We’ve all worried about a potential October Surprise: a well-orchestrated, dramatic event just before the election which would swing it to McCain. We live in a country with an official propaganda Office of Misinformation and paid government shills posing as real journalists on the Sunday talk shows. It’s not that paranoid to think they’ve got Bin Laden in a cage somewhere, ready to be hauled out in front of the news cameras on Oct. 27th. Or that "new evidence" will "force" Israel to bomb Iran sometime around Oct. 13th.
But this week makes me think the Rethugs don’t really have anything up their sleeves.
The evidence is, of course, Gov. Sarah Palin.
Back in August McCain threw a Hail Sarah and managed to stay in the game. But this week Palin's net favorability rating went under water. After a rapturous reception from the Republican base and an "Ohhhh shiny" reaction from undecided voters, the bloom has quickly fallen off that rose.
Add to that the melt down on Wall St. and the unbelievable string of flip-flops and gaffes from McCain and McCain/Palin has had a very bad week.
I started wondering where McCain would get his next Hail Mary.
That’s when I realized that if McCain really did have an October Surprise ready, he wouldn’t have let himself been bullied into choosing Palin for VP. We’d be running against McCain/Lieberman or McCain/Ridge and Sarah would still be making mooseburgers for Todd and the kids.
Now McCain is a craps shooter (Obama is the poker player) and craps is a sucker’s game. Skinner could train a pigeon to play craps. But even a craps shooter should know that if you have a Bin Laden as your hole card, you don’t roll the dice hoping for a Palin.
Obama was so strong coming out of Denver, he forced McCain to pull an October Surprise in August. I don’t think McCain’s got anything but blind luck left between now and Nov. 4th.