Michigan fall out - McCain's action likely to cause widespread damage to GOP there

Michigan GOP scrambles after McCain pullout

http://blog.mlive.com/chronicle/2008/10/michigan_gop_scrambles_after_m.html

With John McCain dismantling his Michigan campaign a month
before Election Day, Republicans are scrambling to come up with cash to
fund advertising and voter turnout efforts for down-ballot races.

In an urgent fund-raising appeal Friday, GOP Chair Saul Anuzis made
clear he did not agree with a McCain decision to shift resources to
other states, one that Anuzis said " leaves a tremendous hole in our
ground campaign that we now must fill."

"I won't sugar coat it," Anuzis said. "The McCain campaign's decision to
pull out of Michigan was a tough blow."

Republicans say the loss of Republican National Committee funding and
the excitement of an involved presidential campaign puts more
legislative seats in play and complicates the re-election of Supreme
Court Justice Cliff Taylor.

Republican strategist Tom Shields said voter pessimism in Michigan that
has deepened in the past two weeks with the Wall Street crisis further
damaged the GOP brand and McCain's effort in the state.
"The thought of the status quo continuing potentially for another four
years is so distasteful to voters in this state, they're willing to take
unknown change for the sake of change," he said.

Republican morale would suffer as a result. Shields said the party would
" have to find some way to motivate Republicans to get out to vote even
if they feel they don't have a chance to carry Michigan in the
presidential race."

Rich Robinson, director of the Michigan Campaign Finance Network, said
the McCain campaign had spent an average of $480,000 a week in Michigan
over the summer. According to his unfinished review of TV ad spending by
the presidential candidates, he said McCain spending had dropped by
two-thirds in the Lansing media market since Labor Day, suggesting that
Thursday's decision had been in the works.

The problem for the Michigan GOP is that Republican National Committee
money that was expected to fund coordinated messaging and voter turnout
will shifted to other states like Indiana and Wisconsin. While the
national party is expected to spend money on two critical races in the
7th and 9th congressional districts held by imperiled GOP incumbents Tim
Walberg and Joe Knollenberg, state House candidates could suffer.