That's almost a direct quote from a highly amusing Politico article about the morale, or lack thereof, inside the McCain campaign. The resumes are being sent out to wingnut welfare institutes, the circular firing squad has formed, the rats are heading for the railings, etc...
Opening sentence:
With despair rising even among many of John McCain’s own advisors, influential Republicans inside and outside his campaign are engaged in an intense round of blame-casting and rear-covering—-much of it virtually conceding that an Election Day rout is likely.
And, let the blame-casting begin. Anonymously, of course:
These public comments offer a whiff of an increasingly acrid behind-the-scenes GOP meltdown—a blame game played out through not-for-attribution comments to reporters that operatives know will find their way into circulation.
One well-connected Republican in the private sector was shocked to get calls and resumes in the past few days from what he said were senior McCain aides – a breach of custom for even the worst-off campaigns.
So, the game of musical chairs for the spots at Heritage and the AEI and so forth has begun. In an abstract sense, I'm curious to see who's left standing when the music stops.
“The cake is baked,” agreed a former McCain strategist. “We’re entering the finger-pointing and positioning-for-history part of the campaign. It’s every man for himself now.”
[...]
One current senior campaign official gave voice to this “Law of the Jungle” ethic, defending the campaign against second-guessers who say it was a mistake to throw away his experience message in an attempt to match Obama’s “change” mantra.
It's the Law of the Jungle. "In other news, the mauled corpse of McCain surrogate Carly Fiorina was found today. It is believed that Ms. Fiorina was disemboweled by a flock of feral Tuckers."
One final quote:
A House Republican leadership aide in an e-mail was no more complimentary: “The staff has been remarkably undisciplined, too eager to point fingers, unable to craft any coherent long term strategy. The handling of Palin (not her performances, but her rollout and availability) has been nothing short of political malpractice. I understand the candidate might have other opinions and might be dictating some aspects of the campaign to staff – but the lack of discipline and ability to draft and stick to a coherent message is unreal. You have half of the campaign saying Ayers is a major issue, and then the candidate out there saying he doesn’t care about a washed up terrorist. You have McCain one day echoing Milton Friedman and the next day echoing FDR.”
A highly amusing article, to put it mildly. What is perhaps the most amusing part is that in an article about the backbiting and low morale of the McCain campaign, the reporters had no trouble getting loads of damaging quotations from staffers who are either disgruntled or jockeying to avoid blame. Very meta.
Update [2008-10-23 21:3:39 by dmsilev]: Completely unrelated, but apparently the NY Times has just endorsed Obama:
Mr. Obama has met challenge after challenge, growing as a leader and putting real flesh on his early promises of hope and change. He has shown a cool head and sound judgment. We believe he has the will and the ability to forge the broad political consensus that is essential to finding solutions to this nation’s problems.
In the same time, Senator John McCain of Arizona has retreated farther and farther to the fringe of American politics, running a campaign on partisan division, class warfare and even hints of racism. His policies and worldview are mired in the past. His choice of a running mate so evidently unfit for the office was a final act of opportunism and bad judgment that eclipsed the accomplishments of 26 years in Congress.
-dms