The McCain Strategy

We can examine a bit of what John McCain might be planning for the general election.

The McCain campaign has opened 10 offices:

Pennsylvania & Ohio Regional Headquarters
Columbus, OH

NJ and NY Regional Headquarters & The New Jersey State Office
Woodbridge, NJ

New England Regional Headquarters
Manchester, NH

Mid-Atlantic Regional Headquarters and Virginia State Office
Arlington, VA

South Central Regional Headquarters
Centennial, CO

Midwest Regional Headquarters
Urbandale, IA

Great Lakes Regional Headquarters & Michigan State Office
Farmington Hills, MI

North Mountain Regional Headquarters and Minnesota State Office
Saint Paul, MN

Southwest Regional Headquarters
Phoenix, AZ

West Regional Headquarters & Nevada State Office
Henderson, NV

The calendar events at McCain's website indicates that they will also be opening an office soon in California:

Upcoming McCain Campaign Events

Town Hall Meeting in Portsmouth, OH -- 07-09
California Campaign HQ Grand Opening -- 07-09
Town Hall Meeting in Albuquerque, NM -- 07-15

Whether the California office is primarily designed to raise funds, or whether McCain believes that he can really take the Golden State, maybe with the help of the state's governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, is hard to say.

Generally, we can expect that the locations of the offices and headquarters indicate the states that McCain will be targeting up to this point.

JohnMcCain.com also lists four groups for special interests:

• Veterans for McCain -- Leveraging McCain's own illustrious military service
• Women for McCain -- Obviously aiming at disaffected Hillary Clinton supporters
• Lawyers for McCain -- Maybe for fundraising? Both Barack and Michelle are lawyers
• Sportsmen for McCain -- NRA gun vote

Here is McCain's campaign strategist Rick Davis on their own plan (June 7, 2008):



So far, it looks like the McCain camp is still searching around for the right issues as it hasn't focused its message yet.

Knowing what the McCain camp is doing at all times, is essential knowledge that the Obama side will need to plan their own strategy.