McCan’t

When Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) was asked recently whether he might soon drop out of the presidential race, he responded by asking if his interlocutor was smoking something.

But following the resignation yesterday of four senior staffers including campaign manager Terry Nelson and chief strategist John Weaver it is the senator and any remaining optimists around him who seem not to be thinking clearly.

We do not advocate McCain’s withdrawal from the race; still less do we criticize his principled stand on the Iraq war. The senator believes strongly that national security demands the defeat of Islamist terrorism in Mesopotamia and, badly though the war has gone, it is difficult to argue persuasively that he is wrong.

But taking principled stances does not always lead to winning elections, and it is now hard to see McCain coming close to the Republican nomination, let alone going on to victory in November 2008. If he did so, he would not need to proclaim himself “the Comeback Kid,” as Bill Clinton did 16 years ago, but would, rather, be granted the accolade by unanimous acclamation from the punditocracy.

Such rebounds hardly ever happen. It is true that early front-runners often fade away and do not figure in the final frame, so the present electoral field may not look the same next January as it does today. But candidates who move backwards through the field despite being prominent for as long as McCain has find it nearly impossible to return.

And anyway, McCain fits into the first category — of front-runners who fade away rather than of candidates who come from behind in a late charge. It is only the fact that McCain has faded so early that masks the senator’s bleak arc from front-runner to the brink of oblivion.

He has little money, no (positive) momentum, and no apparent chance in Iowa. Yet, he needs to compete in the farm state rather than focus his limited resources on New Hampshire, where he has proven popular in the past.

In a stoic statement yesterday, the candidate said, “In the days and weeks ahead this campaign will move forward, and I will continue to address the issues of greatest concern to the American people, laying out my vision for a secure and prosperous America.”

It is courageous and stubborn of him to do so. But it is not enough simply to move forward. McCain has to win an early state because without it he will not have the resources to stay in the race for the long haul. It is reasonable to doubt that he will even make it to the primaries.

McCain needs a home run, and he needs it quickly.