The news that John Dowd, a former lawyer for Sen. John McCain and one of his signed-up fundraisers, decided to endorse Sen. Fred Thompson made it onto the front page of the Washington Post under the headline: "Defections to Fred Thompson Pose a Major Threat to McCain."
Dowd was not one of McCain's top fundraisers. He raised only $7,000 for the McCain campaign. And so far, Fred Thompson hasn't managed to flip any other major McCain donor.
Today, the news that the state senate president in Utah has decided to rescind his endorsement of Mitt Romney and instead endorse Sen. John McCain hasn't really caught on. It's not generating much blogger buzz and the political press doesn't seem to care.
The press is now anchored to the view that John McCain is flailing and collectively, we're likely to interpret major endorsements as outliers, rather than as "signs of momentum" or any positive description.
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