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Published in The New York Post on August 29, 2008.
DENVER
A MASTER was at work last night. A politician who can inspire hope filled in the blanks of his program and articulated his vision with skill and panache.
Barack Obama, never short on inspiration, gave us specifics. He delivered a State of the Union Address, laying out his programs fully and well. He gave exactly the right speech with the right delivery and balance of detail and rhetoric.
And he wove his background and his philosophy into and around his proposals, combining moving words with specific proposals. The speech will surely give him the bounce he needs - turning a deadlocked race into a potential landslide.
John McCain can take back the ground Obama won last night - if he does it right. To wit:
1) Explain why his first term won’t be a Bush third term. This man who opposed Bush in 2000 must rebut the charge that he’s but an echo of W.
McCain led where Bush feared to tread: against torture, for ethics reform in Congress and the Executive Branch, for campaign-finance reform, for regulation of tobacco, for tough protections for worker pensions and limits on golden parachutes. He was out front early with a broad program to promote alternatives to oil, and with the surge strategy that won the war in Iraq. He’s made a careerlong priority for balancing the budget by cutting spending - and eliminating pork, including congressional earmarks.
2) He needs to state the obvious fact: Obama’s programs will cost money, and the hundred words he devoted to how he’ll pay for them do not adequately face the challenge; Obama’s tax cuts are illusions - he’ll dig deeper into our wallets, but just isn’t telling us now.
3) McCain needs to explain the economic disaster that Obama’s taxes will trigger. He needs to put the current economic malaise into perspective and paint what will happen if Obama’s tax program is approved.
4) Finally, McCain needs to explain how Obama’s proposals to gut the Patriot Act, and his weakness in facing foreign crises, will make us vulnerable.
Obama speech won’t stand for months without rebuttal: McCain’s convention starts Monday. His task there is enormous; he’d better get to work.
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Comments
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Obama delivered a political masterpeice last night….and I don’t think that McCain will be able to gain back that political ground that Obama captured. McCain’s negativity against Obama still prevails rather than trying to distant himself from W and create his “own” political identity. Of course McCain has always been preceived as a maverick and high political roller of the dice.
And now with his VP selection of Sarah Palin, he is dangerously rolling the dice again……by selecting a woman. What McCain fails to see that it was not about choosing a woman for VP, but rather about Hillary. He constantly slams Obama for his lack of inexperience, however lets look at his VP selection. McCain selected outside the Washington box; not only outside the box but outside the lower 48; a woman; former mayor of a small Alaskan city for 3 years; governor of the State of Alaska for two years; pro-drilling; pro-life; and former runner up in the Miss Alaska beauty pagent; and finally one heart beat away from the Presidency…..well let me say, that his selection is one of McCain’s finest senior moments……and I’m no political expert……but the McCain/Palin ticket will never be able to be marketed to the American voter……this is going to so backfire on him…you might want to consider coming back to the Democratic party….dick.
Obama’s night was phenomenal. The lasting impact though will be the writing of history as the first black man to be nominated by a major political party. The theatre and the rhetoric will fade quickly as the campaign is illuminated by discussions of substance. Between now and Nov 4th what will matter is what he put down as his specific approach to issues.
McCain has made a very good move in his choice for VP. First, the largest single demographic in America is women and it is clear the pain felt around Hillary has not and will not completely dissipate. In addition he has brought a person very acceptable to the fiscally conservative base of his own party. The VP debate will be fascinating. Biden can’t be too hard on her without coming off as the bully and she doesn’t have to win she just needs to not lose. Advantage McCain/Palin.
I give McCain/Palin the edge in the events of the last two days.
This is great to watch. We are faced with two very viable options.
Hopefully Senator McCain and the other speakers at the Republican convention will carefully examine Senator Obama’s speech, as Mr. Morris suggests. Unfortunately, Senator Obama’s only demonstrable skill is in talking; he has no track record in actually translating words into deeds. Because his words are not disciplined by practical considerations, it appears he feels no need to deal with mundane concerns, such as whether his numbers add up, or whether his new domenstic programs would be any more successful than the failed social-spending of the past.
Indeed, it is significant that Senator Obama has no legislative achievements, and no successful executive experience. (It appears that Obama’s only executive experience was a complete failure that showed gross incompetence and horrible judgment — his disastrous educational “charity” with an unrepentant domestic terrorist, which wasted over 100 million dollars before it collapsed. For some reason, Senator Obama has not been highlighting that executive experience.)
I chose not to watch it.
Think there was a re-run on television or something.
Remarkably, my life hasn’t changed after his speech.
He still hasn’t done anything, except make a statement about Sarah Palin and then have to retract it and blame it on overzealous people in his staff.
Hmmm… Obama blaming others. Haven’t we heard that before based on questionnaires filled out?
Once again, I didn’t listen to Obama’s speech, just saw snippets of it on the talk shows. Here’s my problem with the liberal mentality. If they put on a big, spectacular show, fill up a stadium, and make it as flashy as possible, they think that everyone will fall in line like lemmings.
It’s like talking to a beautiful woman who has nothing to say. After awhile, you become bored.
Sarah Palin is a beautiful woman who has plenty to say. She’s involved an active and her defining moment is when she made the choice to keep her child and talk about how blessed she is to have that child.
People likened Obama’s speech to the grandeur of the Olympics opening ceremony. But the Olympics are over and we’re ready to move on.
What’s Barrack Obama’s end game? To have Joe Biden attack John McCain, showing that it’s business as usual.
To keep using words and talking about change when John McCain shows action and provides change in the form of Sarah Palin.
To keep making excuses for all of the choices and people that he has been associated with?
I just think you have Sarah Palin talk about her family, her church going experience and her relationship with her pastor, and how she knows everything about him, and how involved that he’s been in their lives… and it points out the hypocrisy of Obama’s relationship with Wright.
I just think you have Sarah Palin talk about her children and how their safety is her main concern and she couldn’t think about associating anyone who would harm children by blowing up buildings and killing their parents and saying that it still wasn’t enough.
If she can do it in a nice, subtle way that doesn’t provoke an outcry from Obama about people using the race card, then I think it underscores how legitimely intellectually dishonest Barrack Obama is.