McCain's flip-flopping has become so consistent it's impossible to figure out any central message. There might be a reason for this -
Sometimes it pays to look between the lines. The bloggers at the L.A. Times found a few entertaining facts:
Unlike last year, McCain is working hard to raise money now, and his schedulers fill in the blanks with interviews and other events to attract free media coverage wherever they happen to be.
You can tell a lot about any political campaign by how it invests its most precious resource: the 1,440 minutes in each candidate's day.
Take a look at this edited current schedule for John McCain's campaign.
Thursday, July 17, 2008, Missouri and Michigan
10:00am CT Depart Omaha, NE
10:55am CT Arrive Kansas City, MO
11:30am CT Town Hall Meeting, Union Station
1:00pm Local Media Interviews;
2:15pm CT Depart Kansas City, MO
4:50pm ET Arrive Muskegon, MI; 6:00pm Finance Event, Ferrysburg, MI
7:45pm Depart Muskegon, MI; 8:40pm
Arrive Detroit, MI, Overnight
Friday, July 18, 2008, Michigan
9:00am Tour & Employee Town Hall Meeting, GM Technical Center
10:45am Local Media Interviews; 12:00pm Finance Event;
2:10pm ET Depart Detroit, MI; 3:45pm ET Arrive Newark, NJ 4:15pm Phone Media Interview
4:45pm Interview Late Night with Conan O'Brien
Saturday, July 19, 2008, New York
10:00am Media Interviews
12:35pm Depart for East Hampton by Helicopter; 1:15pm Arrive East Hampton.
6:00pm Finance Event; 7:45pm Finance Event
9:30pm Return NYC, Overnight.
Just 3 1/2 months out from the presidential election, McCain's national campaign schedule is being driven by the quest for money, not by the hunt for votes.
It helps explain that widespread sense of unease among many Republicans nationally who fear he wasted his three-month general election headstart not defining himself and the all-important central message of why he wants to be president. Do you know why? Do you know why his opponent is running? See the difference?
Some still don't detect a national McCain strategy laid out with consistent unfolding messages drawing the portrait in voters' minds of the next commander-in-chief, day by day and event by event.