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February 25, 2008

Obama vs McCain

By Mike Krauss

Assuming Obama secures the Democratic nomination, how might he fare against McCain? The odds are fifty-fifty, at best. In fact, it looks like a fairly standard Democrat/Republican contest. Obama supporters who think his victory over Clinton, if it comes, has laid the experience issue to rest need to think again. There is one important wild card to be played that makes an Obama/McCain contest highly problematic: race.

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In an earlier essay I argued that Barack Obama would be a more formidable Democratic candidate for president than Hillary Clinton, because of his demonstrable ability to attract independent voters and because he does not have the high negatives that attach to Senator Clinton. If the polls can be believed, even many Republicans say they “like” Senator Obama.

 

Now, John McCain has emerged as the Republican nominee. Assuming Obama secures the Democratic nomination, how might he fare against Senator McCain?

 

The odds are fifty-fifty, at best.

 

First, a number of Obama’s victories were in states that held caucuses, where the small number of voters who participated is not representative of those states’ far larger voting age population. And in other states his support was often concentrated in cities and university towns.

 

This does not suggest that he will have an easy time moving Republican “red” states into his electoral column. In fact, it looks like a fairly standard Democrat/Republican contest.

 

Second, John McCain has demonstrated that he can compete for those independent, swing voters.

 

Third, John McCain is not Hillary Clinton, and is unlikely to repeat the mistakes of her campaign.

 

Senator Clinton clearly did not see Senator Obama coming until it was too late. Senator McCain will come to the fight ready. He is already on the offensive.

 

Finally, John McCain will work his far greater experience than Obama to his advantage. Obama supporters who think that his victory over Clinton, if it comes, has laid the experience issue to rest, need to think again.

Senator Clinton has endlessly reminded voters that she has far greater experience than Senator Obama, but she has done a surprisingly poor job of explaining the importance of that experience to the success of a presidency.

 

McCain has already begun that task.

 

Obama has said forcefully that he is ready, eager to meet with leaders whose countries’ interests are presently at odds with those of the United States, or who are openly hostile to the United States. He clearly believes that his considerable personal and communications skills, backed by the sincerity of his intentions, will make these meetings productive. He has immense self confidence.

 

McCain has called this naïve, suggesting that at the very least an agenda for any such meetings must be established. Obama will back off his statements and concede the point, at some point suggesting that of course there would need to be some prior meeting or discussion at a lower level before the top guy goes in. He’ll say that everybody knew that’s what he meant. But, it isn’t.

 

McCain will go further to contrast himself to Obama, turning his age and experience to advantage. There is no point in backing off that one.

 

McCain will observe that when he was Obama’s age and younger, he had a similar passion to serve his country, and embarked on a career in the U.S. Navy. And the navy, recognizing his particular gifts – keen eyesight, quick thinking and great reflexes - made him a pilot, but not an admiral.

 

McCain will suggest that the two and a half years that Obama has served in the U.S. Senate do not qualify his as commander-in-chief of all the armies and navies and armed forces of the United States, and leader of the free world.

 

And McCain will suggest that while Senator Obama has asserted that he has the skills to reach out with the kind of conciliatory attitude necessary to move this country forward, and work with the Congress on the legislation required, it is just that, an assertion.

 

Senator McCain will point out that he has a record of doing just that, working in a bi-partisan fashion to pass important legislation, taking on tough and contentious issues like campaign finance reform and immigration.

 

But McCain will be gracious about it, and observe that it is not to be reasonably expected that any senator, no mater how gifted, can have achieved much of a record in two and a half years.

 

So he will turn his attention to Obama’s record of eight years in the Illinois legislature, where Obama voted “present” over one hundred and fifty times.

 

“Present?” McCain will ask. What does that mean?

 

Senator Obama will be asked to explain, did those “votes” indicate that (a) he couldn’t make up his mind, or (b) he did not think the people he was elected to represent needed to be represented?

