Uh oh!!!!

McCain shakes up staff amid concern about 'unforced errors'

WASHINGTON (CNN)-- "Sen. John McCain's campaign announced a shakeup at the top Wednesday, in the wake of growing Republican concern about its ability to compete against Sen. Barack Obama.

Campaign manager Rick Davis said Tuesday that senior adviser Steve Schmidt would take over day-to-day operations of the campaign . . . .

Schmidt had been a regular on the road with McCain until recently, when he quietly returned to headquarters to help fix what insiders admit are severe structural problems that caused a series of missteps:

* Hiring, then firing, lobbyists who worked for the military junta in Myanmar, then creating a strict anti-lobbyist policy that caused several lobbyists to be dismissed from the campaign.

* Poor vetting that led to endorsements by controversial figures like ministers John Hagee and Rod Parsley, which McCain didn't reject until after months of bad press.

* The campaign also paid for a TV ad to distance McCain from President Bush. The ad's script read, "John McCain stood up to the president and sounded the alarm on global warming ... five years ago." McCain later reversed his position and stood with Bush on the controversial idea of offshore oil drilling.

Oh dear.

It appears that John McCain's campaign may be running into the ground due to the total incompetence and jackassed-ness of the morons who are supposed to be in charge. I think that this shake-up is good for his campaign. Perhaps Mr. Schmidt will enable More-of-the-same McCain to make this race marginally respectable, instead of the epic smackdown that many analysts see looming on the horizon.

Me? I'm not so sure.

At this point, ANYONE who has hitched his/her wagon to More-of-the-same's campaign can't be all that much of a genius. Any RepubliCons worth an onion should be laying low in underground bunkers, riding Election 2008 out, and working on finding a shriekingly reasonable, evolution-denying Southern senator or Governor to work for in 2010.