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Jewish World Review Oct. 9, 2008 / 10 Tishrei 5769 McCain's course for victory By Jonah Goldberg
http://www.JewishWorldReview.com |
John McCain, a former naval aviator, knows what it's like to be heading for a crash landing. But he also knows how to pull out of a nose dive.
McCain needs a two-pronged strategy.
First, he must attack Barack Obama and the Democratic Party, which is very close to completely taking over the government. He needs to show that the choice in November is stark, that he's the safer choice and that there's more to Obama than what we've seen in the mostly fawning news media. But while McCain needs to go negative against Obama, he must simultaneously go positive with the American people, telling them what he will do for them.
Once the darling of mainstream journalism, McCain now seems incapable of grasping that liberal elements of the press simply want him to lose. Many mainstream reporters are so deep in the Obama bunker they could play Operation during a Dresden-style air raid and not even light up the patient's nose. Waiting for them to push storylines disadvantageous to Obama is like waiting for Godot. That means McCain needs to not only attack Obama, but also attack him sharply and honestly enough that the news media have no choice but to cover the underlying charges.
For starters: Pin the Wall Street mess on the donkey.
Politically, McCain has fumbled the subprime mortgage crisis, even though he has a great record as a government reformer and a whistle-blower on Fannie Mae. And yet in Thursday's vice presidential debate, Sarah Palin once again put the blame for this crisis on Wall Street's "predator lenders."
That won't work, not when the entire Democratic Party is deceitfully blaming some mythological McCain-led deregulation of the banking industry. Sen. McCain has already called for the head of Chris Cox, the GOP chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission, but he has barely gone after the Democrats with more than a Nerf bat.
Democrats have been in charge of congressional oversight since 2006. Before that, they stonewalled McCain's effort to get a "world class regulator" for Fannie and Freddie. McCain should directly tie Obama, Joe Biden, Chris Dodd and Barney Frank to the policies that turned the housing bust into financial Armageddon. If Cox needs to be fired, McCain should ask, why do Frank and Dodd still have their jobs?
Play the Bill Ayers and the Rev. Jeremiah Wright cards. Obama attacks McCain's ties to former senator and one-time economic adviser Phil Gramm in nearly every stump speech in order to insinuate that McCain's too economically conservative. And, of course, Obama and Biden can't draw a breath without exhaling "Bush," "McCain-Bush," "Bush this" and "Bush that," even though anyone who has read newspapers over the past decade knows that McCain and George W. Bush are not exactly wingmen.
If these tactics are perfectly fine in big league politics (and they are), why on earth is it unacceptable to link Obama with Ayers, who helped Obama launch his political career, served on a foundation board with him and just happens to be an unrepentant anti-American terrorist? Why shouldn't McCain call attention to Obama's deep and long-lasting relationship with Wright, a hateful, bigoted and radical preacher? Obama says he wants to appoint judges who share his vision. Until Obama decided to run for president, his vision did not conflict with Ayers' and Wright's.
Forget about the troop surge in Iraq, foreign policy and all that. Go after Obama's greatest weakness: He is all talk. From the Wall Street crisis, to ethics reform, to fluffy rhetoric of bipartisanship, Obama is all sizzle and no steak. Indeed, Obama casts himself as a champion of a new, high-minded politics. But he was trained in the political gutters of Chicago, and nothing has changed. Cite chapter and verse of how Obama has time and again confused talking for doing.
Point out that an Obama presidency would be a rubber-stamp on a Pelosi prime ministership. Obama has never stood up in a serious way to his own party. From Chicago on, he has been a party man. Who, McCain must ask, will be more likely to say no to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's expensive schemes and radical ideas while working constructively on bipartisan issues? The most left-wing member of the Senate or the flinty Republican maverick who has earned the wrath of his own party time and time again?
Which brings us to the positive message. McCain needs to reprise his "fighter" theme from the GOP convention. "I'll fight for you," he should say, "my opponent will talk at you. I'll lower your gas bill, your health care bill and your tax bill. Obama will raise all three."
More important, take a page from Palin and speak directly to the American people. McCain shouldn't whine about bad press, but he should indict the "media filter" by telling viewers to get the full story by Googling "Obama and Acorn" (a radical left-wing group Obama once worked for that has been implicated in shady practices). Send viewers to YouTube to search for "Democrats and Fannie Mae." (Don't send people to your own website because undecided voters won't trust it.)
Most of all, channel voter anger in a positive direction. Don't get angry at Obama, get angry at those in the government and the private sector who breached the public's trust.
At this point, the only way McCain can glide to victory is if he can catch the updraft of voters' red-hot anger.
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Arnold Ahlert | |||||||||||
