It is with great regret that this is the second time in less than a week that I am sharing my thoughts with you about a recently departed friend.  That said, this one is much different and far more heart-wrenching than the first.

I have been a Jack Kemp Republican my entire life. His message of hope and compassion mixed with fiscal conservatism, lower taxes, less government, and individual empowerment have guided me throughout my years in both business and politics. I always thought Jack was the true heir to Ronald Reagan and he was an incredible inspiration to so many of us.

His influence on Republican policy can hardly be measured. Jack was one of the earliest to recognize the importance of Arthur Laffer’s supply-side theories. He was instrumental in putting tax cuts at the top of Ronald Reagan’s agenda, and the Kemp-Roth tax cuts are among the most important economic policies of the 20th century.  Without them, it’s impossible to say whether President Bush would have taken the same course twenty years later.  And thanks to his past as a championship-winning quarterback with the AFL Buffalo Bills, Jack understood minorities and others outside of the usual, traditional Republican constituencies better than most of us.  For decades he urged us to go outside of our electoral comfort zone and reach out to African-Americans and Latinos because he believed they shared our values and that by sharing the power of our ideas with more people we could help lift millions out of poverty and into the “opportunity society,” as he aptly called it.  We are not all the way there yet, but when we arrive, Jack will deserve a big share of the credit.

Jack was also a great personal friend.  For years we traveled together, Marlene and I stayed with the Kemps at their home in Colorado to celebrate his 70th, and they visited often with us at our home as well.

I’ll never forget last August in Colorado when John McCain came to be with our most successful fundraisers and supporters, and the next day Mark Sanford, Jon Huntsman, John Thune, and Jack talked to the group.  Of course, the former QB was the ultimate closer and Jack wound it up with soaring rhetoric that argued passionately and compellingly for a greater control of government spending, more emphasis on growth incentives, and an increased reliance on the individual vs. government to lead us out of our current malaise. At the conclusion he tossed the mic to me and walked off to a standing and rousing ovation. It was Jack at his best, as I will always remember him.

He was a treasure to the cause and our country and he will be deeply missed.  As our own party seeks new ideas and new leadership for the future, I can only hope that in doing so, we are reminded of Jack Kemp.  If we are lucky and if we are smart, we will find someone who can channel his passion for conservative principle and policy, his energy, his inclusiveness and his passion that excited and inspired so many for so long.

Goodbye for now, old friend, but you will always be with us.

Fred

There has been a lot of talk about President Obama’s first 100 days in office. Both online and off, there’s also been much analysis about the so-called Obama “FAIL” movement. I don’t hope for President Obama’s failure. I’d like for him to succeed in making our country safer, stronger and much more prosperous. I hope and pray that he does so both for America’s success as well as capitalism’s future. However, his policies are unlikely to achieve desired results.

Given that we the taxpayers are now significant shareholders in a heck of a lot of companies due to the bailout, it is important to remember, that whether you are running just a company or our entire country, in order to achieve success you need to measure success qualitatively and quantitatively along the way.

So with that in mind, here are my grades for President Obama’s first report card.

Foreign Policy: He’s had the good judgment to rely on our distinguished generals and not to withdraw prematurely from Iraq. The build-up in Afghanistan is badly needed, but probably not enough. Talking to the likes of Hugo Chavez and trying to talk with Iran is unlikely to bring results, but there is no great harm in trying a new approach. Policy towards Cuba for almost 50 years can’t be judged a success, so some new thinking has merit. Grade: B+

National Security: In spite of good foreign policy, the recent release of interrogation files and photos will weaken our intelligence-gathering capabilities that are instrumental in preventing attacks against America. President Obama made a mistake in playing too far left and to the politically correct crowd. Grade: C-

Economy: Clearly his worst subject. He’s making a grave mistake by executing on a plan with an over-reliance on government spending and control vs. incentives for private sector initiatives. Never in history has this approach successfully led a democracy out of recession. Further, rather than placing all their focus on digging out of the recession, the Obama Administration is diverting by trying to nationalize the health care system, strengthen power of unions, and increase taxes, especially on investment. Huge deficits will result in more debt than accumulated by past administrations from George Washington to George W. Bush combined. This will inevitably lead to an unhappy ending, and it’s called inflation. Grade: D

