A first(?) thread on 2008: McCain,Giuliani & the Republicans

Stop being so gay?

both are about his performance - by making it part of his campaign, he has to be prepared to deal with all opinions/facts about his performance (and many considered it precisely that - a performance)

He relies on Tom Coburn?

Possibly the single most fundamentalist Senator of the Republican Party?

The guy who said that those who perform abortions should be subject to the death penalty?

Jesus.


So much for the "straight talk"...

Jeez, any local councillor should be able to formulate an opinion on this one. Its not like its such an esoteric question, its come up in mainstream discussion often enough. In the Senate too, for that matter. Was he sleeping?

<shakes head in disbelief>

It summarises his campaign this year as poignantly as anything though. His pandering to the religious right is blatant enough to turn off any independent voter (I mean, Coburn!), but at the same time it's so laughably clear that he doesnt actually give a f*ck about these matters that religious conservatives must be pretty disgusted too.

That's a no-brainer question. If supplying condoms will help prevent aids then do it. But the Christian right is against it. They want to use the unrealistic approach-abstinence.

Poor McCain, he's losing it.

The way things look now it's Rudy. But a lot can happen in the next 11 months.

nimh

This depressing trajectory we see with McCain speaks not only about how much his strategies tell us about his character but also (in relation to Lola's thread that you reinvigorated recently) about the effective power that the religious right has actually managed to gain in eliminating the chances of candidates they do not like. And that 'filtering' system has very purposefully been put into place from the local level of school boards up through the state level and to the presidential level. This has had significant consequences in the US.

On Romney...
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/03/16/AR2007031601987.html

I dont think McCain turning to an extreme like Coburn is reflective of much anything but his rather unique case.

He's a candidate who used to run as an anti-establishment, anti-religious right alternative, and now desperately needs to be accepted by both that establishment and that religious right to stand half a chance. That drives him to extremes in pandering that a regular conservative, with less of an acute need to compensate, wouldnt need to go to.

I cant think of another recent example, barring, obviously, that other turncoat Romney, so I think its really kind of a special/unique situation that cant easily be used to illustrate "the effective power that the religious right has actually managed to gain" in general.

But one can think of that a bit differently. In a very real way, it doesn't much matter what McCain was up to earlier such that "extremes of pandering" now have to be engaged. What matters more is that he must abide by a certain set of litmus criteria insisted by the RR of ALL candidates.

If you did indeed see Giuliani, for example, declare Tom Coburn the man he relies on, that argument would certainly have made sense.

As it is, I havent even heard Giuliani say abortion is immoral, let alone choosing the man who said that those who carry out abortions should be subject to the death penalty as the man he relies on in such matters.

If you hear Giuliani also pointedly refuse to answer whether condoms "probably do help stop" the spread of HIV, you can return to this argument perhaps.

McCain got caught, all right? He got caught on a foreign policy issue way down the list, and which is being linked to a domestic policy issue much higher up the list, (condoms being distributed in schools). He probably has spoke out and voted against the school issue and he didn't know how to explain any possible conflict with the African issue. In fact, the poor guy probably doesn't even remember what his African position is.

As far as turning to Coburn, McCain probably only remembered his stance on certain parts of Coburn's speech, and was reaching for that. It's not like hired Coburn as part of his staff.

There is no question McCain was fumbling around on this, and he probably spoke too much on it without refreshing his memory. But I don't see it as a campaign breaker. And yes, he is trying to mend fences with the same segment of the Republican Right he became so famous for telling off years ago.

The real issue is not the stumble, but rather can a conservative running in a conservative party still reach for the middle on the basis of his character, when you see what being a conservative means-the positions you must take.

As for Giuliani, he really does get a free pass on much of this stuff because he was the Republican mayor-a very effective Republican mayor-of an overwhelmingly Democratic city. All the stuff that he let slip by on abortions, etc, is looked at as something the Democrats were going to get through anyway, you can't blame Giuliani for not being able to stop it. So nobody blames Giuliani for that at all. He skates.

ehBeth-- One stands as an unsubstantiated rumor.

Nimh--

You currently rock.

I'm sure many remember the problems the NYFD had with Rudy over revovery of remains at Ground Zero. It was disgusting then and still is today. "Firemen douse Rudy's image as 9/11 hero" http://www.prisonplanet.com/articles/march2007/180307Firemen.htm

"probably"? I'd say the transcript leaves little room for doubt here. No, he didnt remember.

