Florida Wavers

In Florida, John McCain has to fight to avoid losing. Just a few weeks ago, he was considered the favorite. His decline in the Sunshine State is symbolic of all the problems his campaign faces nationwide.

Brian Cordoba hesitatingly says, “We don’t have the same problems as our parents who only worried about how the American government was handling Fidel Castro.” The film major at Miami-Dade College doesn’t say it, but one senses he intends to vote for Democrat Barack Obama on November 4th. That’s not an easy thing for the son of Cuban exiles to admit.

Up until now, this group has been a mainstay of the Republican Party in Florida. For the older exiles, many of whom settled in Florida after escaping Cuba, things haven’t changed all that much. “Obama talks a lot about change,” says Enrique, a Cuban who fled to Miami 48 years ago. “Fidel Castro said the same thing in the beginning.” Enrique has been successful in the United States: he began by selling roses and now heads up the company that employs 2,500 workers. To him, Obama is a populist and he thinks the Democrats’ tax plans amount to socialism. “None of the first generation of exiled Cubans will vote for Obama,” he says.

Brian Cordoba won’t be the only one rebelling against this dogma in November. “My mother voted for George W. Bush in 2000, but this year she’ll vote for Obama,” says Fany Martinez who is studying to be a social worker at Miami-Dade. She says that there are rumors going around that Obama is a communist. But during these times when her parents are having difficulties with their mortgage, it’s not a time for fighting old battles, she says.

Brian and Fany are a sure sign that John McCain is in deep trouble in Florida because the state should be a sure bet for Republicans. Besides Cuban exiles, a lot of retirees live in Florida and they vote Republican. And in the northern part of the state, there are many active duty military people partial toward Vietnam veteran McCain.

McCain’s reputation as a moderate also comes into play. During the primary campaign, Florida’s Governor, Charlie Crist, praised McCain as a moderate Republican who didn’t hesitate to seek bi-partisan solutions to problems.

Things were going very well for McCain at the time. Winning the primary election there was one of McCain’s greatest personal and political triumphs. He sealed the Republican nomination for President with his victory over rivals Mitt Romney and Rudolph Giuliani in Florida. And for many months, right up until early October, he clearly led Obama in Florida polls.

But then came the descent. Now Obama leads in the polls. Not in every poll, but on average he’s one point ahead of McCain. The Republican will have to fight hard if he wants to carry the Sunshine State.

He mainly has only himself to blame for his decline, and the problem isn’t limited just to Florida. The same problems plague him nationwide.

It all began with his choice of running mate. Many people thought McCain would nominate Governor Crist, but he decided on the folksy Governor of Alaska, Sarah Palin. “His choice of Palin didn’t exactly help him,” says David McPherson, Economics Professor at Florida State University. “People here question her qualifications to lead the nation. Crist would have been a far better choice and he’s enormously popular.” So say the experts.

Crist was instrumental in getting support from those Florida Republicans who were skeptical about driiling for oil off Florida’s beaches. He assured people that the environment – Florida’s greatest tourist attraction – would be protected. But when the tenor of McCain’s campaign was sounded, it came off very differently: “Drill, baby, drill!” became the battle cry when Sarah Palin spoke to the public. That didn’t sound much like vigilance and environmental protection.

The fumbled message about energy was just one example of the many mistakes McCain made in Florida. His unrelenting attacks against Obama for “palling around” with former militant opponent of the Vietnam war Bill Ayers were instrumental in damaging McCain’s image as a moderate. “That backfired,” says McPherson. “McCain was always known for saying he would avoid that sort of stuff.”

According to political scientists, McCain should have begun addressing the economy far earlier than he did. That didn’t happen until Obama’s popularity shot into the stratosphere due to the economic crisis.

Since then, never a day passes without McCain mentioning “Joe the Plumber,” i.e., Joe Wurzelbacher who confronted Barack Obama during a campaign appearance with his fears about Obama’s tax policies. “It’s sad when Joe the Plumber has a better message for the McCain campaign than the campaign itself has,” said former Republican Party official Jaime Miller in a Miami Herald article.

Now McCain is in a tight spot. He was in Florida last week, but then Obama showed up right when early voting began. For two days, Obama attracted crowds of supporters wherever he appeared. After he left, they also flocked to the polling stations where they have been able to cast their ballots since the beginning of the week. According to exit polls, well over half of them cast their vote for Obama.

That unnerves McCain’s strategists. On Thursday, they sent McCain on a bus tour across the state. Governor Crist was called to duty once again and he responded by praising McCain’s economic plans in a telephone interview with reporters. On Wednesday, he took Cuban-born Republican Senator Mel Martinez through one Latino quarter after another in an attempt to get the Cuban exiles back into line.

Floridians had long since missed McCain’s attention to their state. Party activists had become increasingly vocal that they felt McCain’s campaign had been ignoring them. Several Republicans openly declared their support for Obama. And all the while, McCain bravely maintained he had Obama exactly where he wanted him. That mantra becomes less and less believable with each new poll showing Obama’s increasing lead.