Another Regional Campaign Manager For McCain

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Another Regional Campaign Manager For McCain

15 Apr 2008 11:01 am

Ben Golnik, a former executive director of the Minnesota Republican Party and an adviser to Gov. Tim Pawlenty, will take charge of the midwest/mountain region for the McCain campaign, Republican sources said.

(On April 6, Chris Cillizza revealed six other names -- I had not realized since I neglected to read the post that day.)

Two of the nine regional campaign managers are as of yet not hired. They include the RCMs for regions including the states of Pennsylvania and Michigan. Those positions will be filled by May 1.

A look at the names on the list of regional campaign managers suggests that one criticism of McCain campaign manager Rick Davis is no longer operative.

He did not pack this elite roundtable only with his allies. Only one regional campaign manager can reliably be considered a longtime Davis ally -- Doug Davenport, the RCM for the mid-Atlantic region.

Most of the rest are outsiders, like Gentry Collins, or McCain campaign lifers like Jim Barnett, the RCM for New Hampshire and New England, Craig Goldman, the RCM for the Southwest, and Buzz Jacobs, the RCM for states like South Carolina and Florida.

The RCMs will report directly to Davis, bypassing a headquarters-based political desk, and will be largely responsible for almost everything that happens in their region. Davis and the RCMs, along with the campaign's media and strategy teams, will make joint decisions about media purchasing, although the RCMs will have some flexibility.

The model here is very different than the campaign structure built by Ken Mehlman and Karl Rove in 2004. Rove and Mehlman and a small roundtable of headquarters-based aides ran the entire show from Arlington, VA. Power and decision-making were centralized.

There is no Rove-like figure hovering over the McCain campaign, and Davis, by his own admission, does not intend to become one. Still, the funnel of power begins and ends with Davis, who is setting himself up to be the lightening rod for complaints and criticism if his organization does not work.