PHOENIX (By Jon Garrido, The Jon Garrido News Network) November 4, 2008 ― The John McCain candidacy to become President of the United States began in 1982 when McCain was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives from Arizona Congressional District 3. McCain served two terms and then was elected to the U.S. Senate in 1986, winning re-election in 1992, 1998, and 2004.

On the first day in Congress, McCain's constituency became national and to this day, McCain deliberately and intentional did everything to become a national leader rather than represent Arizona constituents that elected him.

Arizona became a stepping stone to a higher mission and in becoming a means to an end, Arizona became an "illegitimate" child.

While other members of Congress became advocates for the needs of home states, McCain's stalwart moral philosophy of frugality of reducing the national deficit to forge a national constituency became a charade rather than addressing the needs of Arizona constituents who because of McCain have never received a dime in financial assistance from Washington.

McCain has been on the wrong side of tens of thousands of popular goodies delivered to other states.

The irony is earmarks are just a tiny sliver of the federal budget. The larger point is that opposing earmarks is not the same thing as shrinking government or balancing budgets or getting the economy going again.

All of this at Arizona's expense. All of this as a means to an end to forge a national constituency of fiscal conservatism but truly a charade because McCain's current economic plan would have exploded the deficit, mainly by making permanent the Bush tax cuts he once opposed. The Brookings Institution estimated that would add $5 trillion to the national debt by 2018; meanwhile, the plan would eliminate only $18 billion in earmarks — and much less if McCain truly intends to preserve aid to Israel and other worthy programs.

This wasn't a problem when McCain was just an Arizona Senator, except of course for, burnishing his maverick credentials by blasting the explosion of earmarks under the GOP Congress and highlighting the role of earmarks in GOP scandals. But when McCain became the Republican nominee, his across-the-board opposition suddenly became inconvenient. Aid to Israel and military housing is funded through earmarks, so McCain had to make it clear he'd protect those programs from cuts. He made a similar exception during his anti-poverty tour in April, when he visited an African-American community in Alabama that got ferry service through an earmark. He then met a Pennsylvania woman with ovarian cancer who was being treated through a clinical trial funded by an earmark; he assured her that program was worthwhile too. "It's the process I object to," McCain explained.

From the beginning, McCain has been campaigning against the history-making possibility of the nation's first black president and faced tremendous political head winds: a country wearied by war, frustrated by economic decline and eager for a new direction after eight years of President Bush.

Since mid-summer, the Arizona senator effectively dominated the day-to-day media narrative through a series of surprising, bold and, to some, reckless tactical moves designed to keep his opponent on the ropes. Whether he depicted Barack Obama as Paris Hilton, selected the little known governor of Alaska as his running mate, manufacture the lipstick-on-a-pig contretemps, or, "suspending" his campaign to tend to the financial crisis, McCain consistently garnered the headlines and forced Obama to respond.

Each of the bold moves brought McCain short-term political gain, throwing the often unflappable Obama off his stride and keeping the Republican nominee very much in the presidential hunt in a dismal year for Republicans. But the tactics also each contained the potential for long-term political costs by distracting from, or eroding, the central McCain message. By comparing Obama to a vacuous Hollywood starlet, McCain found a coherent critique of Obama, but relinquished his own ability to float above the political maw. By choosing Sarah Palin, McCain lit a grassfire of GOP enthusiasm, but risked undermining his ticket's claim of greater experience and putting "country first." By attacking Obama's "lipstick on a pig" comment, the campaign clearly established itself as willing to engage in frivolous, small-ball distractions, a disposition that served McCain poorly when he pivoted and tried to portray himself as a sober statesman willing to halt his campaign to deal with the nation's financial meltdown. Then McCain rolled out a new ad calling on a new spirit of bipartisanship and cooperation in the nation's capital, only a day after blaming the House of Representatives' defeat of the Administration's bailout bill on Democrats and Obama.

By far, McCain's boldest move was selecting Palin, a governor with scant national experience. For a few weeks, the gambit seemed to pay off handsomely. White woman voters overwhelmed campaign events and boosted the ticket's poll numbers. But doubts about Palin's qualifications and competence remained unanswered, and after a series of stumbling television interviews, voters — and even some conservatives — polls showed Republicans began to sour on her.

More and more of his moves looked like losing bets. Even before the first presidential debate ended, McCain's campaign posted an attack ad online highlighting Barack Obama's repeated admission on the shared stage McCain was "absolutely right." On its face, the spot seemed like damaging proof Obama is a wishy-washy follower, not a clear leader. But both Democratic and Republican strategists were puzzled. Why was the campaign cutting a spot that undermined the claim that McCain invites bipartisan agreement?

The deeper problem became while lurching around to win the daily and weekly news cycles, McCain failed to give voters a broad, forward-looking explanation for why they should support him. McCain's national security experience and reputation as a reformer add substance to his theme of "putting country first," but they did not explain what a McCain presidency would mean, or how it would differ from the past eight years. "At no point had they told the American people where John wanted to lead them," said a Republican strategist. "Had they spent more time laying the predicate, they'd have something to fall back on now."

The plan staff developed for McCain called for the campaign to go on offense, with sometimes shocking moves that began winning weeks of news coverage. McCain called Obama an unprepared celebrity. This reintroduced McCain as a maverick and a change-agent. McCain hit old Republican themes on taxes and spending. He ran away from the record of Republicans in Congress and the White House. He made copious use of outrage and emotion. Rather than a single unified message, staff planned a multifaceted attack, which stitched together under the banner of "Country First," a phrase that both highlighted McCain's war hero biography and suggested Obama was a selfish, pandering elitist.

