3 sep 2008

McCain’s September surprise?


It was “something close to magnificent.”
It was the “best speech by far of the convention,” one that built to a “throat-catching climax.”
It “brought the convention crowd to its feet.”

The gushing reviews could easily have been bestowed upon silver-tongued orators such as Ronald Reagan in 1976, Edward M. Kennedy in ’80, Mario Cuomo in ’84 or Barack Obama in ’04. But these are actually accounts of past convention speeches by a speaker more plodding than gifted: John McCain. When he takes the stage again Thursday to accept the Republican nomination, McCain will be resigned to a potentially unflattering contrast with his rival’s electric performance last week in Denver before 80,000 people. But the Arizona senator’s own track record of delivering boffo convention speeches suggests that nervous Republicans with painful memories of droning deliveries, squinty-eyed glances at teleprompters and hideous green backdrops may not need to be quite so jittery. For weeks, McCain aides have been furiously lowering expectations for his convention speech, painting a portrait of a charisma-averse candidate with all the sizzle of a small-town Rotarian. “McCain is not best on the physicality of speech-giving,” said longtime aide and principal wordsmith Mark Salter. “I’ve got a guy with, for better or for worse, two broken shoulders and a broken leg — he’s a little stiff, ya know,” he said of McCain’s Vietnam War injuries, punctuating his reminder with a wry chuckle.
A look at McCain’s convention history, however, suggests that such doleful expectation setting may be just that — and that his campaign isn’t quite as upset about being compared to Obama’s Invesco Field spectacular as you might think.
McCain’s unexpected choice of Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin as his running mate has also brought a new energy to delegates gathered here, giving McCain a real opportunity to connect with the emotion and passion of the GOP base.
Through the years, McCain has embraced the varied styles of convention oratory, turning in performances that ranged in tone from attack dog to inspirational warrior-poet to defiant leader. In 1988, he gleefully joined the GOP chorus that was savaging Democratic nominee Michael Dukakis for being clueless when it came to national defense. Dukakis, McCain thundered, “seems to believe that the Trident is a chewing gum, that the B-1 is a vitamin pill and the Midgetman is anyone shorter than he is.”
The then-Massachusetts governor’s veto of a pledge of allegiance law was “outrageous,” McCain declared. But, in a speech that led him to be deemed one of the convention’s “winners” by the Associated Press, McCain also won a standing ovation in New Orleans by recounting his 5½ years as a prisoner of war in Vietnam.
Similarly, McCain’s 1996 convention speech nominating Bob Dole ultimately did more to boost McCain than to boost Dole. A moving tribute to the World War II veteran’s era of sacrifice delivered with only a few days’ notice, the speech connected the Vietnam generation to that of Dole’s generation with the symbolic reminder that the Kansas senator had worn McCain’s name on a POW bracelet while McCain was imprisoned in Hanoi.
And in 2004, McCain electrified the audience at New York’s Madison Square Garden by denouncing “disingenuous filmmaker” Michael Moore while the creator of “Fahrenheit 9/11” was, unbeknownst to McCain, sitting in the gallery in his role as a guest columnist for USA Today.
McCain’s rising crescendo of a close — “We’re Americans. We’ll never surrender. They will” — was so powerful that his campaign has made it a staple of its videos and ads this year.
This time, though, McCain’s speech must cross a much higher threshold. It’s his convention this time, so he’ll have to incorporate the best elements of his past performances, balancing inspiration, attacks and statesmanship. And his speech will also be judged against the dazzling star turn that Obama took in Denver last week. The Illinois senator self-consciously downplayed his usual rhetorical flourishes in a speech that was closer to a State of the Union address than a barnburner. McCain aides want to avoid the comparison in terms of style and pizazz. But they recognize that the two speeches will inevitably be matched against one another and are eager for the guts of McCain’s message — and his vision for governing — to be contrasted with Obama’s.
Both candidates, said Salter, who is tasked with crafting McCain’s speech, are making “the same central claim: We’re going to change Washington, do things differently and get to work on our country’s problems for a change.” “Whoever wins that argument ultimately probably wins this thing,” Salter contended in a recent interview in his tiny, no-frills office at the campaign’s Arlington, Va., headquarters.
Where the difference comes in — and what McCain is likely to at least hint at in his speech — is in the experience of saying vs. doing. “McCain has had a voluminous record of not just crossing the aisle … but [doing so] on big issues where your party leadership did not want you to or was not happy with your effort to do it,” Salter noted. “McCain has a very long record and the scars to prove it. Obama has nothing.” But what Obama does have are the sort of oratorical chops that could make even McCain’s best performance pale in comparison.
Asked how to compete with Obama on that score, Salter, happy to drop the bar, said with a sigh: “We don’t try.” “They’re two different guys,” he continued, mixing lowered expectations with a weary recognition of the Democrat’s skills. “Obama’s a studied and extremely talented orator. Everybody’s aware of that. … He’s blessed with a near-baritone voice, but his physicality, his movements — it’s very fluid.” But, he added with another laugh, “you might have noticed in our campaign, we are making the argument that that doesn’t qualify you for the presidency.” The goal, therefore, is to not overreach and wind up even more diminished. “I want McCain to be who McCain is.”
If it were the candidate’s choice, that may mean turning the moment into a New Hampshire town hall meeting on steroids, with McCain striding around the Xcel Energy Center stage with a wireless mic in his hand and nary a teleprompter in sight.
But Salter assured that McCain will read from a teleprompter. First, though, “he’ll practice dozens and dozens of times,” Salter said, recalling that before McCain gave his speech to the 2004 convention he practiced with the prompter 15 to 20 times. He likely won’t memorize the speech, but he will have it down to the point where the cadences come naturally. And his language will be plain, even spare, said Salter, who offered a few clues about the rhythm.
Reminded that McCain used a series of two- or three-word commands — “Stay strong. Do not yield. Do not flinch” — to deliver a powerful finish in his 2004 convention speech, Salter suggests such a refrain may be used again. “It’s not his style to do the couplets followed by applause,” he said. “The peroration has to be very simple and direct.”
Without prompting, Salter recalled another such punchy exhortation. In 1993, well before he entered the national spotlight, McCain was asked to give the commencement address at the Naval Academy. “It was a big honor for him,” Salter recalled. “His father had done it, and he really wanted it to be good.” At the end were the same short sentences — “I know you will” — designed to motivate the newly commissioned officers in the Navy and the Marines. “It was very effective for him,” Salter said.
As for the actual content, Salter would not reveal any details but hinted McCain could lay out his vision for how he could fix the broken political process. “You keep it simple: ‘This is what I want to do; this is what I think we need to do,’” he said. “Then you talk and get passionate about a lack of willingness in this town to take these things seriously. ‘Election after election, political class after political class, they all go to Washington, and the place never changes.’ It’s all about being reelected, or becoming a committee chairman, or whatever — and none of this [stuff] gets done.” Important issues aren’t being addressed by a rickety, Cold War-era government because of politically driven inertia, Salter said. “‘Here’s what I’m for; here’s why I’m for it; here’s what I think it will do,’” Salter suggested as a potential theme. “Now why can’t we do it? Because there is no commitment on either side to getting anything done except beating each other in the next election.”
While acknowledging that McCain must “convey statesmanship,” Salter made clear there will be room for highlighting differences. “You also want to convey and we always want to convey that [McCain’s] got life experiences, military experiences, political experiences that are vastly greater than Barack Obama’s and have prepared him to be president in challenging times.”
And, ultimately, the final pitch is not unlike the one Hillary Rodham Clinton offered during the Democratic primary: With McCain, you can have the appealing elements of Obama (change agent) but skip the more worrisome parts (inexperience). It’s the best of both worlds.
Or, as Salter put it: “If you’re a little concerned about the experience factor, here’s your guy — he’s been a changer all his time here.”