And seriously, how can a highly paid Senator with such long experience and actual presidential ambitions not know his opinion on such a basic and obvious question?

AIDS, Africa - its not like we're talking esoteric questions about the price of grain in Laos here. This is stuff most any of us could give an informed opinion about. Are Senators really that ignorant?

Reminds one of that test that - what was it? - some TV station or other submitted to US Senators. Where it turned out that, I dunno, half didnt know about the difference between Sunnis and Shiites or something. They can not possibly be that daft, can they?

In McCain's case, I dont think it is he is that ignorant (or could it also be that he is just that uninterested in Africa as well?), its just he was so weaselly scared that his opinion, if he spoke it, would offend this or that constituency that he hemmed and hawed embarassedly.

Which is bad enough if you're not right then driving the "Straight Talk Express", and is plain ridiculous if you are.

I mean, seriously - forget about Africa -

"Do you think contraceptives help stop the spread of HIV?"

How can one possibly not have an answer on that, at this stage of his political career?

Understood. But Rudy isn't there yet and if he doesn't get there (very real possibility, of course) it will be because of we know what.

But there's another side to this too. We have to make some reasonable accounting of why the RR, in surprising percentages so far at least, respond positively to a Rudy candidacy. I would argue that they do so because there are other aspects in a candidate that they desire or think appropriate outside of those specific gay/abortion items. Authoritarianism is clearly one and father-figure/hero is clearly another (they are related). An ability to win and keep them in relative power is another. They are torn on this guy. But if he does get the primary and does well in the election, it will be because the RR supports him in significant numbers. If they mass against him, he's done for.

Rudy can easily be overcome by Fred Thompson where the RR is concerned, there is already a strong buzz going in the ranks of the RR.

Don't know yet how broad his appeal will be to the mass on the right.

I agree BrandX. Fred Thompson could completely change the whole dynamics of the GOP primary season.

But something else that may completely change the dynamics of the 2008 campaign, for both (or all) parties is this link you posted in the Obama thread:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6h3G-lMZxjo

The San Francisco Chronicle did a pretty good job describing the impact that this kind of thing might have:

Political video smackdown
'Hillary 1984': Unauthorized Internet ad for Obama converts Apple Computer's '84 Super Bowl spot into a generational howl against Clinton's presidential bid
Carla Marinucci, Chronicle Political Writer

Sunday, March 18, 2007

It may be the most stunning and creative attack ad yet for a 2008 presidential candidate -- one experts say could represent a watershed moment in 21st century media and political advertising.

Yet the groundbreaking 74-second pitch for Democratic Illinois Sen. Barack Obama, which remixes the classic "1984" ad that introduced Apple computers to the world, is not on cable or network TV, but on the Internet.

(To see the video, go to: www.youtube.com/watch?v=6h3G-lMZxjo)

And Obama's campaign says it had absolutely nothing to do with the video that attacks one of his principal Democratic rivals, New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton. Indeed, the ad's creator is a mystery, at least for now.

The compelling "Hillary 1984" video recently introduced on YouTube represents "a new era, a new wave of politics ... because it's not about Obama," said Peter Leyden, director of the New Politics Institute, a San Francisco-based think tank on politics and new media. "It's about the end of the broadcast era."

But some say the ad is just the latest attempt by outside activists to influence political campaigns -- or the newest way for campaigns to anonymously attack their opponents.

The video is a sophisticated new take on director Ridley Scott's controversial Apple ad that caused shock waves with its premiere during the 1984 Super Bowl, and shows the same blond young female athlete running with a sledgehammer toward a widescreen -- where an ominous Big Brother figure drones to a mass of zombielike followers.

But this time, the woman is wearing an iPod -- and has her candidate's slogan on her chest. And the Big Brother -- whose image she defiantly smashes with a wave of her sledgehammer -- is Clinton, the Democratic presidential front-runner.

The tagline for the attack: "On Jan. 14, the Democratic primary will begin. And you'll see why 2008 won't be like 1984."

An updated Apple symbol -- transformed into an O -- is followed by the dramatically emerging logo: BarackObama.com.

Veteran San Francisco ad man Bob Gardner, whose work has included political campaigns for former President Gerald Ford, said the video is "very powerful" in its efforts to call for a generational change in politics.

"It puts Hillary spouting cliche nonsense to the drones -- while a fresh face breaks through," he says. "It's old versus new."