The entire strategy rested significantly on the McCain campaign's ability to keep disrupting the political discussion. If people questioned Palin's credentials, attack the media. If talk turned to the economy, attack Obama for proposing to raise some taxes. If the news cycle slowed, release a new advertisement, more controversial than the last.

But in mid-September, the plan was disrupted by real world events. The financial crisis knocked over banks and rocked the world economy forced McCain to shift gears. His big gambit — suspend the campaign and return to Washington — was undercut from two sides. First, upon arriving he found he had very little power to win votes for the deal or shape the negotiations. In fact, House Republicans voted against the initial package he supported by a margin of 2 to 1. Second, many viewed his decision to suspend his campaign as little more than yet another gimmick designed to grab press attention.

Sen. John McCain and his Republican allies then tried an aggressive assault on Sen. Barack Obama's character, believing that to win in November they shifted the conversation back to questions about the Democrat's judgment, honesty and personal associations.

McCain's team decided its emphasis on the senator's biography as a war hero, experienced lawmaker and straight-talking maverick was insufficient to close a growing gap with Obama. The Arizonan's campaign was also eager to move the conversation away from the economy, an issue that strongly favored Obama and helped him to a lead in many recent polls.

Moments after the House of Representatives approved a bailout package for Wall Street, the McCain campaign released a television ad that challenged Obama's honesty and asked, "Who is Barack Obama?" The ad alleged "Senator Obama voted 94 times for higher taxes. Ninety-four times. He's not truthful on taxes." The charge that Obama voted 94 times for higher taxes has been called misleading by independent fact-checkers, who noted the majority of those votes were on nonbinding budget resolutions.

Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin's performances embodied the new approach, as she used every opportunity to question Obama's honesty and fitness to serve as president. At one point she said, "Barack Obama voted against funding troops in Iraq after promising he would not do so."

Palin kept up the attack, saying in an interview on Fox News that Obama is "reckless" and some of what he has said, "in my world, disqualifies someone from consideration as the next commander in chief."

"I guarantee you, you're going to learn a lot about who's the liberal and who's the conservative and who wants to raise your taxes and who wants to lower them," McCain said.

McCain advisers said the new approach was in part a reaction to Obama, whose rhetoric on the stump and in commercials had also become far harsher and more aggressive.

They noted Obama had run television commercials for months linking McCain to lobbyists and hinting at a lack of personal ethics ― an allegation that particularly rankles McCain, aides said.

Campaigning in Abington, Pa., Obama continued to focus on the economy, even as he lashed out at McCain.

"He's now going around saying, 'I'm going to crack down on Wall Street' . . . but the truth is he's been saying 'I'm all for deregulation' for 26 years," Obama said. "He hasn't been getting tough on CEOs. He hasn't been getting tough on Wall Street. . . . Suddenly a crisis comes and the polls change, and suddenly he's out there talking like Jesse Jackson."

Obama highlighted a new report showing a reduction of more than 159,000 jobs last month and he linked the bad economic news to McCain and Palin.

"Governor Palin said to Joe Biden our plan to get our economy out of the ditch was somehow a job-killing plan; that's what she said," Obama told a crowd of thousands. "I wonder if she turned on the news this morning. . . . When Senator McCain and his running mate talk about job killing, that's something they know a thing or two about, because the policies they've supported and are supporting are killing jobs in America every single day."

McCain issued a statement saying the bailout bill "is not perfect, and it is an outrage that it's even necessary. But we must stop the damage to our economy done by corrupt and incompetent practices on Wall Street and in Washington."

Before the bailout crisis, aides said, McCain was succeeding in focusing attention on Obama's record and character.

Michigan however was an eye opener. For months, McCain has made Michigan the centerpiece of his electoral offense, and with good reason. Iowa, a state that George W. Bush won in 2004, certain to swing to Obama; he currently leads there by more than 10 points on average. Same goes for New Mexico, where Obama's ahead by 8. When combined with John Kerry's 251 electoral votes, those two states alone would put Obama within seven of the magic 270 mark; a single, additional win in either Colorado, Virginia, Ohio or Florida — all of which currently favor the Democrat — would put him over the top. Which is why McCain, desperate to make up ground, has long pinned his hopes on Michigan. The Arizona senator was polling within 2 points of his Illinois opponent as recently as Sept. 10.

Unfortunately, the recent avalanche of distressing economic news — especially impactful in a state with the nation's highest level of unemployment — seems to have moved the expensive Great Lakes State out of McCain's reach.

Unfortunately, though, Mr. McCain is a Republican. Hispanics share the general current contempt for Mr. Bush’s party, and have a few grievances of their own. It was, after all, Republicans who wrecked a bill last year that would have allowed most undocumented immigrants to become citizens. It was Republicans who ran television ads in 2006 comparing laborers who stole across the Mexican border to terrorists. As the other candidates tacked to the right during the primaries, the Arizona senator at first hesitated and then seemed to follow. In January he was asked whether he still supported the immigration bill he had helped craft. No, he said.

McCain from the beginning of the 2008 campaign faced an uphill battle for the prize he has always sought.

McCain arrived home in Phoenix early this morning. McCain planned events in Colorado and New Mexico, then a party at the Biltmore Hotel in Phoenix. Tonight's evening before the election returns come in will be McCain's last performance on center stage. It will be his last hoorah.

John McCain's 15 minutes of fame have come and gone. The final chapter will be to defeat McCain's bid for re-election in 2010 to the U.S. Senate. To use a McCain euphuism, our mission is to find a candidate to defeat McCain in 2010.

And please do not suggest Janet Napolitano. She has been a disaster for Arizona. She has been a disaster for Arizona Hispanics. If she is not good enough for Obama, she certainly is not good enough for Arizona.