The finish-line in sight
In the end, the debate wasn’t even close. David Gergen said on CNN that McCain looked like he “had an anger management problem”; that was part of a broader policing-the-emotions issue. Hours of world-class debate prep failed to make inroads on McCain’s fundamental body language issue, nor was it able to wipe the frustration from his voice. And meanwhile Obama remained almost preternaturally calm: in its desperation, the right is now starting to use that as a weapon as well, the same way it tried to turn the “celebrity” issue on its head. Isn’t this guy human? Does he ever break a sweat?
Not in debates, apparently. Nor if there’s a camera within line-of-sight. But this race isn’t over yet. Yesterday’s polls showed that McCain seemed to have arrested the slide in his numbers, if only temporarily; this debate may send them to new lows, but I suspect that what the next few days will actually show is that Obama has peaked too early—and his supporters may have peaked psychologically as well, given the overconfidence that their candidate is now chastening them on. They would be advised to listen to him, as this race could easily tighten across the last two and a half weeks; keep in mind that the media wants a horserace, and would vastly prefer a “McCain as comeback kid who’s clawing his way back” narrative to one of Obama cruising to a massive, easy victory.
It’s also worth noting that there’s still a lot of time on the clock for an October Surprise, especially one that involves foreign policy. Bin Laden may yet make an appearance, if only on video. But also, Bush/Cheney have more than a few cards to play as well, and both men are acutely conscious that their unprecedented attempt to expand presidential power beyond the limits of the Constitution will come under intense (and possible legal) scrutiny should Obama win. (I doubt that Obama himself wants to take this step, but an awful lot of shit is going to come out even if the top players burn/destroy all their files.) So it’s no surprise that the administration has been anxious to catch Bin Laden in the waning days of the election. And anyone who thinks this is just a matter of Bush’s legacy is #$# kidding themselves.
October 16th, 2008 at 9:28 pm
I don’t know – Did you look at Zogby today? More and more states are going purple. I think McCain’s air quotes around “health of the mother” speeded many more independent women on their way to Obama – that and his sheer crankiness.
I sometimes suspect Bush/Cheney et. al. have a deeper plan. It may be that the Republicans are more or less willing to let this one go, in the hope of coming back full blast in 2012. They never liked McCain anyway, and they aren’t stupid – they knew that this was never their election to win. They can make all the gestures in Pakistan they want – but the time to produce Bin Laden was six months ago, before the economy tanked. Would catching him tomorrow save the Dow?
Something I guess we will never know.
October 17th, 2008 at 9:14 am
Well Dave, Palin’s effect on the polls did scare us all to hell in the immediate aftermath of her convention. But, did anyone ever give the GOP nominee a real chance to win? Tantamount to McCain’s nomination was his willingness to “take one for the team.” (Could that explain Rudy “the shrewd but nasty” Guiliani’s half-hearted effort?) Nevertheless, the process does play itself out in real time and egos get caught up. Fortunately, there are signs that McCain once again may be seeing the writing on the wall (Did you see the humorous speech he delivered last night in New York?).
The real story here is that we are about to have our first non-white president, at last. Our nation needs the next couple of weeks, months, maybe years to deal with the very real emotion impact of our moment of national advancement. We can not remain colorblind. We must embrace a person’s cultural heritage if we are to benefit from the full breadth of their talent and experience. Just as in the natural world, so too are we strengthed by diversity. Oh, yeah, plus the long national nightmare of the Bush administration will be over. We’ve shared this thought many times before Dave, but it bears repeating: this is an incredible time to be on this earth.
October 17th, 2008 at 11:03 am
Trust me, there will *never* be a real investigation into any additional powers the Bush Administration may have created for themselves and those that come behind them. There’s simply no good reason to do so–and you never know when you just might need those magical powers.
October 17th, 2008 at 11:39 am
@ Deborah- I hope you’re right, but I’m suspecting that Obama’s support has hit its ceiling.
@ Jerry– agreed on all fronts. : )
@ Brian– the investigations won’t be a matter of Obama’s choice. Congress will almost certainly weigh in in force, and, now that it’s “safe” to do so, journalists might finally start doing their job again too.
October 18th, 2008 at 9:47 am
Robert Baer thinks Bin Laden is likely dead, which makes McCain’s “plan” to get him kind of interesting. (Maybe he really will follow him into the gates of Hell).
You know the better it looks for Obama the more worried I get. I think his staff might think the same since they touted the example of being 15 points ahead in New Hampshire and then losing the state.
October 20th, 2008 at 9:07 am
[…] this blog anticipated, the presidential race has clearly tightened across the last few days, though Obama still enjoys a […]
October 21st, 2008 at 4:10 pm
The polls this morning were 50 plus for Obama and 43 plus for McCain – although yesterday they said the race was tightening, I think the media are kind of rooting for it to tighten – it’s their bread and butter after all.
It somehow seems like by 2008 we ought to have a way of knowing whether someone is alive or not – some radical DNA world wide alert when any one of us departs for the next life – or perhaps the Gates of Hell. But maybe that’s for the 22nd century.
March 2nd, 2009 at 2:52 pm
Great post, thanks for the info