Robert Draper's New York Times piece on the McCain campaign skillfully maps out the strange remove from which McCain and his aides have been operating, a place that few people outside the world of politics could locate in their own experience. It is an imaginary land built entirely of literary abstractions, including "narrative," "character," and "true character moment." (Attn. literary theorists: You could make an argument that it's the first post-structuralist campaign.)
Here is one example:
The campaign was in the throes of an identity crisis by June 24, when a number of senior strategists gathered at 9:30 a.m. in a conference room of McCain's campaign headquarters in Arlington. As one participant said later, the meeting was convened "because we still couldn't answer the question, 'Why elect John McCain?' " Considering that the election was less than five months away, this was not a good sign.
"We had a narrative problem," Matt McDonald recalls. "Obama had a story line: 'Bush is the problem. I'm not going to be Bush, and McCain will be.' Our story line, I argued, had to be that it's not about Bush -- it's Congress, it's Washington. And Obama would be more about partisanship, while John McCain would buck the party line and bring people together."The others could see McDonald's line of reasoning -- and above all, the need to separate McCain from Bush. But the message seemed antiseptic, impersonal. That was when the keeper of McCain's biography, Mark Salter, took the floor. There's a reason McCain bucks his party, McDonald remembers Salter arguing. It's because he puts his country ahead of party. Then the speechwriter, who is not known for his dispassion, began to yell: "We're talking about someone who was willing to die before losing his honor! He would die!"
OK, then. I can appreciate as well as anyone the difficulty of crafting a consistent national message for a presidential campaign, especially a losing one taking place in a time of crisis. But like most people, I tend to think that the message flows from some basic questions any contender might ask him/herself before running: what do I want to do as president? What problems does the country face at this pass in our history? What programs and policies might I put in place to confront those problems? One perk of running for president is you get to think really, really big.
But there's very little evidence in this piece, based on months of reporting and interviews with McCain staffers, that McCain and his advisers have done this. His campaign seems based on one idea alone: because of who he is - not what he has done as a senator, not what he wants to do as president, but who he is - John McCain should be president. It's not like this is nothing. Who John McCain is is clearly an interesting story, and they play around with it just about every conceivable way in successive attempts to sell his candidacy. But nowhere in the piece do you get the sense that McCain is grappling with the issues of the day. Instead, his staff is shown furiously packaging and staging the candidate's reactions to passing news events such as the Russia-Georgia skirmish, trying to fit them to one of their narratives.
This reaches its low point with the Sept. decision to suspend the campaign, which is supposed to be a "true character moment." But as Hilzoy notes, the campaign's response is all about staging and perception and "character," not, well, character - the qualities a real leader employs to respond to a political crisis:
If a Presidential candidate truly wants to do the right thing in a situation like this, it seems to me that the best thing to do is not to talk about it, and not to do anything dramatic, but to work as hard as you can behind the scenes. Very few difficult policy decisions are improved by having Presidential politics injected into them, and this seemed unlikely to be one of the exceptions. McCain is not on any of the relevant committees, has no obvious expertise in finance, and, by all accounts, does not have the kind of standing in Congress that would let him rally members behind him. That means that it's not at all clear how his returning to DC would help at all, especially since he could just as easily have tried to round up support for whatever course of action he thought best by phone.
If McCain had actually asked himself what the right thing to do was, it's hard to see how he could have come up with the answer: suspending my campaign and heading to Washington. If he did think that that was the most helpful thing he could do under the circumstances, I'd have to seriously question both his judgment and his insight into his own capacities.
It may be that there was nothing McCain could have done to turn the tide of the election this year. But he did have an opportunity - the one taken away from him in 2000 - to put his own stamp on the Republican Party. Sure, it might have torn the party apart - but the party is coming apart now anyway. And even that would have shown that McCain and his aides were actively thinking about the party and the country, rather than merely endlessly crafting perceptions.
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So is the McCain team actually in the tank for Obama?
The NY Magazine overview, narrative in campaign thematics, is fascinating.
Working internationally, on the concept of how people understand propositions (as a strategist and designer), there are several things that ring "true". That's one: Truth. True people. True brands.
People either smell the truth or scent a rat. They trust. Or they don't. Truth, in narrative is how people connect with each other. Telling a story that "feels right" -- it's who I am, I'm being "truth full", then there will be a connection between us. One to one. One -- one million.
Another idea -- of truth, in brands, people or propositions -- is the story itself. People think of their lives in the context of stories -- defining experiences based on the weavings of the(ir) story. In sharing a story, you embrace an other.
So, in true stories, true brands, true people -- aligning narrative is crucial for connectedness. The story stumbles, then listeners will fall away.
In listening to people, and finding the story, you've got to reach in -- find the true heart and soul. Tell it, people come. Tell not a truth -- and you will get burned.