The Fishing Foul-up That Was No Felony


Besieged with questions about Sarah Palin's background, John McCain's campaign wants to make one thing emphatically clear: She's not a felon.

In 1993, Palin pleaded no contest to a charge of failing to register as a set gilnet permit holder. Such a license must be obtained in Alaska for commercial fishermen to use the underwater netting frequently designed to catch salmon.
At the time, Palin said she simply forgot to change the nature of her registration from a member of a fishing crew to an actual permit holder.
But the offense was inadvertently entered into an Alaskan district court as a felony.
The issue first arose in 2002 during Palin's gubernatorial race when some opponents seized on the charge. That year, Palin obtained an official letter from the Clerk of the court in Alaska's Third Judicial District.
"I am writing to advise you the data has been corrected in court records and on the state of Alaska's website to reflect your conviction as a violation," Cindy Roque wrote in a letter McCain's campaign shared with Politico.
According to court documents also shared, Palin, whose husband works seasonally as a commercial fisherman, was fined $1,000 and placed on probation for a year pending no further violations of fishing regulations.

The Palin Count Down
















To show what a Republican is worth in current politics, it is a pleasure to take the measures of Sarah Palin, who is, according to Republican standards, the most qualified after McCain to be President of the United States of America.
Pointer presents a series of aspects, selected from the media, to see what and how long this image can endure, a count down. This dossier of articles is labeled The Palin COUNT DOWN and you can select the articles apart from the others by selecting that label.

