McCain again shuffles top campaign aides

John McCain's decision to shuffle his top advisors for the second time in a year follows months of anxiety among Republicans who fear that his presidential campaign lacks the money, discipline and message to beat Democrat Barack Obama.

The question Wednesday was whether the move -- elevating senior strategist Steve Schmidt to head day-to-day operations and shifting campaign manager Rick Davis to a lesser role -- came soon enough.

It's not unusual for a campaign to undergo a staff shake-up. Ronald Reagan, Bob Dole, Al Gore and John F. Kerry all retooled their campaigns. None, however, made the move this close to November, and among them, only Reagan went on to win the White House.

Still, McCain may have had no choice.

Though national polls suggest the race is competitive, there has been growing worry in the GOP ranks about the direction of McCain's campaign, especially the seeming inconsistency of his message. From day to day, McCain has alternated between appeals to independents, who flocked to his 2000 bid, and overtures to the Republican right, which is less than enthused about his candidacy.

"It's a paradox," said Don Sipple, a veteran GOP ad man, offering the issue of the environment as an example. "On the one hand, he's kind of there with [California Gov. Arnold] Schwarzenegger on greenhouse gas, a progressive view for a Republican. But he parts company on the No. 1 symbolic issue on the environment, offshore drilling."

Others, who asked to remain unidentified to avoid alienating the candidate and his team, were more blunt.

"There's a lot of unease," said one Republican strategist who is an occasional advisor to the McCain campaign. "There's the age factor, the past-versus-the-future thing. He's conservative by most measures and people generally like him. But when it comes down to getting excited about the candidate, it just isn't there."

The campaign changes were revealed while McCain, 71, was in the middle of a three-day excursion to Colombia and Mexico to highlight his views on free trade, a trip that fed perceptions that the senator is operating as his own campaign chief, to his detriment.

"He wanted to do it, but the campaign's fine with it," Mark Salter, the senator's closest aide, said last week.

McCain's staff comes in for its share of criticism as well.