September 05, 2008
Rosie DiManno
Columnist
ST. PAUL, MINN.–The Democratic Dilemma: Republicans are savvier, scrappier and scruples-averse.
Also – something Canadians clearly cannot understand – Americans have a default GOP command encoded into their hard-drive, almost like a virus, which more often than not compels a majority of the electorate to cast their ballots for the establishment party even when deeply unhappy with its performance.
Much like the federal Liberals north of the border, a certain entitlement has accrued to the Republicans, so that they will make a dogfight out of this presidential race, against all predictions and despite the thundering unpopularity of George W. Bush.
It helps, of course, that Democrats keep putting forth the most radically liberal options possible – from Mike Dukakis to John Kerry to Barack Obama – providing stark and simplified choices.
More to the point, as has become evident here this week, Republicans observe nobody's rules but their own, tactically outwitting the opposition and fearless in playing hardball. One can only marvel at such brass, such balls, how bang-on the offence works, even when it offends.
Obama keeps saying John McCain and his political ilk just don't get it. Except they do get it and they can bring it, to use a baseball expression.
Sarah Palin was swinging from the heels Wednesday night and Obama took it between the eyes, scorned and ridiculed and belittled, from his community activism in Chicago (why this provoked laughter I still don't follow) to his soaring oratory on the stump.
Such taunting merited an in-your-face comeback, a little dirty dissing counterthrust. Yet, yesterday, the Democratic candidate could muster only a sissy retort: "I've been called worse on the basketball court. It's not that big a deal."
Except this isn't a basketball court and it is a big deal.
"What did you expect?" Obama continued, soft-shoe-shuffling to reporters in Ohio. "This is what they do. They don't have an agenda to run on.
"They've spent the entire two nights attacking me or extolling John McCain's biography, which is fine. They can use their convention time any way they want, but you can't expect that I'd be surprised by attacks from Republicans."
The Dalai Lama has come up with better put-downs.
Obama had better put some lead in his pencil, forget the dignified cool, or he risks being written off in an election that was his to lose. Imagine becoming that historical footnote: The black Democrat who couldn't wrestle the White House back from the GOP in '08.
It's not that the Democrats are incapable of slugging back or even whacking first – there were certainly enough digs in Denver last week. But they're sluggish and off-key on the rebuttal, either too self-consciously gracious, like Obama, or too much the self-righteous dandies, sounding pompous and polemical rather than aggressive, sarcastic rather than ironic.
Even on the immediate counterthrust after Palin's provocative VP acceptance speech, one talking head – press secretary for Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid – put his foot exactly wrong, describing the candidate's remarks as "shrill" – just about the most pejorative adjective that can be applied to a woman, especially a woman in politics, suggesting hysteria, a sexist code word to be avoided at all costs. Might as well have called her a bitch, idiot.
This is not tough talk. This is linguistic suicide.
Thirty-seven million viewers had tuned in to Palin's maiden national speech, very nearly matching eyeballs-on for Obama in his centre stage turn last Thursday.
Momentum has abruptly switched to the party batting last, with Democrats apparently having no clear tit-for-tat plan to neutralize either narrative on the Republican ticket: Not Mommy Dearest on the bottom or War Hero on the top.
"In politics, there are some candidates who use change to promote their careers," Palin chided the other night. "And then there are those, like John McCain, who use their careers to promote change."
Ouch.
What to do with a problem called Sarah – smacking her down without the ugly optics of seeming to beat her up. Because she's a girl, right? And what to do with a presidential aspirant who's walked the walk in service to his country, "service" the bumper-sticker branding of this convention, now brazenly usurping both Obama's "change" mantra and reformer-from-outside status.
Neat trick, that, for someone who's been in the Senate 22 years, a genuine maverick – agreed – until he started courting the reactionary right, a.k.a. party base, in recent months, every day making himself less appealing to independents and non-ideological middle America.
However, who's to argue with what McCain and his party are doing, after this week's smackdown, the Democrats thus far so inept at smack-back? Winning isn't about heaving to integrity or personal convictions. It might fairly be said that Palin is doing more of that than McCain, so different now from the idiosyncratic candidate of town hall meetings earlier in the year.
With his pit bull off the leash, McCain could afford to take the higher road last night, buffing his image as 72-year-old idealist and patriot, the pressure to knock one out of the park – formal speaking not his forte – greatly reduced. But he hit enough of the right grace notes.
"I fell in love with this country when I was a prisoner in someone else's. I loved it not just for the many comforts of life here. I loved it for its decency; for its faith in the wisdom, justice and goodness of its people. I loved it because it was not just a place, but an idea, a cause worth fighting for.
"I was never the same again. I wasn't my own man any more. I was my country's."
That's throwing down the gauntlet. Democrats need to take off the gloves.
http://www.thestar.com/printArticle/491113
Just like I said a few months ago, McCain will win this election.
