Published on TheHill.com on September 9, 2008
Now that the conventions are over, it is evident that the battle of John McCain is over (McCain won) and the battle of Barack Obama will determine the outcome of the election.
Now that McCain has definitively, and I suspect irreversibly, separated himself from Bush, he has become an acceptable alternative to Obama for voters seeking change. The question now is whether Obama’s extra quotient of change — or the different direction that change will take — is worth the risk of electing him.
Obama was wrong to invest so much in the Bush-McCain linkage. Any candidate can define himself at his convention. And if McCain chose, as he did, to use the gathering to distance himself from Washington and from the Bush administration, there was really nothing that Obama could do to stop him. He should have focused very specifically on McCain himself and taken shots at specific votes and bills that he introduced.
Now, after the massive exposure McCain got at his convention and the demonstrable commitment to change embodied in the selection of Sarah Palin, it is too late.
The Obama campaign doesn’t seem to get that it is running against McCain, not Sarah Palin. They spent the entire Republican convention and the week since attacking the vice presidential candidate. That’s like stabbing the capillaries instead of the arteries. Nobody is going to vote for or against McCain because they want Sarah Palin to be vice president of the United States, or don’t. But Palin has served, and will serve, a key purpose in illustrating and demonstrating what kind of a man John McCain is. She stands as a tribute to his desire to bring change, his willingness to cut loose from the past, and his courage in attempting innovation. No amount of criticism of Palin is going to stop that process. Obama needs to remember who his opponent is.
Now the election will hinge on a referendum on Obama. Is the extra healthcare coverage he would pass worth the huge tax increases he will impose? Nobody buys his claim that he will only increase taxes on a few rich people and give the rest of us tax cuts. Voters can add, and they realize that his spending plans and tax-cut promises come to a trillion dollars and that his tax increases represent only one-tenth as much. They know that everyone who pays taxes will end up paying more if Obama is elected. The question will be: Is it worth it?
Is his commitment to income redistribution and increasing tax “fairness” worth the risk his tax plans pose for the economy?
Is his plan to pull out of Iraq and his commitment to multilateralism in foreign policy worth the risk of putting someone with virtually no foreign policy experience in charge of our international relations in the middle of a war? Is his promise to respect the Constitution and ratchet back the intrusions of the Bush homeland security measures worth the extra risk of terror attack?
The answer to these questions will only partially depend on what Obama is proposing and on how sound we think his judgment is. They will also depend on the events that will transpire between now and Election Day. If Iran moves closer to getting nuclear weapons or Israel attacks Iran to forestall that development, things could change in a hurry. If the current atmosphere of economic uncertainty and impending possible crisis — signaled by the federal takeover of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae — deepens, it may make voters less willing to risk the high taxes and big spending that Obama will bring in his wake. If Russia continues to assert its imperial right to dominate Eastern Europe and restore a Soviet-style satellite empire, voters will wonder if they can take a chance on Obama.
But if things are relatively peaceful and uneventful, voters may bristle at the stagnation and turn to Obama in the hopes of change.
The key point is that this race is now not about Bush or McCain or Clinton or Palin. It’s all about Obama.
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Comments
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Another excellent article! I was an Obama supporter, but with the announcement of Sarah Palin as McCain’s running mate, I realize how invested I was in having a woman in the race. I did not care for Hillary’s style, but I did come to admire her tenacity. Sarah has everything Senator Clinton does not: a meteorite personality,a real background of governing achievements and hard choices, and appeals to everyone except the so-called literati. She is also good-looking which adds to her appeal.
I enjoy your books, your appearances on Fox and I wish you and your wife continued success in your books and excellent commentary which provides a rational, fair and a long-years-of-experienced-look at politics.
I mostly agree, but Palin is still crucial. If she does well in the debate and the interviews, her popularity will soar even further, McCain will be almost unstoppable, and Obama will be completely rattled. If Palin does poorly, then Obama will have one last chance to make one final pitch under the banner of “change.”
