Former senator predicts McCain presidential campaign will 'fade' -- GOPUSA

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Former senator predicts McCain presidential campaign will 'fade'
By Jim Brown
AgapePress
March 28, 2007

(AgapePress) -- A former Republican senator predicts Arizona Senator John McCain's presidential campaign is destined to collapse because he has alienated conservative voters.

A new Rasmussen poll shows former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani leading Senator McCain by 18 points in the race for the GOP presidential nomination. Giuliani now attracts support from 33 percent of those likely to vote in the Republican primary. McCain is supported by just 15 percent of those surveyed, while former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich -- even though he has not officially announced he is running -- is backed by 13 percent.

Former Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum attributes Giuliani's large lead to John McCain's "weakness" as a candidate -- despite being viewed the Republicans' "heir apparent" after George W. Bush was elected to a second term in 2004.

"John McCain was front and center [following that election]," Santorum observes. "The problem is that John McCain has [not] governed over the last several years as anything like a conservative ...." And in the process, Santorum feels the Arizona senator "has alienated just about every conservative, whether it's social conservatives or economic conservatives or environmental -- you name it."

According to the former senator, McCain -- who has been a member of Congress since 1982 -- actively recruits and votes in a manner that moves the country away from conservative principles.

"That's not someone who's going to go out and then claim the conservative banner, as he's trying to do in this election," Santorum says of McCain. "So he's created a vacuum -- and as a result of that, Rudy's been able to assert himself."

Santorum, now a senior fellow with the Ethics and Public Policy Center in Washington, DC, predicts McCain's campaign will fade; and consequently, he says, someone else will become the major challenger to Giuliani and then the race "will really start to take shape."