The Speech
I don’t really have much to say about the contents. It was pretty predictable, nothing new. I really liked the specific, personal attacks on McCain. I was bored with the long policy specific section, but for some reason, the media decided that he needs to get specific, despite the fact that there was nothing new in the policy points. Anyone who cared about policy already knew all that stuff. But he got it done.
The most important part of the speech is how it totally destroyed the narrative the GOP was trying to construct in the week coming up to the convention. The setting didn’t look “imperial” at all. The idea that 84,000 people cheering and waving American flags could possibly be a bad thing was always mildly absurd. But the TV coverage of the speech really showed just how ridiculous that notion was.
One complaint – and this applies to just about every convention speech besides Kerry – was that there wasn’t a single compelling, personal reason why McCain was bad. Most of Obama’s criticisms, beside that one reference to temperament and talking about Pakistan, could be said about any Republican who could be nominated. Besides McCain’s continuity with Bush, there wasn’t a single narrative thread about why John McCain shouldn’t be president of the United States. The McSame line will probably get Obama 70-80 percent of the way there, but McCain is a popular politician, with 60 percent likability ratings and still a reputation as a maverick.
What the Obama campaign ought to do is either go full frontal on his personal flaws – out of touch, angry, embittered – or turn his maverick reputation against him. I think Kerry’s “the man McCain vs candidate McCain” provides the best template to do this. It frames the discussion the way most undecided voters understand McCain, and puts his flip flops and selling out the right wing in context. The only risk with this strategy is that it might let some people think that once McCain’s in office, he’ll revert to his maverick instincts. That’s a risk, but the Republicans were able to win* two elections because they had a simple narrative about the opposing candidate. Obama should be able to win because the country is fed up with Bush and because they overwhelmingly disagree with his policies, but the polls are too close. It’s not just that they have to attack McCain more – they’ve been attacking plenty – it’s that those attacks have to coherent and specific. Obama didn’t quite do that, but hopefully he’ll figure it out soon.
