OPINION: How to win in the fall

An old political axiom asks: "How will it play in Peoria?" In other words, how will this candidate or message go over with average Americans on Main Street?

A new axiom, which pertains more directly to the politics of the hour, should ask: "How will it play in Colorado Springs?" No longer is a presidential vote mostly symbolic in the Springs. It's not a stretch, in fact, to believe that Colorado Springs and El Paso County may have a greatly disproportionate influence in deciding who will serve as the next president of the United States. How the left and the national press treat Sarah Palin, darling of the religious right, will have everything to do with motivation on the right. As Colorado Springs is home to the religious right's nerve center, Focus on the Family, the way something plays in the Springs has great influence on how it plays nationally among voters who comprise the religious right.

But this year, it's goes much deeper than that. Colorado is a crucial swing state, considered a must-win by both parties in a variety of likely Electoral College scenarios.

El Paso County, the second-most populous county in Colorado, can easily determine whether the state goes red or blue in a close race throughout the rest of the state.

Enthusiasm in this mostly conservative county may give the state to John McCain; apathy will hand it to Barack Obama.

Those who want Obama to win should hope for, and work toward, a low turnout by El Paso County voters. Democrats and the left could best achieve this by refocusing their energies. They should embark upon a full-fledged effort to blame everything that's wrong with the United States and Colorado on John McCain. They must portray him as nothing less than a conjoined twin of George W. Bush, only recently separated. They absolutely must shut up about Palin, as their critical words only motivate conservatives. They should remind the religious right how McCain strayed from the conservative base of the Republican Party for much of the past 30 years. They should remind conservative voters that James Dobson - a kina-sorta, closest-thing-there-is to a pope-like leader of evangelical Christianity for the moment - refused to support McCain after he became the presumptive nominee until he added conservative Christian Palin to the ticket. The left, to win Colorado, must restore the lack of enthusiasm El Paso County had for McCain before Palin emerged. If El Paso County is bored, the religious right will be bored. Furthermore, if El Paso County is bored, Colorado will likely go blue.

By picking Palin, McCain dug a tar pit for the those on the left. Surprisingly, they stepped right in. As the leftist blogosphere have wallowed in tar, McCain and his supporters have stood back and gleefully blown feathers at them. McCain had to know that liberals would waste tremendous amounts of time and energy smearing Palin. In doing so, they've aided McCain more than they know. They don't understand that tens of millions of American men and women relate to a woman with five children and a messy, average, no-frills life. Far fewer Americans relate well with ivory tower journalists such as ABC's Charles Gibson and far-left bloggers working from their mothers' basements.

The people who have worked full time to malign Palin have no idea how far they are from the folks of Peoria - or Colorado Springs. More women have lives similar to Palin's than have the glamorous lives of Hillary Clinton, or governors Kathleen Sibelius and Janet Napolitano, or the other Obama supporters who tell voters that Palin's not for women. The more the left smears Palin, the more the just plain folks trust and embrace her. It's no more complicated than that.

If the mainstream media and Obama supporters free themselves from McCain's sly trap, it will be up to McCain supporters to push them back in it - if they want to maintain an enthusiastic conservative base. McCain cannot possibly win this election if the spotlight turns from Palin, the only potential antidote to the pop-star appeal that draws moderates and independents to Obama. For Republicans, when it comes to Palin, bad press is good press. Republicans and the right, therefore, must try to maintain an atmosphere of Palin scandal. Smart McCain supporters will e-mail media outlets and leftist bloggers, reminding them that Palin fired her state trooper brother-in-law. They'll encourage the left to steal Palin's e-mails. They'll want to keep in the news that Palin's daughter is with child. They'll urge the left to say nasty things about the choices of parents of children with Down syndrome, and career women with "too many" kids. Mostly, they should urge the media to remind the public that Palin lacks experience to lead. That, of course, always begs questions about Obama's experience. While inexperienced Palin could be a heartbeat away from the Oval Office, inexperienced Obama would be in it from day one.

Though most in the mainstream media don't seem to get the connection between the experience similarities, to the just-plain-folks of Peoria, it's crystal clear.

Although most Democrats and leftists don't understand the self-destructive nature of Palin attacks, a few do. Among them is former San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown, a black American who supports Obama.

"She didn't have to prove she was ‘of the people.' She really is the people," Brown explains on his blog, where he has analyzes the Palin phenomenon. Brown explains that with Palin on the Republican ticket, Obama and Biden seem like the old "Status quo."

Brown gets this because he has lived as an average Main Street guy. He was the fourth of five kids, growing up poor as a small-town boy in the segregated South. He shined shoes in a whites-only barber shop. He was a janitor, a fry cook and a farm hand. Though he has accomplished great things, he knows the middle-American mindset - the mindset that respects mothers with big, messy families above most else.

The choice of Palin has excited ground zero of the conservative base, right here in Colorado Springs. The left's anger toward Palin has only fueled this unlikely phenomenon. If it continues on this course, Republicans might achieve the impossible: victory in November. If Democrats and leftists free themselves from the trap McCain set, and do so quickly, Obama might prevail.