McCain wins anti war voters

Boston Globe/Houston Chronicle:

John McCain, the Republican Party's most relentless and unapologetic guardian of an enduring American presence in Iraq, has become the favored candidate of anti-war voters in the Republican primaries, according to exit polls.

In New Hampshire, McCain overwhelmingly won the votes of the one-third of Republican-primary voters who told exit pollsters they "strongly" or "somewhat" oppose the war, and trailed Mitt Romney by more than 20 points among those who strongly support it. In Michigan, where McCain lost to Romney, the Arizona senator also carried anti-war voters while losing among those backing the conflict.

The unlikely base of support for McCain has been central to his campaign's resurgence. Both analysts and staffers acknowledge it is evidence of how much McCain has succeeded in winning over voters on the basis of his personal qualities while often failing to convince them of his policy positions.

"People know this is someone who knows the possibilities and limits of military action and would not take those steps lightly," said Steve Duprey, McCain's New Hampshire vice chairman, explaining the senator's appeal to anti-war voters.

For much of last year, McCain's support for the war in Iraq appeared to threaten his prospects among independents, Democrats, and moderate Republicans. McCain repeatedly said then that he would "much rather lose a political campaign than lose a war."

Yet McCain has managed to establish a third position in a previously two-sided debate that has allowed him to draw supporters from among the war's boosters and skeptics. By criticizing both the Bush administration's wartime management and Democratic opponents he said wanted to "set a date for surrender," McCain was able to present himself as a candidate who both supported the war and best understood the costs of what he calls "our failure in Iraq."

Throughout his career, McCain has articulated a simple lesson from Vietnam — wars should be waged to win at any cost, or not fought at all. That all or nothing approach has pushed him, at various times, to both dovish and hawkish extremes.

The notion that McCain could be wrong about the war but grasps its gravity is a theme in newspaper endorsements, which McCain has won in greater numbers than any other Republican contender.

This week, the Daily Herald of Arlington Heights, Ill., cited McCain's "courage" in noting that "we disagree with McCain's endorsement of the war in Iraq, but his early criticism of its execution ... has been proven accurate."

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The newspapers including the Globe still don't comprehend what is going on with the so called anti war vote. Among the so called anti war voters are those who are against a losing war. They want to win and they want someone who will do what it takes to win and be impatient for victory. The consensus when the war started was roughly 70 percent in favor of the war. When the consensus changed it did not mean that suddenly those who favored the war joined the MoveOn Democrats in wanting to lose the war. McCain seems to fit their niche in terms of doing more to win. The war in Iraq has turned out to be his best issue, because many of his other positons such as on ANWR are pretty screwy.