Obama won, and he won huge. Now most moral, intelligent people treat who they vote for and who they think will win as two completely different things, hoping the first will influence the second but never the other way around. Therefore we all gather around the television set on election night and ponder what’s going to happen, independent of our personal desires.
Now, it may be that I, like some Babylonian sooth sayer, gazed into the future and predicted this election’s outcome with raw, undulating voracity. That’s not for me to say, however, and good manners dictates that I move forward with another topic amicably.
Moving right along, I saw in the news today that oh the heck with it I am gonna gloat I called it, baby! I called it! I swear to you, I am some kind of socio-economic Nostradamus! Shame on all of you who argued with me, let that be a stern reminder that if one talks for a long enough period of time about something they don’t understand, they will eventually achieve victory and misattribute its origin.
I should be clear here, I’m not taking pleasure in McCain’s defeat. I wasn’t a fan of him this election, but he has a long record that has always impressed me, and if he had gotten the GOP ticket in 04 I would have happily put him in the White House. Nor was I one of those people whose hatred for Sarah Palin escalated to a white hot frenzy. I tend to agree with our President-elect about her, she was a cunning choice who fared much better than her detractors would have liked.
So with it being understood that I do not intend to rub it in the faces of McCain supporters, let me tell you why I have always thought he was going to lose this thing. Hindsight is 20/20, yes, but a cursory glance over my past blog entries will reveal that I’ve said all of this before. This is just a recap. I’d love to hear from you guys about whether or not you agree with my analysis, so please let loose.
Why McCain Lost (in no particular order)
1. The President Bush thing stuck like glue. It really did. Obama’s campaign took McCain’s best attribute, his decades of experience, and spun it around on him so fast he had to break a sweat just keeping it from being a negative. McCain clearly wanted this election to be about who’s got the experience in times of crisis, and rightly so, but Barack kept painting him as “more of the same” every time he tried. It was slick, too, very clever and underhanded; you never realized it when it was going on. These days, with so much press about “attack ads” and “going negative,” you have to hit your opponent when we’re not looking. And yes, before you ask, you absolutely must hit your opponent.
2. Money. Obama had more. Way more. His campaign will go down in history as one of the leanest, meanest money-raising operations in American political history. The best part about having more money than your opponent is that it gives you dozens of advantages over him, all of which the American people are completely blind to. For some reason, voters believe that both Presidential candidates have the same amount of money, and it’s about how they use it. I think we cling to this because we wish it were true, and we’d like to think our vote cannot simply be purchased.
3. They didn’t fight hard enough for the moderates. One of my great pet peeves this election has been how much people have talked about “getting” the conservative base. You do not “get” the conservative base, you already have them, you go for people you don’t have. If you’re a moderate, and I am, Barack Obama was the only person talking to you. During every debate, every political ad, you name it, John McCain seemed hard at work to secure the votes of people who couldn’t possibly cast their ballot for anyone else. My theory on this is that John left his unsuccessful bid for the GOP nomination a little bitter, certain that going towards the middle of the road wasn’t how to get the job done. Then, when he watched John Kerry evaporate as the youth vote left him at the altar, he became even more certain. “Next time,” he must have thought to himself, “I’ll go in there guns blazing.”
But the times have changed, and Americans are tiring of controversy (even though it’s hypocritical, since we fuel it). He could’ve seen the proof in Hilary’s defeat; you can’t imagine a savvier person, but the political climate in this country is exhausted, no one wants a “love ‘em or hate ‘em” President. Clinton saw the writing on the wall and tried hard to aim at the middle, which is why Obama beat her far more narrowly. McCain, it seems, still wanted vengeance for his last run at the office, and it cost him.
4. Sarah Palin. She got too much attention. Palin did well in her debates and she had class, but she let the hoopla boil over around her and everyone forgot a little about John. Let me tell you another thing McCain could have learned from Hilary: keep your sidekick in check. Bill Clinton’s angry diatribes basically tied a millstone around his wife’s neck and sank her, even when he clearly meant well. Palin fared far better, but the campaign didn’t use her the right way, and she ended up being a draw for all the wrong reasons. A bid for the White House needs to be a streamlined, aerodynamic thing, and when too much attention goes to the wrong place, it slows you down.
5. Bad Timing. Republicans have a pretty hard time getting elected to fix the economy, because their policy is to leave it alone and let it work itself out. I can’t stress enough how much merit this policy has, nor can I doubt that FDR-styled “New Deal” policies often amount to little result, but that’s easier said than tolerated when the chips are down. There’s just no way to get elected into a financial crisis by encouraging everyone to suck it up and wait it out. It may be true, but it isn’t going to give you the chance to find out.
6. Image. Barack Obama said in his acceptance speech that his campaign was born on front porches, in back yards, etc, but it wasn’t, it was born in Hollywood. From the very beginning, his team understood the power of an image, and they nearly brainwashed their audience with word association games, showing Obama’s face and then flashing “Hope” or “Change.” It was simple psychology, we began to think of him as the revolutionary before we even heard his policies. From a purely technical standpoint, it was a powerhouse campaign, and a guy who would have been the oldest President in history just couldn’t stand up against it.
So, there’s my analysis.
I generally concur with your analysis, and would differ only to the extent that I too — a McCain supporter — saw this coming and said so, though probably not here. As to your #2, it bears at least passing mention that McCain’s handicap was in sticking to his pledge to rely on public funding and the resulting spending limitations — the same pledge — the same pledge Obama made early on. The difference, of course, is that McCain KEPT his word. Silly man.
I honestly wish Obama well; he’s my president now. He has inherited a staggering mess that transcends politics and political parties. We’ll see how he does with it.
Oh, absolutely, I agree. My point with article number 2 was in McCain’s defense, he led a significantly less media-driven affair with a much more modest budget.
Also, I think everything is timing in these things, and culturally I think America wanted a different image than the one McCain was selling.