Energy and Environment: While President Obama deserves some credit for addressing climate change, especially focusing on carbon emissions, his cap and trade proposal is destructive. It will increase taxes on American businesses, and ultimately this diminishes our competitive advantage and leads to displacement of employment from the United States to other countries. Further, the new employment and production will be in countries like China and India, which have little or no constraints on carbon emissions. Thus, the end result will be fewer jobs in the U.S. and greater world wide pollution. Further, the limitations and/or bans on off shore drilling inhibit our energy production and further increase our dependence on countries, some of whom want nothing more than to destroy our way of life. Grade: C

Overall Grade: C

President Obama’s first 100 days could have been a lot better, but, scarily, could have been worse. Let’s hope the President gets some serious tutoring on the economy and Capitalism 101. I will be anxious and hopeful to see improvements and real results next semester.

Fred

I have known and been friends with Arlen over 36 years and have always supported his important role as a moderate in our party.

He will continue to be a friend.

But leaving the party because you’re facing a tough electoral challenge doesn’t seem consistent with his record of courage and principle.

I have given to every one of Arlen’s statewide campaigns. While the passion with which I supported him may have been magnified by our friendship, the fact of my support was a consequence of our shared political values of limited government and strong national defense. In our country, parties are necessarily big, to accommodate a range of views and geographies. I have always viewed the GOP as a Big Tent Party, and appreciate the inclusion of moderates like Arlen.

However, in leaving the Republican Party, Arlen has abandoned people who have been his allies for another team. He has thrown in with people who have a fundamentally different vision for America, and one that I profoundly disagree with.

Why did he do this? It seems as if Arlen took the path of least resistance. He knew that his primary fight would be difficult. Arlen has never stepped down from a fight, but he did this time. Undoubtedly his Democratic primary campaign will be safe. Ed Rendell, Arlen’s former boss at the Philadelphia District Attorney’s office, will get his former Deputy Mayor out of the race now. So after a career of fighting for what he believed in, Arlen took the easy way out to keep his job.

So that’s why I will be supporting Pat Toomey for US Senate against my friend Arlen Specter. Right now, Barack Obama and the Democratic Party are taking America in the wrong direction. And we need a strong voice in the Senate fighting for our party’s perspective against them.

My last chapter in the campaign ended with our successful convention in St. Paul, MN. Both John McCain and Sarah Palin excited people across the country, and we came roaring into the general elections. Due to the enthusiastic crowds that Sarah was attracting, John and Sarah did a lot of campaigning together as a team. It was working, and John’s message and character, as well as the team’s maverick image, resulted in a real boost to the ticket. By September 12, we were three points ahead on average in the national polls and were well positioned and gaining in the key electoral states.

Then came the economic tsunami, and it all changed. On September 13, Lehman Brothers failed, and an economic crisis gained steam. The public placed a fair amount of blame on the party in power – the Republicans, and the Obama campaign skillfully exploited this disaffection. While candidate Obama and his team offered no real solutions and had no experience in dealing with the economy, they weren’t us and thus reaped the benefit. With an unpopular war, an incumbent president sinking in the polls, and now the most vexing economic crisis of our generation, John McCain went from a three point lead to an eight point deficit in the polls in ten days.  We weren’t helped by John’s decision to suspend the campaign, threaten to cancel the first debate, and return to Washington to address the problem and find a bipartisan approach to a salvage package. Unfortunately, he wasn’t able to accomplish this and his standing on the economy was diminished.

Although John performed admirably in the three debates, and Sarah did a great job in her debate with then Senator Biden, we could not achieve parity in the polls on who would best handle the economy or in presidential preference.

On the fund raising side, we knew John would have time for only four fundraisers. We mapped out where we though we would have the best possible return with John’s time and decided to hold events in Chicago, Miami, Los Angeles, and New York.

