American Missive

LONG BEACH— Even in a time when Barack Obama was picking his cabinet members, planning his parties and taking his victory lap Americans were still looking at the candidates and the calendar. This race isn’t over despite the best press clippings claims.

Several weeks ago pollster John Zogby made an alarming claim. In a period of campaigning malaise for Mr. McCain, Mr. Zogby said the race is much tighter than it would appear.

I don’t think Obama has closed the deal yet
—John Zogby, October 8th, 2008.

Even CNN has a poll showing the race has tightened up. The CNN poll found that Mr. Obama’s tag line is losing it’s grip. “Forty-nine percent of those questioned in the new survey say McCain would mostly carry out Bush’s policies, down from 56 percent in the previous poll.”

Mr. McCain has been a bad campaigner this cycle. He’s made campaign stunts the basis of his game and it has started to wear thin. I don’t blame the American electorate for losing faithin him. If all they have to choose from is a silver tongued socialist or a bunch of political parlor tricks, they’ll side with the silver tongue. At least you get a consistent message from one of them, even if you don’t like it.

Like every American I have my fears and my hopes based on the potential outcome of this election. I fear the extent of the destruction of the American dream Mr. Obama’s domestic policy could usher in. His socialist ideals are a recipe for punishing those who succeed in reaching the top and encouraging the rest to not attempt to dream so large. But at the same time he is a skilled politician. A very skilled politician. Because of this he must have calculated that he cannot deviate from his initial campaign promises without risking alienating his base and being branded as a flip-flopper and thus losing the election miserably.  He already received scars for this type of action earlier in the election cycle when the truth came out about his NAFTA rhetoric. So my hope is that as a skilled politician he recognizes that his promises cannot be met and once in office he makes a Clintonian adjustment to his to-do list and scraps the excess in an aim to solidify the country.  His silver tongue should be able to grant him some room to manuver on this while maintaining a strong base of leadership.

With Mr. McCain we have a populist. I appreciate some of his ideals, but not all of them. In the wake of this current economic crisis both candidates were left standing in the same position. One obtained that position by a means called on by the American electorate for the past eight years. Patience. Monitor the situation. Formulate a position. Take a stance. Explain your stance. The other weaved in and out of ideas taking radical actions along the way. Suspending his campaign. Rallying against an AIG bailout. Then for the bailout. Taking a multitude of positions only to land in the same spot as his opponent. All one is left with to judge the difference between these two on this issue is the means of which they obtained their position and Mr. McCain loses in this approach. It has potentially frightening consequences when you think of what might happen should Mr. McCain be the decider on such issues in the future.

But the race is tightening back up, just as Mr. Zogby had predicted.

Zogby said the race mirrors the 1980 election, when voters didn’t embrace Ronald Reagan over then-President Jimmy Carter until just days before the election.

“The Sunday before the election the dam burst,” Zogbysaid of the 1980 tilt. “That’s when voters determined they were comfortable with Reagan.”

I think Joe the Plumber is having a larger impact on this race than initially estimated (which would explain the recent liberal left attacks on a US citizen asking a question). I think his question, and the response by Mr. Obama to that question, startled a lot of people. Additionally I think Mr. McCain’s latest campaign line is starting to resonate with the electorate again.

If Mr. McCain can continue to frame the election as a choice of reform verses socialism it will favor him.  He must continue saying: “I am not George Bush. If Barack Obama wants to continue running against George Bush he should have run for office 4 years ago.”  Then, after pegging Mr. Obama as a backward visionary (campaigning against Bush and the decision to go to war), he needs to spell out his reform and frame his campaign as forward looking. He needs to continue pounding the socialist agenda of Mr. Obama and stress how his presidency wouldn’t punish Americans for dreaming big. The most liberal in this nation will not buy into it. Just as the most conservative in this nation will not buy into Mr. Obama’s campaign. This is a fight for the independents and they are most certainly up for grabs.

No doubt the man has a lot of work cut out for him. But if he can consistently push these two points he can re-frame this election and pull out the victor. November 2^nd will be the day people make up their minds.  And if by then they have a consistent and solid message by Mr. McCain in their heads to run along side Mr. Obama’s message they might just favor Mr. McCain.