It's where I live: true stories:
http://tim.girvin.com/Entries/?p=556
http://blog.girvin.com/?p=1188
http://blog.girvin.com/index.php?s=True+Stories
Tim Girvin | GIRVIN Brands
NYC
http://www.girvin.com | http://www.tim.girvin.com/ |
blog: http://blog.girvin.com/
girvin@girvin.com
1. His violation of the USNA honor code, http://www.perrspectives.com/blog/archives/001232.htm
2. His never-ending claim that he is someone great because he "put his country first", instead of admitting that he was simply following orders like any other captured service person should have when he refused to accept parole from the POW camp. http://gba.wavethemes.net/code-of-conduct.html
I guess he banks on the fact that few people have ever heard of the American Fighting Man's Code of Conduct, or the Honor Code.
I find his brand of 'patriotism' disgusting.
Unlike Jimmy Carter, http://millercenter.org/academic/americanpresident/carter/essays/biography/2
who graduated near the top of his class and has a nuclear sub named after him, McCain graduated at the bottom of his class. I am willing to bet that he never wanted to join the Navy in the first place.
http://www.rollingstone.com/news/story/23316912/makebelieve_maverick/print
That's a strong argument for having a sub named after McCain actually. ;-)
It could possibly be failing as one of the last structuralist ones, though.
Obama's campaign is more like a post-structuralist campaign, given its decentering in the grass roots. If it was also aiming to deliver the Senate and Congress, it would be even more on that path. Either way, neither campaign really addresses the schizoid nature of capitalism - but I know which one I think does a better job of trying.
Or perhaps post-pre-post-structuralist...
When McCain suspended his campaign and wanted to postpone the debate during September, I can remember saying, "Huh? What is that going to accomplish?" Absolutely nothing, as it turned out. In fact, from what I read at the time, it actually caused some delays in what had been a bipartisan decision-making process that had been making good progress towards a solution.
As a life-long Democrat, I have seen my state and my country suffer under Dubya and his cronies. I only wish Barack Obama had spent more time and money here in Texas and taken us from red to blue. I have done my part - I voted Obama/Biden last week when early voting opened. But you know we may surprise the country yet. In my daily travels around San Antonio, I have seen numerous Obama/Biden signs and very few for McCain/Palin. I certainly hope we do go blue. That would really stick in McCain's craw!
Make sure you vote this year...early if you can! Your vote does count.
And while it may be a big ambition, it reveals a rather small man.
All EGO and very little substance....!
It became too evident in the second debate when his body language (and his barely contained anger) seemed to say "I still can't believe that I, John McCain, have to share a stage with THAT ONE!"
Aafter so many years in the Senate, aside from MCain-Feingold, what do people recall about McCain's positions, other than he proudly voted with Bush more than 90% of the time?
That ALONE should preclude him from EVER becoming a candidate for President!
outside the government.
John McCain has been amply rewarded for his service. That was was many years ago. I know
of no one who still lives in that time period but McCain. He needs to move on.
I for one am tired of hearing him blast poor welfare receiving people when he has a life long
record of receiving welfare from our government. (they call it service, but we know better)
From Obama's wiki -
"As a member of the Democratic minority in the 109th Congress, he helped create legislation to control conventional weapons and to promote greater public accountability in the use of federal funds. He also made official trips to Eastern Europe, the Middle East, and Africa. During the 110th Congress, he helped create legislation regarding lobbying and electoral fraud, climate change, nuclear terrorism, and care for returned U.S. military personnel."
Of course that isn't a complete list but easily retrievable by anyone with internet access.
Since McCain's service as senator is 5 times longer, shouldn't his list of accomplishments?
But wiki has even less on McCain -
"he made campaign finance reform one of his signature concerns, which eventually led to the passage of the McCain-Feingold Act in 2002. He is also known for his work towards restoring diplomatic relations with Vietnam in the 1990s, and for his belief that the war in Iraq should be fought to a successful conclusion. McCain has chaired the Senate Commerce Committee, has opposed spending that he considered to be pork barrel, and played a key role in alleviating a crisis over judicial nominations."
Wonder why that is?
But the nuts-and-bolts effectiveness of a campaign matters -- perhaps even more than "message." The media praised the "message" of Rove and company and talked little about their VERY EFFECTIVE ground-game (current buzzword). Likewise, in all the BS regarding this election: Barack v. Hillary, Bill Clinton's hurt feelings, William Ayers, Rev. Wright, the celebrity of Sarah Palin, lipstick on a pig, blah, blah, blah -- the real genius of the Obama campaign -- whatever happens next week -- remains logistics, voluntarism, get-out-the-vote efforts, grassroots appeal, appealing to unlikely voters, mobilizing the youth vote, etc. Those issues don't grab headlines, so not (or at least under-) reported.
Yes. It's the very definition of "community organizing, " isn't it?