I just came accross this article which made me think:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/steve-rosenbaum/when-mccain-drops-out_b_107236.html

What do you think, is it possible?

Here's what I think...

I believe this is entirely possible. By now it's become clear that conservatives don't like McCain. In fact, no constituency is enthusiastic about him. The only thing making him "popular" is that some people don't trust Obama because he's new. And those who do genuinely like him, like him because of what he used to be (i.e. a moderate and a maverick), not for what he is now. He won the primaries by winning the republican-leaning independents, but once he clinched the nomination, he flip-flopped on almost every issue to make his policies as Bush-like as possible. A lot of people still don't know that and still like him for his old views. So the irony is: he is still somewhat popular because people don't know him (they think they do). But that's gonna have to change, as the campaign goes on, he's gonna have to state his views clearly, and it seems like with every statement he makes, he drives away some of his supporters (either moderate or conservative). So as people get to know Obama and McCain, Obama will be gaining popularity (as people will no longer think of him as an unknown radical elitist muslim), while McCain will be losing it (the popularity at least). So it makes sense to swap him with someone else.

If he drops out gracefully, e.g. because of his health and age, it won't seem like primary voters are being disregarded (unless this becomes known as the Republicans' plan) and it may even invoke a lot of sympathy, which could enable him to "transfer" his supporters to the replacement candidate.

Also, McCain can in such case very well be used as a throw-away prototype (a term used in software development). He has during his campaign said and done a lot of things, some of which worked and some did not. And some of the things made permanent scars on his popularity (clearly flip-flopping and being clueless being among them). Thus by now the Republicans have a pretty clear picture of what works among voters and what not and what voters simply don't tolerate. So they could start anew with a brand new candidate who will start with a "fresh" policy and will do everything right, right from the start, without flip-flopping.

I think this definitely is a viable option for the Republicans that they are no doubt considering, so we should keep an eye on this. It would be nice if the media reported on the idea, because people won't fall for it so much if they know it was planned.

What do you think?