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Fri. Sep 05, 2008

Obligatory Convention Post

I’ve said little to nothing about politics or the election for over a month now (don’t you wish everyone else had done the same? Could have been a real August vacation, eh?), but I feel compelled to make the Obligatory Convention Post, for fear they’ll take away my Pundit Permit if I don’t.

And this year emphasized what a farce the whole convention business really is.

On the Democratic side, there was months of worrying about the floor fight that could erupt between Hillary Holdouts and the mass of delegates for Obama. Then they even decided to let delegates vote for Hillary as some kind of “catharsis” (I do not think that’s why you gathered). In the end, they all voted for Obama … in a voice vote by acclamation.

In other words, they could have completed that task via one big conference call: “All who are in favor, Press 1. Those opposed, Press 2. To repeat this message, Press #. For additonal options, please dial the Republican Convention Conference Call.”

On the Republican side, the threat of Hurricane Gustav at one point had them considering cutting the convention to a quick vote and two speeches, one by Palin, one by McCain. You could do that in one night, easy. Add to it the fact the three main networks have limited coverage to one hour per night, and it ought to be clear to everyone the conventions are 2% substance, 98% bunting.

In the case of the Democratic Convention, it was almost like “Act One” (the Clintons) and “Act Two” (the Democratic Ticket). In Act One, I had little doubt that Hillary would stand before the delegates and Do The Right Thing. Say what you want about Hillary, she’s not dumb and she’s incredibly disciplined. She did exactly what she had to do.

Now, as for her husband, I admit I had my doubts. “Discipline” has never been one of his strengths, and he’s appeared to have a very real chip on his shoulder pretty much this entire year. But Bill Clinton hit a homer. Not only that, I’d begun to wonder if he’d lost his touch, but about a third of the way into his speech, you could see him kick into gear … and it was all there, the legendary charismatic persuasion, actually deployed on behalf of Obama. I was pleasantly surprised, as I honestly expected a very reserved presentation from him.

Since he was nominated for VP, Joe Biden has pretty much acted in the reverse of his perception as a verbose guy prone to verbal slips. He’s been tight, perhaps a little too tight.

Then Obama stepped out before 85,000 people, and gave the speech of his life.

It deserves a lot more than that one sentence. But the truth is that within 12 hours, it had been wiped from the face of the news cycle, as if it had never happened, by the arrival of Hurricane Sarah.

Say what you want about the substance of Gov. Palin, our political reality is that she will soar or fail based on … poise and presentation. If she can maintain poise under the certain fire she will take, and if the campaign can control how she is presented to America, it will make all the difference.

Granted, these are two very big “ifs”. With the seemingly skin-deep vetting the McCain campaign appeared to give her now being “finished” by the media, they’ve somewhat lost control of the “presentation” issue.

As for “poise,” all we have to go on so far is her big speech at the convention, and she appears to be a potential boon to McCain. We may not know much about her actual qualifications, but she has definitely displayed a high RMQ (Red Meat Quotient). She could be a very effective “attack dog,” which is often the campaign role of the VP candidate. Of course, it’s one thing to give a practiced speech from a teleprompter, and another thing to face up to a tough press conference, or a vice presidential debate.

I do get the sense that she is the type of personality who thrives in confrontation, and will feed off of any negativity thrown at her, not wither under it. Which would indicate the best thing Obama/Biden can do is to run hard against John McCain, and ignore Palin. Let her continue to define herself in her own harsh way, give her some more rope, and let the media finish the vetting the McCain camp apparently did not.

My guess is that within a few weeks, she will have turned herself into a non-factor, or a completely negative one, without much help from anyone. And if I’m wrong on that, guess what else happens in a few weeks? The Vice Presidential debate. Let Joe do his job.

I also wanted to link to some points recently made by others that are well worth considering.

Shaun Mullen: “Look long and hard at this photograph, America. I mean really long and hard. Because when all is said and done, this is what selecting a vice presidential running mate is all about.”

James Fallows: “Barack Obama has used his family as a prop from time to time — most recently, bringing the charming girls onto the stage at the end of his convention speech. That’s life in politics; everybody does it to some degree. Very few politicians do it as all-out as Sarah Palin just did, from citing the disabilities of her youngest child as part of her resume to including the shotgun groom of her elder daughter. I can’t recall any spectacle comparable to Baby Trig being passed from Cindy McCain, to Trig’s 7-year-old sister, to Palin herself when she ended the speech. Her husband looks charming, I have to say. From this point on it will be hard for her to declare anything about her personal or family life out-of-bounds.”

David Frum: “How sustainable is it for the GOP to put Sarah Palin’s life half in the spotlight and half out of bounds? Republicans have highlighted her baby — while denouncing as sexist all questions about the raising of the baby. Republicans have invited America to admire Sarah Palin’s reproductive choices — while fiercely disallowing any discussion of the reproductive choices of Sarah Palin’s under-age daughter.”

While one can argue that she would have been criticized for not “caring for her child” if he had not been present Wednesday night, I admit I wondered what a 4 month old infant was doing out at 11pm at night in a room with 20,000 rowdy people. But even more, I wondered why “Levi,” the father of Palin’s grandchild-to-be, was dragged all the way from Alaska at the last minute to be in the spotlight, if they truly want this matter to be treated as private.

You can’t have it both ways. I agree that the children of candidates should be off-limits, and irrelevant to this process. But when you use them as stage props so heavily in your debut, one could argue you’ve re-opened that door with your own actions.

I watched McCain’s speech last night, and got one overwhelming impression. When McCain “vowed Thursday night to vanquish the ‘constant partisan rancor’ that grips Washington” I wondered when he was going to start on that goal. After the campaign, one would assume, if you judge actions as louder than words.

It appeared that Job #1 at the Republican Convention was to brainwash us into believing that they haven’t been the party in power the past eight years, and/or that you need a certain level or type of experience to fix this mess that’s been created by members of their own party.

And it also seemed to me that the choice of Palin was about solidifying and motivating the party base. However, if you get everyone who identifies themselves as Republican to vote for you, you’re still about 12-13% shy of the 50.1% you need to win. That’s the national polling reality (and, as if that isn’t bad enough, here’s the current electoral reality: Obama 301, McCain 224, Ties 13).

And I think Peggy Noonan, who got nailed by an open mike, responds by nailing the Republican misperception: “In our off-air conversation, I got on the subject of the leaders of the Republican party assuming, now, that whatever the base of the Republican party thinks is what America thinks. I made the case that this is no longer true, that party leaders seem to me stuck in the assumptions of 1988 and 1994, the assumptions that reigned when they were young and coming up. ‘The first lesson they learned is the one they remember,’ I said to Todd — and I’m pretty certain that is a direct quote. But, I argued, that’s over, those assumptions are yesterday, the party can no longer assume that its base is utterly in line with the thinking of the American people. And when I said, ‘It’s over!’ — and I said it more than once — that is what I was referring to.”

The base is not enough. But now it’s all they’ve got.

This is still the Democrats race to lose. And, sadly, they’ve shown themselves capable in the past. But as for me, I’ve been shown no reason at all to change the voting pattern I chose two years ago, and the candidate I chose in January.

The arrival of Sarah Palin on the national scene does not change my belief that the Republican Party needs a top-to-bottom thumping in November that inspires them to go off into the wilderness on a spirit walk, and find whatever it is they lost over the past decade. Like, any scrap of conservatism that is not socially derived, but based on policy and reality.

In fact, in many ways, Sarah Palin’s “red meat” arrival only emphasizes that.