Immediately after the Convention, John headed to Chicago for his first major fundraiser in the General Election. We had been told repeatedly that we would never raise more then $2 million in Chicago. No Republican had ever raised more than that and most observers felt would be increasingly difficult in Obama’s home town. We knew there was a silent Republican base in Chicago who wanted to support John and would be willing to contribute if given the opportunity. Our team in Illinois, led by Pat Kinsey, ended the night with $4 million for John with great leadership from Bill Strong, Jack Sandner, Bill Smithburg, and others.

Subsequent events in Miami and Los Angeles were successful, culminating in our October 14 final event in New York City. Woody Johnson, who was a tower of strength throughout the campaign, again performed admirably. Our consulting team of Tamara Hallisey and Rachel McGregor had been a strong team of fundraisers in New York and Connecticut throughout the campaign. They were determined once again to break the record as the largest event for John, which they had previously set in May at $7 million. This was also to be the only joint fundraising event with both John and Sarah Palin.  As we approached this event, the economic turmoil that we are now experiencing began to break, and we were all nervous about how this would affect the bottom line. In the end, our New York Finance Committee rallied together, raising over $10 million – the largest fundraising event for a candidate in the city’s history. 

Sarah Palin also traveled the country attending political events and fundraisers. It was absolutely incredible to see the grassroots support, both politically and financially, that she generated. Her fundraisers were extremely successful, out performing all the goals set.

As mentioned at the onset, I am proud that total fundraising for McCain-Palin 2008 resulted in the most successful finance efforts for a Republican presidential campaign in history.

Really enjoyed guest hosting CNBC’s Squawk Box this morning.

The last chapter of this spellbinding (at least to me) campaign narrative culminated with John McCain’s New Hampshire victory on January 8, 2008. Naturally this gave great impetus to our fundraising. As we moved through the remaining primaries I had the privilege to join John and Cindy at many more victory celebrations. The closer we got to capturing the nomination we found ourselves having serious discussions about the status and future of the campaign’s finance structure. We knew if we were going to compete against the Democrats it would take a serious transformation; one similar to a start-up company going corporate overnight.

Tom Loeffler asked me in late January to take on a more serious role in the restructuring, taking on the number two position as Deputy National Finance Chairman. At the same time, Rick Davis wanted to create a simple avenue for our donors to contribute as large a sum of money as possible to help John. Similar to previous campaigns, a Victory effort was formed at the Republican National Committee. It combined a series of committees under one entity, so an individual could contribute up to $70,100. Lew Eisenberg and Wayne Berman, also fellow National Co-chairmen, were asked to lead up the new Victory fundraising efforts, and they did so with great skill and success.

Tom Loeffler, Susan and I focused on the needed primary and General Election Legal and Accounting Compliance Fund (GELAC) dollars, while Victory focused on the RNC money. Our goal was to raise $50 million primary and GELAC money prior to the convention, plus help Victory raise more than that to support RNC campaign efforts. In fact, we held the first victory event in my office in the Willard Building on April 8, 2008. It was a round table, and we raised $280,000 with only two days notice.

We immediately began to strengthen our finance operation and added programs and structure. We decided to develop a major donor program that recognized the efforts of our fundraisers and created a simple avenue for our new donors to get involved in our leadership structure. We adopted a model similar to the tremendously successful Ranger & Pioneer programs from the Bush/Cheney Campaign and called the groups the Trailblazers for those who would raise $100,000, and Innovators for those who would raise $250,000 in Primary and GELAC dollars.

During this ramp up and afterwards, I spent roughly 75 percent of my time on the campaign, usually starting by attending the 7:30am senior staff meeting, meeting with the finance team, calling regional chairmen, overseeing events, recruiting large donors, and recruiting Trailblazers and Innovators. For us it was a family affair, and I was particularly proud of our daughter, Michelle Olson, who raised over $1 million and served as a model of how to do it. Basically, she organized her own mini-campaign, reaching out to her network to form a leadership committee with titles based on achievement. She held a kick off reception for her group with me as a guest and Senator John Thune as a speaker by phone. She provided materials and training for her team, organized other mini-events, and recruited donors for the larger events that John and Cindy McCain would attend. She was even profiled along with a few others in the Washington Post article on McCain fundraising.