Sarah Palin was named John McCain's vice presidential nominee just three days ago, yet it seems that weeks have passed in terms of the mountains of controversy it has stirred up. An overwhelming amount of negative publicity and sometimes shocking information has come out about her and her relatively short political career.
Choosing Palin has been called alternately a brilliant stroke that reinforces McCain's maverick image and a desperate, irresponsible "Hail Mary" pass in the face of an almost sure defeat in November. The fundamental question being raised: Why Palin? True, her personal narrative has lots of color: former fisherman, NRA hunter, mother of five, small-town mayor, short-term governor of a state with a small population, etc. But that does not qualify her to be a heartbeat away from the presidency.
Anathema to Moderates, Liberals and Progressives
George Lakoff, in an accompanying article, lists some of the issues swirling around Palin:
She is inexperienced, knowing little or nothing about foreign policy or national issues; she is really an anti-feminist, wanting the government to enter women's lives to block abortion, but not wanting the government to guarantee equal pay for equal work, or provide adequate child health coverage, or child care, or early childhood education; she shills for the oil and gas industry on drilling; she denies the scientific truths of global warming and evolution; she misuses her political authority; she opposes sex education and her daughter is pregnant; and, rather than being a maverick, she is on the whole a radical right-wing ideologue.
Part of the shock that many are grappling with: How could a 72-year-old man with bouts of cancer choose someone who appears to be completely unqualified to become president? Thus, McCain's age and health become central issues in the campaign, as does his judgment, although it may be tricky for Democrats to raise these issues without creating some backlash.
As Democratic strategist Paul Begala notes: "It is interesting that McCain passed over Tom Ridge, a decorated combat hero, a Cabinet secretary and the former two-term governor of the large, complex state of Pennsylvania; Mitt Romney, who ran a big state, Massachusetts, a big company, Bain Capital, and a big event, the Olympics; and Kay Bailey Hutchison, the Texas senator who is knowledgeable about the military, good on television and -- obviously -- a woman."
Not Good in the Polls
Republican pollster Frank Luntz, working with the AARP, did some focus groups of "undecided" voters and found some bad news for John McCain:
They don't like his choice of Sarah Palin for vice president. Only one person said Palin made him more likely to vote for McCain; about half the 25-member group raised their hands when asked if Palin made them less likely to vote for McCain. They had a negative impression of Palin by a 2-1 margin ... a fact that was reinforced when they were given hand-dials and asked to react to Palin's speech at her first appearance with McCain on Friday -- the dials remained totally neutral as Palin went through her heart-warming(?) biography, and only blipped upward when she said she opposed the Bridge to Nowhere -- which wasn't quite the truth, as we now know.
Then there was this, from a woman named Teresa, who went to the Democratic convention as a Hillary delegate and is leaning toward voting for McCain -- obviously the target audience for the Palin pick: "His age didn't really bother me until he picked Palin. What if he dies in office and leaves us with her as president? Also she leans toward the rigid right, and I always thought he was a moderate. ... You know, I change my mind almost every day, but right now I'm wondering where the John McCain I really liked in 2000 went. What happened to the moderate? This John McCain has the look of someone who is being manipulated -- probably by Karl Rove."
A commentator to the article appearing on the Time Magazine blog BlankSlate wrote:
Only someone in the throes of a serious mental condition could have make a pick this astonishing. This focus group confirms the Rasmussen Reports polling that, among undecided voters, the Palin pick makes 6 percent more likely to vote for McCain and 31 percent less likely to vote for McCain. About 59 percent of these undecided voters do not think Palin is qualified to be president. It is a stunt gone terribly amiss. And the hilarious thing is that the right wing really believes that this is going to turn everything around. Amazing, amazing, amazing.
Local Media Unhappy with Palin
Greg Mitchell, the editor of Editor & Publisher, checked out the Alaska newspapers to see how they felt about their governor. He found that they were nervous to say the least:
The pages and Web sites of the two leading papers up there have raised all sorts of issues surrounding Palin, from her ethics problems to general lack of readiness for this big step up. Right now the top story on the Anchorage Daily News Web site looks at new info in what it calls "troopergate" and opens: "Alaska's former commissioner of public safety says Gov. Sarah Palin, John McCain's pick to be vice president, personally talked to him on two occasions about a state trooper who was locked in a bitter custody battle with the governor's sister."
A reporter for the Anchorage Daily News, Gregg Erickson, even did an online chat with the Washington Post in which he revealed that Palin's approval rating in the state was not the much-touted 80 percent, but rather 65 percent and sinking -- and that among journalists who followed her, it might be in the "teens." He added: "I have a hard time seeing how her qualifications stack up against the duties and responsibilities of being president."
His paper found a number of leading Republican officeholders in the state who mocked Palin's qualifications. "She's not prepared to be governor. How can she be prepared to be vice president or president?" said Lyda Green, the president of the state senate, a Republican from Palin's hometown of Wasilla. "Look at what she's done to this state. What would she do to the nation?"
And from the editorial in the Anchorage Daily News: "It's stunning that someone with so little national and international experience might be heartbeat away from the presidency."
What's Next?
With the Republican National Convention delayed by Hurricane Gustav's arrival on U.S. shores, there must be lots of discussion and soul-searching going on in Republican circles as to how the Palin candidacy will hold up over the next two months. The biggest question perhaps is whether the McCain inner circle, perhaps in a major concession to the extreme right wing, which hasn't been friendly to McCain, has made a drastic error to woo its support. Or in fact, as some would suggest, McCain is crazy like a fox. Under that scenario, Palin will weather the initial avalanche of negative publicity that paints her far outside of the political mainstream, and she undermines many of McCain's efforts to appear to be the maverick moderate. Palin becomes a strong campaigner, and her extreme positions get lost in her efforts to support McCain.