Politico: McCain Could Drop Dead Any Day!

From the ghouls at the Politico:

US Republican presidential candidate John McCain’s mother Roberta (L) talks to the media as she sits with his adopted daughter Bridget (R) at the opening session of the 2008 Republican National Convention in St. Paul, Minnesota September 1, 2008.

McCain and the politics of mortality

By: Alexander Burns
September 3, 2008

ST. PAUL, Minn. — Since John McCain announced Friday that first-term Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin would be his running mate, Democrats have been quick to point out that the 44-year-old governor could soon be just “a heartbeat away from the presidency.” The veiled reference to McCain’s advanced age is hard to miss.

It’s a macabre point to raise on the night when Palin will speak to the convention here — but a look at the actuarial tables insurance companies use to evaluate customers shows that it’s not an irrelevant one. According to these statistics, there is a roughly 1 in 3 chance that a 72-year-old man will not reach the age of 80, which is how old McCain would be at the end of a second presidential term. And that doesn’t factor in individual medical history, such as McCain’s battles with potentially lethal skin cancer…

The odds of a 72-year-old man living four more years, or one full White House term, are better. But for a man who has lived 72 years and 67 days (McCain’s age on Election Day this year), there is between a 14.2 and 15.1 percent chance of dying before Inauguration Day 2013, according to the Social Security Administration’s 2004 actuarial tables and the authoritative 2001 mortality statistics assembled by the National Association of Insurance Commissioners.

Going by the Social Security Administration’s tables, that’s nearly ten times the likelihood that a man aged 47 years and 92 days (Barack Obama’s age on Election Day this year) will die before Jan. 20, 2013… 

The same calculations made by utilizing an annuity table, which is used for the purposes of disbursing pensions and tends to predict slightly greater longevity, suggest that a man McCain’s age has a marginally reduced one in ten chance of not reaching age 76…

Powers observed that these statistics would be incomplete without factoring in the two men’s full medical histories, adding: “McCain’s expected age of death is probably higher than Obama’s because he’s already lived to the age of 72.” …

Plus, Powers noted, serving four or eight years in the White House could wear down the presidential candidates even beyond what actuarial statistics would predict.

“Probably, there is a substantial effect associated with being in an office like the presidency,” said Powers. “I think people do believe it tends to age you rather quickly.” …

McCain has acknowledged in the past that his advanced age would be a factor in the presidential campaign, particularly when it came to choosing a running mate…

Subtle, aren’t they?

So the McCain deathwatch begins. And never mind that McCain’s mother Roberta is 96 and still going strong. And so is her twin sister.

But of course the real point of this article is to make us fear Sarah Palin.

However, as Ann Coulter says in today’s column — this only speaks to what should be our new motto:

“Sarah Palin is only a heartbeat away!”