In April, the media began to target lobbyists involved in the campaign’s leadership structure, and in May they focused on Tom Loeffler’s role as Finance Chairman. John McCain and the campaign leadership determined that lobbyists had two choices: resign from lobbying or resign from the campaign. Unable to give up his livelihood or abandon his clients, Tom resigned from the campaign.

Now I have never been or even hired a lobbyist. However, I believe lobbyists perform an important and necessary service in helping to connect legislators to constituents, and the vast majorities are dedicated and honorable people. And while agreeing that lobbyists performing at high levels of campaigns should be prohibited from discussing client policy issues with the leader they serve, I also feel that the media, as well as campaign leadership, overreacted and created a sort of frenzy over the issue. Tom Loeffler should have remained with the campaign.

With Tom’s departure, I was asked to take over the role as defacto National Finance Chairman for the McCain campaign. It added to the load. To manage the programs I divided the country into regions and appointed chairmen to work with the state chairmen already in place. Operationally the committed campaign finance staff managed the program. Sarah Lynch served as the director of the programs, and John Cook, Campbell Engle, and Alex Lawhon served as regional directors for all fundraising activities. The programs took off, and over 1,000 people signed on to raise money for us.

It was extremely rewarding to think back on the year, going from a small fundraising dinner at my home to chairing a finance committee with over 1,000 committed fundraisers. It certainly was a testament to John McCain’s leadership and tireless service to our country. We far exceeded the original $50 million goal for the primary by early July and set out to raise an additional $100 million primary and GELAC money by the election in November.

As an incentive, we offered that anyone who achieved Trailblazer or Innovator status by August 1 would be invited to a two day retreat in Aspen in mid-August (it helps that John likes Aspen). The Aspen retreat was a huge draw and a great success – and a lot of fun. In addition to John and Cindy, we had with us Jack and Joanne Kemp, Governor Mark and Jenny Sanford, Governor Jon and Mary Kaye Huntsman and Senator John and Kimberley Thune. The Kemps and the Sanfords stayed with us. While John was the main attraction, starring at our opening dinners, I’ll never forget Jack Kemp’s rousing talk on the economy at lunch the next day, drawing the group to their feet with his charisma and peroration, or the inspirational talks by Mark Sanford, Jon Hunstman, and John Thune that evening at the reception at our house.

In August we ramped up our focus on the Republican National Convention in Minneapolis/St. Paul. We invited all of our successful Trailblazers, Innovators, Chairman, and major supporters and ended up having over 600 participants to attend through our Friends and Family program. The Friday before the Convention, John announced his selection of Sarah Palin as the GOP’s Vice Presidential nominee. She was a tremendous asset to our fundraising activity. Overnight, our internet fundraising went through the roof, raising several million dollars a day. Becky Donatelli ran this operation with great skill, and it produced superior results through Election Day.

Perhaps my most memorable moment in the campaign came that next week at the Convention. It was an once-in-a-lifetime experience to sit in the Friends and Family Suite as John delivered his nomination address. I was moved by his vision for the country and reminded why we had worked so hard to ensure he made it this far.

An excellent read from Thursday’s Washington Post, front page in the analog version, about the amazing turnaround of the Washington Capitals. This is a classic example of what visionary leadership, hands-on management and innovative marketing can do for a franchise or a business.  I have the pleasure of knowing Ted Leonsis, the owner of The Caps, and he’s just an incredible guy.  Congrats, Ted!  You deserve it.  Let’s keep the wins coming and the sell-outs going, all the way to the Stanley Cup!

The campaign strategy was to focus on a repeat performance of John McCain’s 2000 primary win in New Hampshire.  Knowing that Iowa had never been a strong state for John, partly due to his opposition to ethanol subsidiaries (sometimes straight talk doesn’t achieve the best political result); the plan was to spend only modest time there and go for broke in New Hampshire.

Under Rick Davis’s leadership the campaign had developed an austerity budget that continued through the fall. The basic concept was to keep total spending to $1.5 million per month, raise $2 million or more per month, and put some money in the bank for the final push in New Hampshire.

My role as Finance Co-Chairman was pretty simple – spend a few hours each day calling people to solicit $2300 contributions. In June and July, the success rate of those calls was at best 10 percent – pretty discouraging. However, it improved dramatically as we moved into September 2007.

