Larison on McCain
McCain supporters need to acknowledge that Larison lands many, many blows in this post.
McCain regularly won among anti-Bush voters in the GOP primaries, and this perception of independence from the conventional GOP line seems to be a reason for his continuing appeal to independents and his ability to outpoll his own party label by ten points or more. In the eyes of the media, McCain must necessarily be distancing himself from Bush, because they “know” that McCain is the Good Republican and Bush is the antithesis of this. They are also counting on McCain’s ability to get by without having a clue about numerous areas of policy. They probably anticipate that he will once again be able to prevail by muttering boilerplate about opposing wasteful spending and the dreaded earmark with the odd gas tax holiday pander thrown in for good measure. It’s worked before, so why not on a larger scale with the general electorate?
What Halperin also misses here is that in any contest between Obama and McCain, Obama is the substantive, policy-oriented candidate, while McCain is the one offering mostly pious bromides about victory, service and being American. If style often beats substance, Obama is in trouble because, as his supporters tirelessly remind us, Obama does have a substantive policy agenda (even if he doesn’t spend as much time talking about it and a lot of his boosters don’t care what it is) and McCain’s entire campaign has been even more driven by biography and character than Obama’s.
This parallels an observation made by a friend of mine recently — that Mark Salter strongly reinforces major McCain vulnerabilities: an overemphasis on personal loyalty, an indifference or even hostility towards social conservatives, a high-mindedness that is mostly procedural and substance-free, and a marked disinterest in domestic policy. Anyone who wants John McCain to win needs to encourage the campaign and the candidate to fight against these tendencies.
The post begins, by the way, as a characteristically polite evisceration of Mark Halperin. I’d love to live in a world in which someone half as incisive as Daniel had a platform like Halperin’s. But hopefully this person would not use this platform to advance the dismemberment of the Union, which I for one am pretty fond of.
Obama the substantive policy oriented candidate???
To bad every Obama policy takes more freedom and money from American citizens, and puts it squarely in the governments pocket.
McCain may be more about style, but when Obama is forced off the teleprompter in debates… McCain will eviscerate him, no matter the subject. Obama is suited perfectly for being a major network news anchor and reading what others write, right down to the terminal left wing idealism.
— GL · Jun 6, 10:46 PM · #
lol, GL is going to be in for a big shock when the debates roll around.
— Korha · Jun 6, 11:06 PM · #
McCain has made a pretty foolish mistake with his debate invitations the other day. Obama is by almost all accounts a very talented lawyer; I think GL and many others are in for a shock when he draws McCain into misstep after misstep (not that McCain’s temper are going to do him any favors either).
— jjcoop · Jun 6, 11:16 PM · #
Where has Obama ever demonstrated that he is a “very talented lawyer”?
One of the worst lawyers I ever worked with was a Phi Beta Kappa and Law Reviem member from Harvard. Put her in a library and give her 12 hours, and she’d produce a thing of beauty on paper.
Ask her to convince a stranger of the correctness of a particular legal position in a contested venue, and she was a blabbering idiot.
— shipwreckedcrew · Jun 6, 11:45 PM · #
“Shipwreckedcrew,” you will learn—you will learn. He will teach you, as your candidate is constantly reduced to being a blithering idiot in front of us.
Not for nothing has Lawrence Tribe called Obama the “best constitutional law student” in his “entire teaching career,” but also they don’t give positions in the Harvard Law Review to students who can’t eloquently defend and discuss the law in front of others.
As far as Obama’s ability to be eloquent, precise and focused under pressure, I’d take odds on my self-contained, reflective candidate, against your volatile, ungracious and <i>tired</i> one any day!
— digbydolben · Jun 7, 01:45 AM · #
shipwreckedcrew, I’m glad you realize that observations about “how certain people are” are statistical and not anecdotal. What on earth does it matter that you know A person who was a Harvard Law Review member and a bumbling idiot?
I don’t conclude that, just because I see a black person from Harlem on the street begging for spare quarters, that all of them are like that. I’m not sure what you’re trying to prove.
— Brandon · Jun 7, 01:55 AM · #
digbydolben,
As a graduate of one of the nation’s premier law schools and a former board member of its law review, let me share with you a dirty secret: At no law review in the country that I know of does “eloquently defend[ing] and discuss[ing] the law in front of others” bear any relationship whatsoever with one’s ability to get on law review. At my school, whose law review was as selective as Harvard’s, one generally became a staff member of the law review by doing nothing more than (1) getting stellar grades the first year of law school (which were determined entirely by written blind-graded examination; in-class participation played no role in our grading during the first year), and (2) a pro forma examination of one’s proofreading skills. Board selection for the following year was largely a political process that selected from among those staff members who had (1) put themselves forward as candidacy because they were willing to exchange an especially unpleasant third year of law school (instead of slacking off like everybody else) for an additional line on their resume and (2) demonstrated an above-average level of competence in editing and providing comments on articles that they had cite-checked as staff members. The only way one’s eloquence in discussing would play any role in that process is if one had made an especial fool of oneself in a shoot-the-s—t session on legal issues during a late night of cite-checking in the law review offices.
I’m really sorry to disabuse the American public – or at least the American Scene readership – of the notion that being EIC of the law review is a sure sign of brilliance and eloquence, but really, it’s not. Trust me. Like nearly every other credentialing exercise in the legal profession, it bears little relationship to anything beyond one’s ability to take law school exams and to play well with others.
— Richard · Jun 7, 03:07 AM · #
Larison does hit the nail on the head.
About that “Anyone who wants John McCain to win …” – I can see why some people want Obama to lose, but McCain hasn’t given anybody a reason why he should win. He has a pony plan for Iraq. He has a pony plan for the economy. He’s been on both sides of many major issues. Every now and then – for example, the farm bill – he shows what he could do, but he just hasn’t done it.
— Peter · Jun 7, 05:47 PM · #
I think Larison misses an important part of perception. Obama is indeed far more stylish than McCain—compare their speeches on Tuesday, there’s no question. But Obama’s stylishness contributes, unfairly, to the impression that he is substance-free, that he is only style. People distrust charmers, people who could obviously hoodwink them. Obama is clever enough that he easily could hoodwink people. If you were considering hiring him, you would definitely fear that he’s a better interviewer than worker.
McCain, by contrast, is only stylish in a gruff manner. He’s tough—and people love a bad-ass—but not polished. He drives forward but isn’t one for lateral motion. This gives the impression that he’s serious minded, an impression I believe is belied by his obsession with purity, honor, patriotism, “America”, etc.—lovely abstractions all, but an odd political platform. So McCain’ style contributes to the erroneous view that he is substantive, while Obama’s contributes to the erroneous view that he is not. But style itself matters, and Obama is more fully stylish than McCain. I expect that, and the political environment that is generally odious to Republican prospects, to be the decisive factor.
— Robert · Jun 7, 06:57 PM · #