And So It Goes…
I’ll be taking a blogging hiatus for a few days, and may or may not get in another post after this one. Two things I’ll be watching during my short time away (besides the Olympics – and yes, the Chinese gymnasts were underage – here’s the proof) are the continued flagrant violations of the Georgian ceasefire by Moscow, and the continuing unraveling of John (99% Honest) Edwards:
As tabloid reports of a sex scandal threatened former Senator John Edwards’s presidential campaign last December on the eve of the Iowa caucuses, two lawyers surfaced with written statements that appeared to exonerate the candidate.
One of them, Robert J. Gordon of New York, said that his client, Rielle Hunter, a pregnant 43-year-old filmmaker, was not carrying Mr. Edwards’s child. Shortly thereafter, the other lawyer, Pamela J. Marple of Washington, sent word that her client, Andrew Young, an Edwards campaign aide, was the baby’s father.
Seemingly issued independently of Mr. Edwards, the statements appeared to deflate the anonymously sourced reports of an Edwards tryst. But what went unnoticed was that the two lawyers shared an important connection to Mr. Edwards that suggests they were part of an orchestrated effort to protect him, one that is continuing even after he admitted last week that he had an affair with Ms. Hunter but denied that he fathered her child.
The lawyers are linked through Fred Baron, a wealthy Dallas lawyer and former finance chairman for the Edwards campaign who was a key player in the campaign’s response to the scandal. Mr. Gordon has worked with Mr. Baron on class-action personal injury cases, and Ms. Marple helped defend a lawsuit brought against both men and their law firms by an asbestos manufacturer.
After initially saying that he did not know how the lawyers were chosen to represent Ms. Hunter and Mr. Young, Mr. Baron acknowledged that he might have played a role.
The revelations of ties among the lawyers emerged through public records and interviews with people close to Mr. Edwards and Ms. Hunter, which suggested that their affair went on longer than Mr. Edwards admitted and that the effort to conceal it by Mr. Edwards’s inner circle was much more extensive than has been reported.
The review found that Mr. Edwards’s political action committee went to unusual lengths to make a final $14,000 payment to Ms. Hunter’s film company months after its contract with the committee had ended. The payment was issued while the committee was short on cash and could pay its bills only after receiving thousands of dollars from Mr. Edwards’s presidential campaign and donations from four people, including Mr. Baron’s wife.
Furthermore, a woman who helped Ms. Hunter create a Web site on New Age spirituality in 2006 says she regularly corresponded with her about a married North Carolina man named John whom Ms. Hunter was dating in March of that year, if not earlier. Mr. Edwards has said his affair with Ms. Hunter did not begin until after she had started doing video work for his political action committee months later.
I seem to do best at provoking comments when I don’t ask for them, but if any of the regulars are interested in carrying on a conversation while I’m gone, here’s a possible topic (another possible topic will arise if either candidate names a VP choice in my absence). If you were John McCain, what is the one (only one) strength you would highlight at the convention and during the debates? What is the one (and only one) weakness of Obama you would hammer? Now turn it around…
I’ll go first.
For McCain – strength: biography…Obama weakness: campaign finance.
McCain should hit his patriotic background, his service, his time as a POW, his years as a straight-talking maverick, his military credentials. He should use the (to some) wonky issue of campaign finance to illustrate Obama’s flip-flopping and essential untrustworthiness (if you can’t keep a promise on your signature issue, what promise can you keep? And by the way – a draft opinion of the FEC released today says that McCain DID NOT break campaign finance rules in the primaries).
For Obama – strength: change…McCain weakness: more of the same.
Obama is stronger the farther he stays away from the actual issues. Themes are his strength. We saw this in the primaries and there’s no reason to think that dynamic has decreased. He’s dynamic and popular with younger voters. He should praise McCain’s long years of service, but say that he is a sign of the past when America needs a new future.
Your thoughts?…
It’s the price of gas, stupid.
That’s the theme of the next 3 months. The candidate that can successfully make himself appear to be on the side of lowering the price of gas while making his opponent appear disinterested in same will win. Early on, that candidate was McCain. Lately, Obama has hit back and done well. I’m a political junkie so I know when he’s stretching the truth or even pointing out irrelevancies (and I know that with McCain too), but the general public doesn’t. His latest ads that he’s running here in Indiana are very effective. If I didn’t know better, they’d make me vote for him.
So, that’s what each candidate needs to do at the convention, if they’re only going to hit on one thing, that is.
If McCain”s strongest hand is “his patriotic background, his service, his time as a POW, his years as a straight-talking maverick, his military credentials,” then he might as well fold.
Patriotic background, service, time as POW, and military credentials are the same thing said four ways. They are all wonderful attributes, but have nothing to do with having the ability to be President. If you are going to elect a President based on military credentials, then you should elect Wesley Clark or Jim Webb. Not only did both men reach much higher levels of military service, but they also have the experience of managing huge organizations, which McCain lacks.
McCain’s “years as a straight-talking maverick” ended quite some time ago, with too many reversals of supposedly core convictions to enumerate.
peter,
you’d have a valid point if Jim Webb or Wesley Clark were on the ballot. Since they aren’t, McCain can talk about his military credentials all he wants. It’s something his opponent can’t possibly match. As for service, I think Mark meant his time in the senate, not military service.
As for patriotism, I think sadly the word has come to mean different things to the left, center, and right. Patriotism to the right means “duty, honor, country”, respect of the flag, respect of the military. Patriotism to the left means belief in the right to protest, belief that the government must assist the poor and downtrodden, belief that the best moments for America were when it found peaceful solutions to hard problems.