The Republican primary debates began in September.  It was apparent that John was the best candidate on stage with substantive viewpoints and the necessary experience to lead. As a result our fundraising activity began to improve, and we surpassed the monthly goals set through the remainder of the year, paid off much of the campaign’s debt, and made significant investments into our messaging and political activities.

On September 19, we hosted one of John’s most successful fund raising dinners at my home in McLean, VA. We had 26 people and raised about $60,000. It seemed like a lot at the time and represented real progress from where we came, but it was still a far cry from what we needed and would later achieve.

We knew John had to win New Hampshire to have a shot at obtaining the nomination.  Although we didn’t have superior finances, we had a candidate who was committed to meeting every single voter.  So John spent the fall traveling across the state that had catapulted him to stardom just eight years earlier.  The polling numbers continued to rise.

The Iowa Caucus came, and Mike Huckabee had a surprise win over Mitt Romney with John coming in a respectable third, especially given that he virtually pulled out of the state months earlier.  This was a major boost to us since Romney has been leading in both Iowa and New Hampshire polls for months. All eyes turned to New Hampshire.

We received some great boosts including the endorsement and active campaigning of Senator Joe Lieberman, and the later endorsements from all the major newspapers, including those in Governor Romney’s hometown of Boston. By November, I was convinced John would win the nomination and even ventured forth with a blog to that effect as well as an Op Ed in the “Washington Times.”

Marlene and I joined the campaign’s leaders in New Hampshir e for a final get out the vote push.  It was apparent that our finance team had bonded a great deal since our time in Sedona that summer.  Everyone had worked tirelessly to ensure we would still be alive in New Hampshire, and it looked like we might actually have a shot to win.  We spent the morning going to polling places, holding “Vote McCain” signs – kind of a far cry from managing a campaign, but what else was there to do. In fact, the Washington Post even picked up on this in an article that appeared the next day.  We spent the afternoon making get out the vote calls and ended the day in John and Cindy’s suite at the Crown Plaza in Nashua.  Finally, the AP notified us that they were going to call the race for John.  A feat that had seemed impossible months earlier had just become a reality.

After leaving Sedona on June 30th with a clearer picture of the campaign’s financial plight, Terry and John Weaver returned to campaign headquarters with the resolve to lighten the campaign’s monthly burn rate.  They ordered each department to terminate members of their staff.  This day, which became known as Black Monday, ended with a much smaller campaign staff.  This of course impacted the Finance Department too; shrinking the organization to just seven members.   These reductions were needed, and in my view came very late considering our financial situation.

Meanwhile, while in Iraq, John realized the campaign needed more stringent control on spending and a fresh leadership perspective.  He decided to turn to Rick Davis, his 2000 campaign manager, long-time friend and confidant.  Up to this point, Rick had been serving as the campaign’s CEO, a position that was more relationship building than operational.

When John returned to Washington, DC he met with Terry and John Weaver and explained his decision to bring Rick Davis back into the leadership structure. Terry and John Weaver then resigned from the campaign, and the remaining staff at headquarters was abuzz with resignations.  The Finance Department went from its six members to three. Mary Kate Johnson, Jim McCray, her deputy, and two other members of the finance staff resigned that day.  At the close of business, a meeting was held with Rick Davis and the remaining staff.  People were looking around the room and wondering just how many days were left.

My sense of what went wrong up to this point was that the people running the campaign had earned their spurs in the Bush campaign where he was the presidential nominee in 2000 and the certain nominee in 2004. They seemed to feel in 2007 that John McCain was the presumptive nominee this time and that they could mount a large and costly campaign from the start, replicating their successful efforts in the Bush campaigns. They also seemed not to realize how weak John’s support was among the Conservative base, and how vital that base was to a successful fund raising effort.

Despite the fact the campaign was declared dead by the pundits, that the entire staff could fit into a single conference room, and that we were several million dollars in debt, not a single member of the Finance Committee abandoned their support for John McCain.

Without a Finance Director, Tom Loeffler turned to Susan Nelson, a former fundraiser who was working at his firm to take over the day-to-day operations. Tom also asked Brian Haley, a third year law student at UT Austin, who had taken the year off to work at Tom’s firm and assist him at the campaign to assume the responsibilities of the deputy finance director.

