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Wednesday, October 15, 2008
John McCain lives!
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Joe the plumber may turn out to be the most memorable non-candidate of the political season.
John McCain, speaking to Joe, a plumber who had questioned Barack Obama’s tax proposals, explained to Joe the differences in his tax and health care proposals and Obama’s. “I want to tell you,” McCain said to Joe, “I’ll keep your taxes low…I will not stand for tax increases.”
His use of Joe to offer a narrative on the impact of Obama’s policies was among his most effective approaches of the campaign. Finally, he may have communicated in a meaningful way with the voters who don’t pay much attention to politics.
The last of the debates was easily to best of them. The format allowed the two to stay on a topic long enough to have revealing exchanges — even to the point of giving McCain an opportunity to point out to viewers the nuances of language that the eloquent Obama uses to mislead.
McCain did it effectively in a couple of instances — once when Obama declared that he would “look at” offshore drilling, while repeating the misleading assertion that oil companies have 68 million acres under lease that they’re not tapping. The missing element is, of course, that those tracts most likely contain little or no recoverable oil. McCain used that as a teachable moment on the deceptions of political rhetoric.
He did it again on abortion, where Obama said he favored a “health” of the mother exception. As McCain noted, that’s a huge loophole favored by pro-choice supporters. It can be interpreted to mean anything.
It remains to be seen whether this debate helps McCain recover in the polls. But whether he does or not, this was his best performance and, for the viewer, it was the best opportunity yet to get beneath the surface of the talking points.
Two asides here: One is that the moderator asked two questions that reflect the Washington media perspective. One was to explain “why the country would be better off if your running mate is President rather than his running mate?” That’s clearly directed at Sarah Palin and the left’s view that she is not qualified to be President. The second was asked more directly: “Do you think (the vice presidential candidate) is qualified to be President?”
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The McCain we need to see tonight
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
It’s the final Presidential debate of the season tonight and John McCain needs to take the gloves off.
It’s high risk. He’s down as much as 14 percentage points nationally in the latest CBS/New York Times poll (53-39) and as little as 3 and 4 points in two others.
The townhall-meeting debate was a snoozer and gave undecided voters no real reason to vote for either candidate. Independents are split roughly down the middle. That advantages Barack Obama, since registered Democrats outnumber Republicans.
The problem for McCain tonight is that he has to develop a strategy and stick to it. Importantly, he has to make the case that he’s better prepared to deal with economic issues, something beyond cracking down on earmarks, and that he is the outsider who can change the culture in Washington. It would be a good night, too, to announce that former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney will join his administration as Treasury Secretary.
It’s a good time to remind voters of — or more precisely, introduce them to — Herbert Hoover, a Republican who occupied the White House during the 1929 stock market crash, which ushered in the Depression. “The last president to raise taxes and restrict trade in a bad economy as Sen. Obama proposes was Herbert Hoover,” McCain said earlier this week. “That didn’t turn out too well. They say those who don’t learn the lessons of history are doomed to repeat them. Well, my friends, I know my history lessons, and I sure won’t make the mistakes Sen. Obama will.”
That’s the stuff. This debate needs some pizzazz. McCain, during the weeks of the financial crisis, has often sounded like the warm-up act for the Democratic agenda, including lines such as this: “We cannot spend the next four years as we have spent much of the last eight: waiting for our luck to change” He should leave that material on the campaign bus.
McCain’s reputation is as a fighter. That’s the John McCain who needs to show up tonight.
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