While calling any election months ahead is hardly an exact science, at this point, it appears that McCain is the candidate to beat. This is not a Stratfor endorsement for McCain or a statement of opposition to Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama (so please do not flood us with hate mail); this is an analysis of the proclivities of the U.S. electorate, the quirks of the U.S. electoral system and its impact abroad.

To be perfectly blunt, the Clinton and Obama campaigns both suffer from eminently exploitable flaws. Clinton, while by far the most intelligent candidate in the field, is not well-liked — even among the left. Obama, despite being the most inspirational candidate, sports the middle name “Hussein.” And the much-discussed Clinton-Obama (or Obama-Clinton, if you prefer) ticket simply would marry these problems.

But even if the Clinton and Obama campaigns were not facing such obstacles, McCain would still be the candidate to beat for one reason: The Democrats are locked into a Clinton-Obama death match for the loyalty of the left, while McCain — who has secured the political right — can begin courting the center and run for the presidency itself (rather than for the nomination).

In the weeks and months ahead, this distinction will allow strategists far beyond the United States to deal with a far simpler matrix of U.S. presidential possibilities, and they increasingly will be forced to consider the possible implications of a “President McCain.” The deepest impact would be felt in Russia and Iran. McCain has become rather famous in Russia for saying that all he saw when he looked into Putin’s eyes were three letters: K, G and B. And Iran is more than a touch nervous about McCain’s assertion that the United States needs to think of its Iraq deployment in a manner similar to that of Germany or South Korea — a decades-long commitment.

The fear of an aggressive United States is not one that will fail to shape Russian and Iranian policies between now and the election. Tehran has been pussy footing around talks with the Bush administration, attempting to get as good of terms as possible on the future of Iraq. If Tehran thought 2009 would bring a more aggressive U.S. presidency, then the logic for reaching a settlement with the Bush administration would increase greatly. Suddenly, the United States could see some dramatic gains in its Middle East policy.

The inverse is true for Russia. The Kremlin already is feeling pressure to secure its interests in the former Soviet Union before the United States can extricate itself from Iraq. McCain’s strength raises the possibility not only of a United States that is led by a man who sees the Kremlin leadership as requiring containment, but also of a United States that is no longer bogged down with Iraq and Iran and therefore is free to focus all of its attention on Moscow.