects their cable TV appearances).

(Continued here.)