 

McCain will point out that chronic indecision and a failure to discharge the most basic responsibility of your office are not qualities Americans look for in a president.

 

Finally, McCain will suggest that despite Obama’s claims to be a new and different kind of politician, his hands are not much cleaner than many other politicians. McCain will follow the money.

 

It has been reported in the mainstream media (Boston Globe, 14 February, www.boston.com) – and rather better documented in the blogs (www.soursewatch.com) – that between them Senators Obama and Clinton have donated almost $900,000 of contributions they have raised over the past three years to the Democrat super-delegates on whom their nomination may ultimately depend.  The Obama campaign has also made donations to various groups and organization that subsequently endorsed or assisted him.

 

This is not illegal. It may even prove wise with respect to securing the nomination. But, it looks like the ultimate in insider politics, even vote buying.

 

Vote buying is not unheard of in Chicago, of course. Nor is it illegal, as the Obama campaign has done, to contribute money to organizations that then downstream that money to other organizations to which the Obama campaign has already given the maximum $5,000 allowed by the law.  

 

But as an attorney for the non-partisan and not-for-profit Campaign Legal Center put it, “This is the sort of classic example, where even though the activities do not pass the smell test, they are nevertheless legal…”

 

Now that McCain is raising substantial campaign funds, he has followed Obama and Clinton and is withdrawing from public campaign financing in the primary election cycle. But my guess is he will challenge Obama to keep the pledge he made last March to join him in relying only on public financing for the general election.

 

Headlined in the New York Times last March 2, “McCain and Obama in Deal on Public Financing,” and described in the article as a “deal,” a “truce,” and an “accord,” Obama is now backing away from what the Times now obligingly reports as only “indications” he gave last year that he would accept public financing.

Understandably, as Obama contemplates the kind of money an African-American, super-star politician can raise among establishment elites and energized true believers, he may now be thinking that campaign finance reform is one change he does not believe in.

 

Senator Clinton never challenged Obama over his campaign finance practices. She was too vulnerable. Clinton has yet to release her income tax filings and has consistently ducked questions about where her money comes from.

 

In fact, Clinton never really took the gloves off against Senator Obama, perhaps worried about alienating the lunch bucket Democrats by appearing too tough. But

John McCain will not worry about looking tough if he goes up against the junior Senator from Illinois.  He can’t afford to.

 

Democrat strategists know where both Clinton and Obama are vulnerable. That is why the New York Times got the ball rolling last week by dusting off a story nine years old to attack Senator McCain’s integrity. For good measure, the Times threw in an insinuation of an extra-marital affair. Democrat attack persons are doing their best to keep the story alive.

 

With the New York Times doing the Democrats’ dirty work for them, McCain will have no choice but to be direct with Obama in a way that Clinton was not.

 

Finally, there is one important wild card to be played that makes an Obama/McCain contest highly problematic: race.

 

With many African-Americans rallying to Obama because he is African-American, many white Americans may conclude that race is a perfectly acceptable criteria by which to choose between two admirable candidates. But, which way will that cut?

 

Many younger whites embrace Obama because he is not white, and represents to them an important, hopeful expression of the multi-ethnic reality of their America.

 

Older whites may embrace McCain because the long career of the modest patriot, hero and responsible, effective legislator expresses something equally authentic and admirable about their America.

 

The lunch bucket Democrats have begun to desert Clinton for Obama, not because she is a woman, they tell the pollsters, but because they are for change. It is not inconceivable they will also desert Obama for McCain, not because Obama is not white, they will tell the pollsters, but because they want experience.

 

It’s way too early for Democrats to be picking out their outfits for the inaugural ball.



Authors Website: http://www.publicbankingpa.org

Authors Bio:

Author of the forthcoming novel "Pursuits of Happiness," a director of the Public Banking Institute and chairman of the Pennsylvania Project. Mike is an international transportation and logisics executive with broad experience in U.S. government and politics. Mike has lived in the first world and the third world, traveled widely and done business on five continents.



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