Rick, Tom, and Susan requested an emergency conference call with the National Finance Co-chairman that next day.  Rick explained the campaign’s situation. He shared that John had instituted a new Budget Oversight Committee with fiduciary responsibility over all major financial decisions at the Campaign and promised to reign in the out of control spending and begin to pay down the debt. The news was dire but the participants each recommitted their support.

Tom, Susan and Brian devised a new strategy to raise money for the campaign. They recommended we focus our major fundraising swings in four states: California, New York, Texas, and Florida. In addition, as an effort to save travel costs, they outlined a strategy to visit states in the periphery of the early Primary States where John was spending much of his time.  This was a tough period for all of us associated with the McCain campaign. John had sunk down to single digits in some polls, he trailed Mitt Romney, Rudy Giuliani, and Fred Thompson by wide margins, Romney was on his way to a big win in the Iowa straw poll, and many press articles were no longer even mentioning John when discussing the field. Some friends were laughing at me for my continual support, and all but a very few told me his campaign was dead. I didn’t believe it and continued to believe his proven leadership, his determination, his character, and his view of the future (including Iraq and immigration) would eventually prevail. So we marched on.

For me the turning point came on John and Cindy’s trip to Aspen on August 15. I am a part time resident of Aspen, especially in the summer, and have the pleasure to serve on the Board and Executive Committee of the Aspen Institute. Each year in August, we have an awards dinner where we honor people of distinction, and in 2005 we honored John McCain and Joe Lieberman together for their bipartisan leadership. The Institute also invites distinguished speakers for late afternoon forums, and the Institute’s President, Walter Isaacson and I discussed inviting John to speak the summer of 2007.   I was impressed by the positive response from Democrats and Republicans alike to John’s speech at the Aspen Institute.  People approached me asking what they could do to help.

Later we hosted a small dinner at our home for John and Cindy with ten of our friends, some McCain supporters and some Democrats. Included were Bill and Cathy Mayer (then Chairman of the Aspen Institute), Bob and Jillian Steel (current Chairman and former Under Secretary of Treasury), Stewart and Lynda Resnick, Rick and Erica Horvitz, and Walter and Cathy Isaacson. It was a lively discussion and I became even more convinced John would become our nominee.  He was on fire throughout the dinner, and won over all 14 people present.

On the broader political front, Rick, Charlie Black, and John decided to focus the campaign on John’s commitment to win the war in Iraq and his successful call for the surge strategy.  At the time, the country was still very much focused on the outcome of the war and the surge had just begun to take effect.  John hopped on the re-branded Straight Talk Express for his No Surrender Tour, visiting halls, diners and the like mainly in New Hampshire. There was John flying alone on commercial airlines, carrying his own bags, and engaging the constant barter with reporters and others on the bus. This was the real John McCain again – the Mac was back. A strategy partially borne of frugality was working. People relished the straight talk, the refusal to pander, the direct and honest responses to issues they would raise. John was winning voters one and two at a time. Retail politics at its best.

Life was slowly, but surely being breathed back into the campaign. The new fundraising strategy was paying off, and the political tide was changing.  We even met August’s budget projections.

Next post, I’ll share a first-person view and what that was like of the real “turn-around” for the campaign.

The 2008 presidential campaigns will long be remembered as historic.  Of course, one of the most remarkable thresholds crossed was the record breaking financial resources raised and spent through the process.  In fact our fund-raising for McCain-Palin 2008 raised over $450 million, by far the most successful in Republican Presidential campaign history.  The previous record was $260 million, set by Bush-Cheney in 2004.  Much will be discussed over the coming years on how political races should be financed.  With record shattering funds raised by both campaigns and political parties it’s easy to see why.

As mentioned in an earlier post, I had the distinct privilege of serving first as a National Finance Co-chairman and then as de-facto National Finance Chairman for Senator McCain these past two years. While I have served on many campaigns, in a variety of different leadership positions, this was the first time I focused most of my energies on finance.   Having spent the past few months reflecting on my time leading the finance team I would like to share a few of my observations, in a short series of posts over the next few days about this historic campaign.  I welcome any and all thoughts that you’d like to share.