Neither the left nor the right are wholly correct in this matter, and neither are wholly incorrect.
And what happens often in our elections is that the center decides which of these views of “patriotism” is correct at the time. Is it sit-ins with MLK? Or is it being willing to pick up a gun and fight a war on foreign soil?
So, I think McCain can talk about his “patriotic background”, but only if the center sees his view of patriotism as the one for the moment. I don’t know if they do. The people I tend to associate with do, but I’m not stupid enough to think that’s the only viewpoint out there. I live in a bright red county in a traditionally red state, so naturally patriotism is viewed a different way here than it’s viewed in Danbury, CT, for example.
It’s true that neither Webb nor Clark are on the ballot, but Mark’s disdain for Webb is hard to miss, and I don’t recall him supporting Clark when he was on the ballot. I’m not picking on Mark: just suggesting that if military service is the criterion used to pick a President, there are much better qualified candidates than McCain. Also, Obama’s military service is exactly equal to Rudy Giuliani’s, who Mark endorsed in the primaries. The implication is that if this is all that McCain has to hold his hat on, then his qualifications are pretty thin. Hence many Republicans look at McCain and are acting like a pregnant girl trying to fall in love.
As for time in the Senate: God forbid someone like Robert Byrd or Ted Stevens make it to the White House.
As for patriotism: I completely disagree. I can only speak personally. I’m generally liberal (usually agree with the New York Times on issues outside of economics) but sometimes conservative (typically agree with the Wall Street Journal on economics and business, also believe that the things which made America great are now mostly lacking, with the exception of those who have recently come here as immigrants). However, my notion of patriotism comes from being a kid and watching George Reeves as Superman fight for Truth, Justice, and the American Way. I think those who serve in the military are doing a great service, and shortly after 9/11 when I was at my daughter’s elementary school for an event and said the Pledge of Allegiance for the zillionth time, it resonated like it never did before.
Right to protest is in the First Amendment: as a conservative, presumably this is a value which you also hold dear. Helping the downtrodden is a good thing, but has little to do with patriotism. The best moments in America also include using military force, as in World War II, Korea, Bosnia, and Afghanistan.
In my view, patriotism is a phony issue, used by zealots to show that they are purer than those they oppose. I think that George Bush is the Worst President Ever, but I’ve never questioned his patriotism or love of country. So to me the presumed benefit of a “patriotic background” means nothing. Obama may or may not be a better candidate for President than McCain, but to me the argument that one of them is more patriotic than the other is just silly.
“Patriotic background, service, time as POW, and military credentials are the same thing said four ways. They are all wonderful attributes, but have nothing to do with having the ability to be President.”
True. These do not, per se, qualify anyone to be president. You may recall that Wes Clark said roughly the same thing a month or so ago, albeit less respectfully. The response to that argument, then as now, is that it is not so much the fact that McCain flew in a plane and got shot down and tortured that qualifies him to be president. It is the fact that he refused an early release, knowing that he would face further torture. This is indicative of the strength of his character and the extent of his patriotism, which are qualifications to be president. No one in politics today has suffered and sacrficied as much for America than Senator McCain. That does not mean that Obama is not as patriotic as McCain. For all we know, he may even be more patriotic. McCain’s patriotism has been tested, and thus proven; Obama’s has not.
Using someone’s strength against them is the most difficult, but effective strategy of attack. John Kerry attempted to use his background in the military (“Reporting for duty!”) but was defeated in large measure by Bush’s, and Bush’s surrogates, ability to turn that strength into a weakness.
McCain should be wary of attacks on his military background (think: if the only tool you have is a hammer then everything looks like a nail type of criticism), his time in the Senate (old crony, if things are broken then he is part of the reason), and his (self-described) reputation as a straight-talker.
Obama can be attacked on his outsider reputation (new blood vs. inexperienced), visionary rhetoric (there is no there there), and youth (inexperience and lack of experiential wisdom).
Aaron:
I agree that strength of character and patriotism are necessary (but not sufficient) qualifications to be President. However, if you were to do a pie chart of Qualifications Necessary To Be President, I think they would have a smaller slice than things like judgment, wisdom, experience, management ability, leadership, and so forth.
When you add all of these things together, I think Obama comes out ahead, and I’ll vote for him. However, you may be happy to know that I typically end up voting for the loser.
“Obama is stronger the farther he stays away from the actual issues. Themes are his strength. ”
You know, because “McCain should hit his patriotic background, his service, his time as a POW, his years as a straight-talking maverick, his military credentials.” really goes into specific issues!
Wowzers. Classic projection.
10 years of “mavericky” goodness, perpetrated by the media at large. Oh, but media matters can’t count, so nothing to see here.
What would it mean, functionally, to say that Obama’s patriotism is greater or less than McCain’s patriotism? I don’t even understand where you’d get any kind of numbers to quantify such a comparison.
Fargus, I think you missed the point.
The point wasn’t that Obama had less patriotism than McCain, but that McCain has demonstrable patriotism. Obama doesn’t. That’s not his fault. That’s just the different circumstances of their lives. Obama may be just as patriotic as McCain. Hell, he may be more so (although, like you, I’m not sure what levels of patriotism means). but that doesn’t matter.
Well, that was my point, really, was what you put in parentheses. I think it’s an empty criticism because it doesn’t really mean anything. McCain has served his country, sure. But we can all agree that military service is not the only way to serve your country. In a time when criticism of an administration is often elided with criticism of the country as a whole and then used to demonstrate a lack of patriotism, how can patriotism really be said to have any meaning, much less to be a quantifiable metric?