Rosie DiManno
Columnist
ST. PAUL, MINN.–The Democratic Dilemma: Republicans are savvier, scrappier and scruples-averse.
Also – something Canadians clearly cannot understand – Americans have a default GOP command encoded into their hard-drive, almost like a virus, which more often than not compels a majority of the electorate to cast their ballots for the establishment party even when deeply unhappy with its performance.
Much like the federal Liberals north of the border, a certain entitlement has accrued to the Republicans, so that they will make a dogfight out of this presidential race, against all predictions and despite the thundering unpopularity of George W. Bush.
It helps, of course, that Democrats keep putting forth the most radically liberal options possible – from Mike Dukakis to John Kerry to Barack Obama – providing stark and simplified choices.
More to the point, as has become evident here this week, Republicans observe nobody's rules but their own, tactically outwitting the opposition and fearless in playing hardball. One can only marvel at such brass, such balls, how bang-on the offence works, even when it offends.
Obama keeps saying John McCain and his political ilk just don't get it. Except they do get it and they can bring it, to use a baseball expression.
Sarah Palin was swinging from the heels Wednesday night and Obama took it between the eyes, scorned and ridiculed and belittled, from his community activism in Chicago (why this provoked laughter I still don't follow) to his soaring oratory on the stump.
Such taunting merited an in-your-face comeback, a little dirty dissing counterthrust. Yet, yesterday, the Democratic candidate could muster only a sissy retort: "I've been called worse on the basketball court. It's not that big a deal."
Except this isn't a basketball court and it is a big deal.
"What did you expect?" Obama continued, soft-shoe-shuffling to reporters in Ohio. "This is what they do. They don't have an agenda to run on.
"They've spent the entire two nights attacking me or extolling John McCain's biography, which is fine. They can use their convention time any way they want, but you can't expect that I'd be surprised by attacks from Republicans."
The Dalai Lama has come up with better put-downs.
Obama had better put some lead in his pencil, forget the dignified cool, or he risks being written off in an election that was his to lose. Imagine becoming that historical footnote: The black Democrat who couldn't wrestle the White House back from the GOP in '08.
It's not that the Democrats are incapable of slugging back or even whacking first – there were certainly enough digs in Denver last week. But they're sluggish and off-key on the rebuttal, either too self-consciously gracious, like Obama, or too much the self-righteous dandies, sounding pompous and polemical rather than aggressive, sarcastic rather than ironic.
Even on the immediate counterthrust after Palin's provocative VP acceptance speech, one talking head – press secretary for Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid – put his foot exactly wrong, describing the candidate's remarks as "shrill" – just about the most pejorative adjective that can be applied to a woman, especially a woman in politics, suggesting hysteria, a sexist code word to be avoided at all costs. Might as well have called her a bitch, idiot.
This is not tough talk. This is linguistic suicide.
Thirty-seven million viewers had tuned in to Palin's maiden national speech, very nearly matching eyeballs-on for Obama in his centre stage turn last Thursday.
Momentum has abruptly switched to the party batting last, with Democrats apparently having no clear tit-for-tat plan to neutralize either narrative on the Republican ticket: Not Mommy Dearest on the bottom or War Hero on the top.
"In politics, there are some candidates who use change to promote their careers," Palin chided the other night. "And then there are those, like John McCain, who use their careers to promote change."
Ouch.
What to do with a problem called Sarah – smacking her down without the ugly optics of seeming to beat her up. Because she's a girl, right? And what to do with a presidential aspirant who's walked the walk in service to his country, "service" the bumper-sticker branding of this convention, now brazenly usurping both Obama's "change" mantra and reformer-from-outside status.
Neat trick, that, for someone who's been in the Senate 22 years, a genuine maverick – agreed – until he started courting the reactionary right, a.k.a. party base, in recent months, every day making himself less appealing to independents and non-ideological middle America.
However, who's to argue with what McCain and his party are doing, after this week's smackdown, the Democrats thus far so inept at smack-back? Winning isn't about heaving to integrity or personal convictions. It might fairly be said that Palin is doing more of that than McCain, so different now from the idiosyncratic candidate of town hall meetings earlier in the year.
With his pit bull off the leash, McCain could afford to take the higher road last night, buffing his image as 72-year-old idealist and patriot, the pressure to knock one out of the park – formal speaking not his forte – greatly reduced. But he hit enough of the right grace notes.
"I fell in love with this country when I was a prisoner in someone else's. I loved it not just for the many comforts of life here. I loved it for its decency; for its faith in the wisdom, justice and goodness of its people. I loved it because it was not just a place, but an idea, a cause worth fighting for.
"I was never the same again. I wasn't my own man any more. I was my country's."
That's throwing down the gauntlet. Democrats need to take off the gloves.
http://www.thestar.com/printArticle/491113
Just like I said a few months ago, McCain will win this election.
