Obama, Throwing Heat

By Howard Kurtz
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, June 10, 2008 9:51 AM

RALEIGH, N.C., -- Monday was the first day of the rest of your campaign.

And it was hot. As in, 101 degrees. And here at the North Carolina State Fairgrounds, amid the funnel cakes and "Barrel of Fun" rides, you could work up a good sweat waiting to pass through the magnetometers.

The first sign that Barack Obama was in general-election mode was inside the cavernous expo center, on the huge blue billboard that served as his backdrop: "Change That Works for You." It's a subtle tweaking of his primary slogan; now it's no longer about him, it's about you.

And it's no longer about Hillary Clinton. A bit odd, after the endless primary season, to cover Obama now as the undisputed Democratic nominee, no longer dueling the woman who promised to be ready on Day One. Although he did begin by paying tribute to her "historic" effort, which I imagine we'll keep hearing as he tries to appeal to HRC's voters.

One other oddity: Obama had John and Elizabeth Edwards here, along with half a dozen governors, including Virginia's Tim Kaine and Maryland's Martin O'Malley, but didn't invite them on stage. People in the crowd couldn't see them. Ergo, no photo op.

The kickoff in this red state was an economic speech that contained no new economics. But Obama came out swinging, pummeling John McCain on tax cuts, housing and health care in a way that signaled he plans to stay on offense. To my ear, he spent more time on the attack and less on detailing his proposals, than in any other speech I can think of.

Obama's speech was sprinkled with sound bites--McCain would turn President Bush's housing approach of "too little too late" into "even less even later," his health-care plan only takes care of "the healthy and wealthy"--that elicited the desired applause. He also engaged in some selective statistics, denouncing the McCain tax cuts as outrageous because they would save Exxon-Mobil $1.2 billion.

Before ripping into McCain for a "full-throated endorsement of George Bush's policies," Obama allowed that McCain can "legitimately tout independence from his party" on congressional earmarks and climate change. A hat tip to your opponent can sometimes make your charges sound less indiscriminate and more credible.

Obama said it was not a conservative vs. liberal argument, but it sure sounded that way.

After the speech, the media contingent had the audacity to hope for a cool ride to the airport. Tragically, the A/C on the bus was kaput. So much for the glamour of the campaign trail.

"Senator Barack Obama, with the Democratic stage to himself for the first time, began a two-week assault on Senator John McCain's economic policies in a series of battleground states on Monday, moving to define the general election campaign by focusing on the economy as the central theme," says the New York Times.

"Mr. Obama assailed Mr. McCain, the likely Republican nominee for president, for what he characterized as a dangerous ignorance of economic matters. His remarks signaled how he plans to pound away at his core argument: that electing Mr. McCain would mean four more years of what he termed the failed economic programs of the Bush administration.

"Mr. Obama used the address to reach out to lower-income and lesser-educated Americans who rejected him in the Democratic primaries in favor of Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, who formally conceded the race on Saturday and pledged her support for Mr. Obama."

The L.A. Times version: "With recession in the air and gasoline over $4 a gallon, presumptive presidential nominees John McCain and Barack Obama focused on the economy today, each accusing the other of not understanding how it works. Obama launched his 'Change That Works for You' tour in Raleigh, N.C, where he blamed much of the nation's economic troubles on the Bush administration and policies that he said are 'little more than the worn dogma that says we should give more to those at the top and hope that their good fortune trickles down to the many who are hardworking.'

"Stronger government investment in health care, education, energy and the infrastructure could have lessened some of the economic impact on families, he said . . .

"The McCain campaign charged that Obama's economic solutions would 'further weaken our economy. While hardworking families are hurting and employers are vulnerable, Barack Obama has promised higher income taxes, Social Security taxes, capital gains taxes, dividend taxes, and tax hikes on job creating businesses' campaign spokesman Tucker Bounds said."

McCain offered this jab with Brian Williams: "Obama says that I'm running for a Bush's third terms. It seems to me he's running for Jimmy Carter's second."

There's some interesting shadow-boxing going on over McCain's proposal for them to appear at a dozen town halls. Both campaigns blew off ABC's request for a session to be moderated by Diane Sawyer. They don't want "media sponsors," which means they don't want to give any one network an exclusive. They want it to be open to widespread coverage, as the fall debates are. The reality is that while cable news would be all over it--albeit with less enthusiasm than if Wolf or Brit or Chris and Keith were the moderators--no broadcast network is going to give up lucrative prime-time hours unless its journalists are running the show.

Sponsorship aside, will the Obama camp ultimately agree to this? McCain needs the forums more than Obama does, both because he's the underdog and because he can never come close to matching the Democrat's oratory as he speechifies around the country. And anyone who's seen McCain work the town halls in New Hampshire, as I have in two campaigns, knows that's his best format.

On the other hand, doing a series of no-frills, substantive appearances, long a goal of goo-goos in the media and elsewhere, may hold a certain appeal for Obama. And it would liven up the summer.

Liberals, though, are turning thumbs down. The New Republic's Noam Scheiber:

"I've heard all the arguments for why the joint forums would actually benefit Obama--they'd highlight McCain's old age and diminutive stature; holding his own against a war hero would give Obama gravitas; etc.