That theme -- reflecting a generational change in the relationship between media, politics, candidates and voters -- suggests that "Hillary 1984" could have the iconic power with the 21st century political generation that another classic political ad called "Daisy" represented to Baby Boomers, says Leyden. That 1964 spot for President Lyndon Johnson -- featuring images of a child plucking a daisy, which morphed ominously into a nuclear mushroom cloud -- battered GOP presidential candidate Sen. Barry Goldwater because it, too, portrayed "a shattering of the whole world" in both political leadership, and media.

Bill Burton, a spokesman for Obama, said he is aware of the "Hillary 1984" video and has gotten calls from reporters on it -- but he insisted that the campaign is not connected to it. "It's somebody else's creation," he said, declining to comment on the ad's biting content.

Burton said he doesn't know who created the spot, but it shows "there is a lot of energy for Sen. Obama on the Web, in communities all over the country ... and frankly, that energy will manifest itself in a lot of ways."

But in the weeks since its early March debut, the expertly created video remix -- called a mashup in blogosphere circles -- has "changed the zone" between political campaigns, their followers and the Internet, said Simon Rosenberg, president of the Washington-based New Democrat Network, an influential party advocacy group based in Washington, D.C.

With presidential campaigns now poised to spend hundreds of millions of dollars in advertising that will blanket television before November 2008, this seemingly home-produced video -- created with software and a laptop, and likely without the benefit of a team of expensive political consultants -- opens a new window, Rosenberg said. It has dramatized a brave new world in which passionate activists outside the structure of traditional campaigns have the power to shape the message -- even for a presidential candidate.

The ad is proof that "anybody can do powerful emotional ads ... and the campaigns are no longer in control," Rosenberg said. "It will no longer be a top-down candidate message; that's a 20th century broadcast model."

It also dramatizes that today, political activists with the Internet as their ammunition have gone from being "just donors to the cause," he said, "to being partners in the fight. And they don't have to wait for permission."

But while the medium is clearly more grassroots, political campaigns have not been averse to having an outside or independent voice -- witness the efforts of the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth in the 2004 presidential race against Democratic Sen. John Kerry -- delivering ads that are tougher and meaner than the candidates might launch on their own.

Eric Jaye, a San Francisco political consultant and key adviser to Mayor Gavin Newsom, said the sophisticated "Hillary 1984" effort is the "best example yet" of a crop of viral videos that have blossomed on the Internet over the past 18 months.

But Jaye predicted such efforts are bound to become attractive tools for political campaigns, which will "orchestrate these videos on the down low to communicate negative messages -- without having to own them in public."

Jaye noted that Obama's campaign -- even as it insists it has no connection to the production -- reaps a clear benefit from the mashup video: "They get to call Hillary Clinton a pabulum-spewing pseudo-fascist, without having to own it."

And he says the individual viral video efforts popping up on the Internet, however creative, come with risk for political campaigns -- especially presidential runs, where nuance and caution usually win out over edginess when it comes to shaping messages that appeal to wide swaths of voters

"They tend to be more entertaining -- but they tend to be nastier. You used to have a series of apologies for what campaign bloggers said. Now you have to have a series of apologies for what people with a video camera and software editing and a laptop do."

Still, Jaye said, there's a clear benefit in the energy such efforts create.

"If people take the time to make a campaign ad, it helps generate more excitement, more laughs. It's fresher," he said. "But it also generates more issues. You have people making ads you don't authorize."

Gardner said the success of "Hillary 1984" means that now "every candidate will have to worry about some guy with a video camera and a Mac being able to do whatever he or she wants."

At the Obama campaign, he added wryly, "they are probably calling their consultant and saying, 'Why couldn't you guys come up with something as brilliant?' "
LINK TO STORY

That's one of Obama's big strengths IMO, is the connection with the youth vote. Some of it he's done purposely, the whole next generation thing. Some of it seems organic -- he's the youngest candidate, he's post-baby-boomer, etc. But the other thing that this ad brings to mind is how he met with the leader of some web-based group of young people -- I THINK it was Facebook, I don't remember -- that had gathered a huge number of members on some Obama-for-president theme, and he'd never met any of them, nor knew anything about it.

Major grass-roots stuff.

I like the democratic aspect. (Anyone can do it.) I dislike the potential for abuse, though. (A major campaign could make an ad, give it to some schmuck, have the schmuck put it on YouTube, and then deny any connection. I don't think that's what happened here but it could.)