Photo via cdw9. Great macro shot.

It pays to keep your eyes on the fine print of the McCain campaign. And this is certainly an interesting little turn of campaign events for the McCain Lobbyist Express.

I wonder how weak McCain's internal polling numbers really are for this sort of move this early -- to risk alienating the Hagee/Dobson/Bauer types (again), by placing social moderate advocates in positions of real authority and power within the McCain campaign? Very intriguing. Via WaPo:

One of McCain's first decisions has been to assemble a novel and risky campaign structure that will rely on 10 "regional managers" who will make daily decisions in the states under their direction, his advisers said. The managers will gather today in New Mexico to plot strategy with GOP state officials....

One element that will work in McCain's favor in coming weeks is the formation of the Republican Party's Victory Committee, which can put together events that are held jointly by the senator and the Republican National Committee. Those events can bring in nearly $30,000 per person because the limits for giving to the RNC are much higher than those for candidates.

The naming last month of Lew Eisenberg, a former partner at Goldman Sachs and one of the heaviest hitters in Republican money circles, as the finance chairman of the Victory Committee silenced many of McCain's critics on the fundraising front....

McCain recruited two key officials at the RNC: Frank J. Donatelli, a Reagan administration official, will serve as deputy chairman and will be the campaign's liaison to the committee. Mike DuHaime, who managed former New York mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani's presidential campaign and used to be an RNC political director, will help staff the RNC's political team. He will also work directly for McCain.

The regional managers, most of whom have been chosen, will spend four days at the New Mexico resort this week. McCain aides said there will be intensive meetings with Republican chairmen from across the country, who are holding their annual meeting in the swing state. (emphasis mine)

Now, call me skeptical, but isn't it a bit unorthodox to have the national party apparatus so integrated into your presidential campaign in terms of power structure? Rick Davis may still be the titular head, but "decentralized control structure" in the McCain campaign can mean only one thing -- someone else is pulling the strings. And this has Ken Mehlman written all over it.

Don't get me wrong, Lew Eisenberg is a great get for the McCain camp -- although a bit unexpected given Eisenberg's unabashadly pro-choice and socially liberal bona fides which are sure to raise the hackles of the "values voter" contingent. Especially in tandem with Frank Donatelli, a lobbyist/political operative and pundit who has advocated reaching out beyond the traditional GOP constituencies who alienate moderates, and taking a more -- dare I say -- liberal approach on campaigning for Republican candidates.

What does this say to me? That McCain's fundraising heft hasn't improved even since he was crowned the GOP heir apparent.

And Republican party stalwarts are worried about McCain being a bad brand for the party as a whole since selling him as the "change" candidate isn't going to be easy given his curmudgeonly, gruff embrace of all things Bush/Cheney failure, so they are stepping in to shore up the foundations and dupe the Republican faithful into contributing to "the party" rather than having to swallow their bile and pony up for McCain.

McCain appears to be dependent on the party to raise enough funds to be competitive, because he can't raise the necessary campaign money on his own. Which says McCain knows he can't win depending on just the GOP to turn out because the reception has been rather tepid.

So they are bringing in all the Republicans they usually trot out for the highly staged convention moderation tap dance...but this time, they are doing it before the convention. It's a rather public admission of the failure of social conservatism as a lasting political power, isn't it?

Weird dynamic. Almost akin to an internal party apparatus panic -- or a scattershot Hail Mary approach before we even get to the fall campaign push. Definitely worth keeping an eye on, though.