THE EARLY DAYS

John McCain approached me to support his bid for President in mid-2006.  Although I had been contacted by each of the to-be Republican candidates, it was an easy choice to support John. My initial assignment was to Chair or Co-Chair a Senior Advisor Group that would meet with John every other week to provide an objective and unvarnished view of what was right and what was wrong with the campaign:  to give those hard truths that are often difficult to get from staff.  This assignment was exciting to me as it tied in with my prior political roles as 1988 Convention Director and 1992 Campaign Manager for President George H.W. Bush.  However, due to John’s campaign travel and Senate responsibilities, it never really got off the ground.  In March 2007, it became apparent that fundraising was lagging, and I was asked to serve as one of his original 20 National Finance Co-chairman and charged with the task of helping to raise $100 million for the primary. That seemed like an awful lot.

As someone who supported John’s bid from the beginning, it’s hard to forget the high political ups and deep political downs the campaign faced through the election cycle.  Thinking back, one of the original disappointments we encountered was the announcement of poor fundraising numbers during the first quarter of 2007.  Much of this was due to John’s steadfast and courageous support of the unpopular surge in Iraq and of immigration reform.

Regardless of the inflow of cash, the campaign’s leadership, who at that point consisted of Terry Nelson as Campaign Manager and John Weaver as Chief Political Strategist, was still spending towards the $100 million budget.  The campaign was at its first major (of what would be many) finance hurdles.  As a result, John Weaver and Carla Eudy asked Tom Loeffler, who was then serving as General Co-chairman and as a National Finance Co-chairman, to assume the responsibilities of National Finance Chairman.

Tom approached his new responsibilities, and the dire financial situation, with the calm and collective presence that he always portrays.  What was unapparent however, was the tremendous turmoil-taking place behind the scenes. It wasn’t more than a month before an announcement came that Mary Kate Johnson would replace Carla Eudy as the campaign’s finance director.

Not long after Carla’s departure, a meeting of the National Finance Co-chairman occurred and a plan was laid out to reach the necessary targets to meet the budget and win the Republican primary.  We left the meeting with assurances that spending was under control and that more time was being allocated to accommodate additional fundraising events across the country.

June served as the final fundraising month of the second quarter and John planned to spend a great deal of time traveling the country raising funds and gathering support for the campaign. Unfortunately, political plans do not often line up with realities.  In June of 2007 Congress decided to tackle the very divisive issue of Immigration Reform.

Whether you loved or hated John’s position in the Immigration debate, his actions that June exhibited the quintessential get-in-the-middle, role up your sleeves, bi-partisan leadership that has marked his service to our country.  Unfortunately, at the time, much of the Republican base did not see this leadership as a positive attribute.  As a result, the fundraising well dried up, and it could not have come at a worse time.

The National Finance Co-chairmen were invited to John and Cindy’s beautiful cabin in Sedona to review campaign strategy and fundraising. The date was June 30.

Terry and John Weaver presented the situation to us. The campaign had accrued a great deal of debt due to heavy spending and the harsh fundraising environment in June.  In fact the campaign was not only broke but owed money.  Despite the problem, John remained encouraged and upbeat.  He shared his vision for America and thanked us for continuing to support his bid. Marlene and I enjoyed the stay at the McCain’s cabin thoroughly and left with deep concerns but continued commitment.

John left Sedona and headed to Iraq with his good friends and colleagues Lindsay Graham and Joe Lieberman.  Although we left Sedona with great uncertainty on the future of the campaign, we also left with a stronger commitment to John and his vision for our country, and a deeper impression of his resolute discipline and perseverance.

It’s funny given that I run in both business and political circles, for years if not decades, I would consistently hear CEOs complain about politicians and Washington and state, “if politicians could only be for like us, Washington and this country would be a better place.”  In light of our current economic crisis, I can say without a doubt if every CEO had the discipline, perseverance and sense of honor of John McCain, this economy and this country would be in a much better place.

Up next, I will share my thoughts on “the leadership shake-up” and the beginning of the turn-around in the McCain campaign that led all the way to the nomination in St. Paul last summer.