By the middle of June, I've got three intimidators knocking back McCain's awareness rating in states where he hasn't set up an election headquarters to counter their effect. I park two in Pennsylvania and one in North Carolina. With judicious ad buys and speeches, I keep hitting McCain for supporting high gas prices and not wanting to improve the economy.

But then things take a shocking turn at the end of the month. Could the election be over? Read why after the jump.

McCain continues prattling on about the War on Terror. Knock yourself out, dude. No one cares. The War on Terror is so 2004. It isn't a decisive issue in any of the important states. In the national polls – which I'm not sure how to relate to the gameplay, and Political Machine's doesn't see fit to tell me – 88% of Americans prefer McCain's stance. But national polls are meaningless in Presidential elections.

So I don't understand why the AI is chasing the War on Terror, and I can't see it paying off in the world of The Political Machine. The real world is a different matter, of course. Imagine the significance of another terrorist attack, especially in the United States. It would change the calculus of the current election dramatically.

But there are no events in The Political Machine. Nothing ever happens overseas, or in the United States, or in individual states. Gas prices don't continue to rise, the economy doesn't improve, the surge doesn't appear to have an effect, the housing crisis doesn't level off, Zimbabwe doesn't become a foreign policy issue, and no skeletons appear in anyone's closet. There is no place for unpredictability here. I can understand the developers not wanting to toss the game to the winds of chance, but it's worth noting that in the precursor to The Political Machine, a game called The Corporate Machine, there were events in the form of cards you could play against your opponents. These were a big part of what made that game so exciting and replayable. I miss them.

As our eventless June wears on, McCain isn't being very efficient. He buys expensive ads in Florida, then Ohio, then Florida again, then Ohio again. Somewhere in there, he takes a trip to Tennessee to buy an ad opposing illegal immigration. In Tennessee? Since when is immigration an issue in Tennessee? Are there Arkansans coming in droves across the Mississippi River?

And then, on the last week of June, on turn 24 of this 41-turn game, John McCain does something utterly and completely unexpected: nothing. He stands stock still in Iowa for the entire turn. He does not move. He performs no actions. He sits there quietly, his little bobble head looking up at me.

At first, I just sort of roll my eyes at the crazy AI . I then take my turn, which includes a TV interview, an ad buy in Ohio, and the hiring of a smear merchant. As I proceed to write up my notes for the month, it occurs to me that maybe McCain can't afford to move. Every time a candidate moves from one state to another, it costs $25,000. There are times I've accidentally spent too much money and get stuck in a state until I've earned enough some income on my next turn. Maybe that's what happened to McCain.

In fact, given that he's outspent me considerably with all his ad buys, but without raising funds or building up a strong financial basis with election headquarters, maybe he's bankrupt his campaign! There's no way to see your opponent's funds in The Political Machine, but you can look at a list of all his headquarters (his income) and all his advertising (his expenditures). With a pencil and paper – this is one of the data points The Political Machine doesn’t provide for some reason – it's relatively easy to figure out your opponent's weekly income. So I do a little quick math and figure that McCain is spending $289,000 per turn on advertising, and he's only making $173,000 from election headquarters. Ouch. It looks like The Political Machine's idea of a challenging AI hasn't yet learned fiscal responsibility. In other words, it's extremely realistic for a modern-day Republican candidate.

I'll be curious tomorrow to see whether McCain can actually get himself out of this financial quagmire. He's going to have to shut down some of his useless ads, or he's going to spend the next four months chilling in Iowa because he can't afford a ticket out of there. With the projected electoral college vote at 260 for Obama and 278 for McCain, it would be a shame if he just stalls out now. Stay tuned.