"There's something to this. But even if you think Obama would win on points in such a format, that doesn't make it a good idea for him. To make the right strategic call, you have to compare a race in which Obama does the forums to one in which he doesn't. And I don't think that comparison is even close. Under the joint forum scenario, Obama may do marginally better than McCain, but McCain won't be a disaster. Without the joint-forums, McCain has to give a high-profile speech every time he wants serious media attention. (Big media outlets just don't care much about low-key town hall meetings.) And, as we saw Tuesday night, he performs hideously in those settings.

"So, at best, you're looking at a slight advantage for Obama under the joint-forum scenario versus a huge advantage for Obama without them. Seems like a no-brainer to me."

Josh Marshall remembers when Charlie Gibson and George Stephanopoulos were grilling Obama about the Rev. Jeremiah Wright and flag pins:

"After the ABC debate train wreck from last April, I have a hard time believing any candidate -- particularly Barack Obama -- would be stupid enough to accept an invitation for another ABC-controlled debate. And both Obama and McCain have turned down ABC's invitation for an ABC-controlled 'town hall meeting' in Manhattan moderated by Diane Sawyer.

"Interestingly, both campaigns negged the idea on the same grounds: that any town hall events they do will have to be open to all press and not sponsored or organized by a single news organization.

"Perhaps ABC would be more suited to staging a debate between Hannity and Colmes."

It's hard to overstate how bummed Republicans are over McCain's lousy speech on the night when Obama was clinching last week. Bill Kristol, a longtime McCain booster, doesn't sugarcoat it:

"McCain chose to speak early in the evening, before the polls closed in South Dakota and Montana, thereby getting the jump on Obama. He read a disjointed set of remarks at a badly staged rally at the Pontchartrain Center in Kenner, La. Here's part of an e-mail message I received as McCain spoke, from a Republican who admires him: 'They could have done so well tonight, shown a tone of confidence. Instead it looks like a bad Congressional race: dumb green puke background, small crowd . . . Makes me want to cry.'

"In any case, with the battle against Hillary Clinton behind him, everything seems to be going swimmingly for Obama. Meanwhile, the McCain campaign dog-paddles along. And almost every Republican I've talked to is alarmed that the McCain campaign doesn't seem up to the task of electing John McCain.

"Several of these worried McCain supporters cited the decision by the campaign gurus that McCain's Tuesday night speech should consist in large part of criticisms of Obama's various proposals. The attacks often concluded, 'That's not change we can believe in.' Is it wise to begin a general election campaign by making fun of your opponent's slogan and presenting yourself mostly as a debunker of his claims? Even hard-hearted Republicans think a general election message should be a bit more positive than that."

The Daily Mail tracks down McCain's first wife, Carol, but she does not throw him under the Straight Talk Express:

"My marriage ended because John McCain didn't want to be 40, he wanted to be 25. You know that happens . . . it just does."

In Tuesday's print column, NBC's Richard Engel responds to criticism of his war coverage.

I wrote Monday about Mayhill Fowler, the Huffington Post blogger who reported both Obama's "bitter" comments and Bill Clinton's "scumbag" tirade, both under questionable circumstances. The Fowler saga has now sparked a rather sharp exchange between Buzz Machine's Jeff Jarvis and Politico's Michael Calderone:

"I arrived home and found a comment on my post that echoed his opinions closely under the name Mary. [She called his post "disgraceful" and "offensive."] I looked up the IP and found it came from a Politico-related company. I responded to Mary and noted the source -- and the irony that this appeared to be a person at Politico misrepresenting herself. Calderone emailed me saying he did not write the comment -- which I hadn't said -- but acknowledged that a colleague did. He then left a comment on my post -- which is how I would have preferred this discussion to have happened, in public. I looked at the IP address and it was identical to Mary's. So I then asked him point-blank whether he wrote Mary's comment. He said he did not and I take him at his word. I suppose the IP is the company's firewall.

"So I wrote to Politico's editor, John Harris, asking his policy and views for this post. On reporters' identity, Harris said: 'At Politico I expect reporters to identify themselves clearly as journalists when asking questions of public officials or average citizens alike. If there were exceptions to this, I would want as editor to be closely consulted about the reasons.'

"But then I was rather shocked at what he said about hidden identity in comments -- sockpuppetry: 'My preference is that if Politico staff are going to engage in debates about journalism they do so with name attached. But the case of leaving comments on a blog or submitting a question to an on-line chat strikes me as not exactly involving sacred principles. When I was at the Post I would frequently send in questions under various to colleagues for their on-line chats, just to be mischievous. These days with a new publication I'm too busy for that nonsense. In any event, have you never done something similar?'"

I didn't know Harris had done that!

Jarvis says he's never done such a thing, and in fact, Michael Hiltzik of the L.A. Times lost his column for leaving anonymous comments on other people's blogs.

"Mary" adds in a follow-up note to Jarvis:

"This was the first time I've ever commented on a blog and I ended up embarrassed at work as a result, which leaves me questioning whether it's worth it to join in on the great democratization of media."

I'm in the camp that believes journalists should always identify themselves. In fact, I think everyone should identify himself or herself, which would probably cut down on the bile factor. Newspapers don't print letters without people's names; why should they post anonymous comments?

Finally, I mentioned Monday that McCain had told Newsweek that he hadn't uttered a line in a speech text that the media had treated Hillary poorly. Well, it turns out that McCain had used the line. A McCain spokesman says Newsweek's rendering of the comment was "paraphrased and unclear," but the magazine says it was verbatim.