Best line I heard today was that all Palin has to do to win her debate is to cede all of her time to Biden. I am getting the feeling that all that is going to be said about McCain and Obama has been said and voters are pretty much decided on which one of them they like. I think Palin comes into play big time in the rural areas of states like Ohio. As one Ohio radio guy put it: “She shoots her own rifle and baits her own hook. Pretty tough for Obama or Biden to beat that.” I watched her speech on return to Alaska tonight and she is just plain likable. Something I just don’t see in Biden. I think sometimes folks like myself and others on this site forget that a lot of Americans don’t really get into much detail and come Nov 4th they just vote for the one they feel ok about. If so the edge goes to McCain/Palin. One thing really puzzling is that listening to the tv talking heads and checking blogs Obama seems to be the only person in America who doesn’t realize he shouldn’t be talking at all about Palin.
“Now that the conventions are over, it is evident that the battle of John McCain is over (McCain won) and the battle of Barack Obama will determine the outcome of the election”……….It’s happening again. Regardless of the outcome of the conventions, it appears that half of America is falling for the same superficial political trickery that gave us eight years of George W. Bush. You know the routine.
“Now that McCain has definitively, and I suspect irreversibly, separated himself from Bush, he has become an acceptable alternative to Obama for voters seeking change,”………has he really by choosing Palin? You can put on lipstick, Tina Frey glasses, a skirt, bait your own hook and carry a gun…..but it is still all Bush.
Obama has to refine his message, ideally in such a way that it can be boiled down to another equally simple catch phrase…ENOUGH!…It’s an umbrella for everything.
“ENOUGH stalling on health care, a subject that neither John McCain or Sarah Palin even mentioned at their convention.
ENOUGH making us less safe by fighting the wrong war in the wrong place, while bin Laden remains at large.
ENOUGH putting our soldiers in harm’s way because our leaders can’t admit their mistakes.
ENOUGH secret meetings with energy companies that lead to record profits for them and skyrocketing energy prices for you.
ENOUGH denial of global warming.
ENOUGH sending your jobs overseas.
ENOUGH mortgaging our children’s future.
ENOUGH hiring unqualified people who are unable to deal with a disaster when it comes.
ENOUGH with leaders who think they’re above the law. ENOUGH trashing of the Constitution.
ENOUGH treating the core principles of this country like they mean nothing.
ENOUGH exploitation of fear. ENOUGH attacking your patriotism if you dare to question one of their policies. ENOUGH breeding hatred by dividing this country into red states and blue states instead of bringing us all together as the United States.
ENOUGH spin, enough lies, enough corruption.
ENOUGH distractions about idiocies like that big ‘lipstick on a pig’ controversy.
ENOUGH ignorance, enough arrogance, enough incompetence.
The American people have had ENOUGH of all of it.” (Slansky HuffPost)
Enough people in America are so furious and outrage that they want a candidate that shares they fears and concerns about this country and cause a transformal change of the last eight years of the Bush Administration….a bad Disney Movie.
In the words of George H.W. Bush, he’s going to do “what it takes” to become president…….and so will McCain, and I might say even Obama.
The howls over McCain’s seem to appeal to America’s sense of fair play are, frankly, ridiculous. The man fights dirty. If Obama doesn’t like it, he will have to find a way fight back without going into the politcal gutter and with fierceness and urgency.
[…] a nice editorial piece from Dick Morris: Now that the conventions are over, it is evident that the battle of John McCain is over (McCain […]
I wonder if we are seeing a deliberate and calculated strategy on the part of the Obama campaign to at least somewhat ignore McCain and focus on Palin and her vulnerabilities. Maybe they figure they can exploit the “heartbeat” away issue?
Traditional thinking would say to focus on the top of the ticket. Maybe the dem strategists are thinking ahead of the rest of us. I don’t for a minute think they are just dumb and the attacks are a knee jerk reaction.
I thought she did great in her interview on ABC. Her inexperience and talent was visible in the question about the “Bush doctrine”. She obviously didn’t know what the doctrine was but neither did she look like a deer caught in the headlights. She is a real breath of fresh air in a stinking smoke filled room. There is just something “genuine” about her.