I recently heard a presentation by one of the best media-training professionals I’ve ever met, Don Rheem of Washington. He wasn’t talking about the presidential race, but he made a comment that summed up John McCain’s problem:

“People don’t care what you think until they know that you care.”

McCain has never made a fundamental connection with voters the way FDR, Reagan and Bill (“I feel your pain”) Clinton did.

Even that notoriously cool cat Barack Obama seems to have connected.

If you look at McCain’s life, you can understand the disconnect: privileged son and grandson of admirals, Annapolis cadet, Navy pilot, prisoner of war, career Washington politician, husband of a wealthy heiress and resident of her many homes.

He has had plenty of pain in his life, but it is hard for him to feel our pain.

So McCain’s flailing efforts to address the economic crisis – and his political crisis – just do not ring true. We don’t think he gets it.

Now, he is by no means out of this race. Maybe he can disconnect voters from Obama by talking about William Ayers and terrorists. Maybe he can drop a bomb on Obama in Wednesday’s debate.

But McCain has little time to make voters believe he is – as Sarah Palin would say – a regular Joe Six-Pack.

Click Here to discuss and comment on this and other articles.