[Rick Lee]

I don't believe McCain really has much support from independents. A lot of those who vote for him are Dems and I'm not even sure they really like him. The media want us to believe that McCain is the man. They love his campaign finance law because it gives the media greater control of the message of criticizing politicians while limiting parties' and challengers' abilities to do the same. And they know that McCain would have a very hard time getting the GOP base to show up to vote for him, which helps the Dems. I'm not much of a conspiracy theory believer, but this is definitely a case of the media pushing the Republican they think will be easiest to beat.