I recently had the pleasure of attending a town hall meeting in the Baton Rouge RiverCenter featuring Senator John McCain, the Republican nominee for president. Senator McCain was introduced by a train of incremantally more prestigous local officials, from Mayor Kip Holden to Ex-Governor Buddy Romer, to Governer Jindal. Governor Jindal's mere appearence on the stage caused an eruption of applause and good ole-fashined hollerin'. It was almost scary how religious the crowd's fervor for the man is.
Religion, by the way, was not by any means a taboo topic at this event. Mayor Holden came out strong by lauding the Senator in religious terms; McCain himself said of Washington D.C., and I quote: "It's hard doing the Lord's work in the city of Satan, my friends." It seems likely that he was playing to the crowd; the senator enjoyed an obviously overwhelmingly conservative audience. Questions that were posed were less actual interrrogations and more set-ups for his talking points. The first lady who got to speak was chosen because either she A.)was so much of a plant she gets energy by photosynthesis or B.)was waving her arms like she was on fire.
That being said, I was impressed by his responses. McCain obviously brings a great deal of experience and has a coherent, rational, consistent political philosophy. A few times, he brought up his own controversial topics, as if to prove he could. This event only increased my support for McCain as a candidate.
However, one thing concerns me. McCain simply does not have the charisma of his opponent, Barack Obama. If Obama has one thing going for him, the man oozes charisma like mayonaise from a McChicken Sandwhich. This could become a serious liability when the election draws near and the official debates start. I can only hope that McCain can summon all of his rhetorical prowess so that he doesn't repeat the infamous Nixon/Kennedy debacle and steer his old, bald campaign into an iceberg
However, there is a ray of hope for the McCain team. McCain announced at the meeting that he has invited (challenged) Barack Obama to a series of 10 or so similar Town Hall-style meetings.
The catch? They'll be doing it together (competitively).
I will admit, I've been frustrated by the formal debates recently. The past few formal debates have been nothing but oppurtunities for the candidates to dodge questions and whip out their same tired stump speeches.
Hopefully, this will be the end to that. In my opinion, a town-hall style format lessens the chance of recycled speeches making it into the "dialogue." I'm practically salivating for a chance for the two candidates to be dumped in the same rhetorical ring, peppered by questions from an audience that contains members of both sides of the political spectrum. This environment means having to think on your feet, or, more appropriately, requires a consistent, logical political philosophy and a fundamental understanding of a wide variety of issues.
If Barack has the cajones to accept this challenge, I think McCain can show that, although he doesn't have Obama's silver tongue, he is at least as qualified, if not moreso than his opponent.
3 comments:
A senator trying to establish distance from a president less than popular than HPV probably shouldn't be asking for more opportunities to showcase his conservative agenda - an agenda that only diverts from the current catastrophically unpopular president on global warming (he acknowledges it) and Bush tax cuts (insufficiently generous).
The problem that every GOP operative I now keeps citing is that the party brand is in the shitter because of the current president - and, though McCain is the only GOP candidate who has a chance in hell against Obama, his repudiation of the qualities that made him a great candidate in 2000 are just as shameless as Mitt Romney.
Maybe I'm crazy for thinking about this somewhat rationally, but a candidate who proudly touts policy positions that are incredibly unpopular (and we're talking about 70/30 issues here) isn't what I would call a "moderate." In fact, such a candidate would be a far cry from "hardcore moderation" - if we take "moderation" to mean things that reasonable people agree with in reasonable numbers.
McCain is a neo-liberal (in layman's terms, far right) on the economy - is one can honestly say that McCain has any ideas about the economy, which is a stretch. He's well outside the mainstream on abortion (70% of the country is in favor of Roe v. Wade being upheld). He's not only in favor of the current war in Iraq, but suggests a foreign policy with Iran which would necessarily lead to more war (70% of Americans disagree with him on Iraq, while only 8% agree with war with Iran).
I guess what I'm saying in a roundabout way is that I'm unclear how any of the issues you're touching on in recent posts can be charitably considered to be moderate, or how your ideological assertions based on those politicians you approve of can in any charitable way be called "moderate."
I'm a liberal - I don't believe in free trade, think the idea that anyone can truly be said to own property is half-baked, believe in wealth caps accompanied by wealth redistribution and believe that abortion is okay because fetuses aren't human life. Further, I think taxation is necessary and should be disproportionately placed on the wealthy given that the wealthy are given more opportunities by the state and have a greater duty to the state - a position as old as the Republican prerogatives as the Roman empire.
So when I see things that presume that Bobby Jindal and John McCain are in some possible universe considered moderate or reasonable candidates, I'm left very confused: especially since by any objective standard the Democratic party is right of center.
Thus, Jindal and McCain - given their stated economic beliefs and, in Jindal's case, retrograde socially conservative policies that are admittedly anti-science - represent the far right.
NOTE: One can make a strong case that Jindal is actually a good deal closer to the center than McCain given his penchant for deficit spending and continuing Democratic policies, but this is a metric measured in inches rather than miles.
I fail to see how a true moderate in the denotational sense of the word can express any affinity for the Republican party whatsoever - their agenda since the Goldwater revolution has been around the Thatcher area of the political compass.
I left the Democratic party because it's a party that only appeals to moderates; centrist on economics, less authoritarian than the Republicans but still quite authoritarian.
So if I'm a liberal - which I am - where does that leave you, as a hardcore moderate? I'm an Obama supporter despite the fact that he's a milquetoast American moderate simply because he's the best that I can get - and his extensive policy platform in many ways lags behind that of Bob Barr in terms of progressivism.
-neal
Of course McCain is going to court a conservative crowd. Yes he's pandering; they have a synonymn for that, and it's POLITICS.
Although it's true that the policy positions I talk about and that you criticize are unpopular in a broad national sense, you have to remember that the man was speaking to a rabidly conservative crowd. You can't expect the man to stand up and tout how he differs from Bush in the face of that; that's just not good politics.
That article from Rolling Stone you sent out only helps my point. Yes McCain is looking like just another idealogue. THAT'S THE POINT. The man can't get elected by Republicans if he doesn't look like a Republican. And, as Taibbi himself painstakingly points out, many these positions miraculously changed right before the election.
DUH. McCain is blatantly courting far-right folks. Is this shameful? NO. It's neccessary. And even if it wasn't, it's par for the course when it comes to politics.
And by the way, just because I support McCain does not in any way shape or form mean I support the Republican part. Just would like to make that clear.
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