One of the reasons that McCain is down in the polls is that he has the worst cast of surrogates ever, and the worst of the worst is, by far, Tucker Bounds. He consistently refuses or is unable to stray far enough away from his talking points to be the least bit persuasive. Rather than turning the discussion back to policy (especially tax policy) he merely identifies the question being asked and spouts off the talking point that closely matches. He keeps coming back to Bill Ayers when it has become obvious that Bill Ayers is a loser issue.

McCain's best moments have been those when he is able to make a coherent argument about Obama's taxing and spending. Unfortunately, he is too often unable to make a coherent statement. What he needs to do is continue to pound the fact that Obama is going to raise taxes. People are not that afraid of Obama as a person, but history shows that people are afraid of increased taxing and spending. The only focus between now and election day should be taxes and spending. If he can convince people that they will be hurt (directly or indirectly) by taxes, he can pry votes away from Obama. If he continues to talk about "who the real Obama" is, he will lose.