All About Obama

By Howard Kurtz
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, July 3, 2008 10:06 AM

You may have blinked and missed it, but John McCain has been in Colombia and Mexico the last two days, not that the mainstream media much cares (at least compared to his latest staff shake-up).

I'm going to go out on a limb and say that Barack Obama's upcoming trip to Europe and the Middle East will draw 100 times more coverage, and that may prove to be an understatement.

While few will admit it, most journalists just think Obama is a better story, and a story that sells in terms of circulation and ratings. And in a political sense, Obama is also the story. Much of the debate swirls around who he is, what he believes and whether he has what it takes to be president. McCain is a familiar figure who many view as a default choice for the White House, an experienced hand running a not very exciting campaign. Obama is seen as an inspiring figure who still has something to prove, with his race providing an added layer of complexity for his candidacy.

That is why the Great Flip-Flop Debate matters--for both candidates. Obama has changed his position on the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, public financing, government wiretapping and the D.C. gun ban, opening himself up to attacks that he is abandoning his principles (known, more benignly, as moving to the center). McCain has changed his positions on the Bush tax cuts, offshore oil drilling, veterans' educational benefits and other issues.

But Obama seems to be taking the greater battering on the matter, maybe because the GOP is attacking more effectively, or he's the relative newcomer, or, as I said, because he's the story.

Most voters aren't following every twist and turn of the FISA debate. But they want to get a general sense of what a candidate stands for, and whether he bends with the wind. Flip-flopping makes sense sometimes, if you can offer a convincing rationale. But the game seems to be denying that you're doing any such thing and dismissing past explanations as "inartful."

One last point, amplified nicely by the New Republic's Noam Scheiber, is that pols do this all the time, and Obama hasn't been running as an ordinary pol:

"What 'serial exaggerator' was to Al Gore, and 'wind-surfing flip-flopper' was to John Kerry, so will 'shameless opportunist' be to Barack Obama. To highlight the point for the non-discriminating and the mentally obtuse, the GOP even hauled out its chief meme-smith, Karl Rove, to pronounce it thus. To which the proper response for an Obama supporter should be: Right on! John McCain may win the contest over 'who is willing to put principle above personal ambition and self-interest,' as Rove wrote in last Thursday's Wall Street Journal. But that contest will have very little to do with who wins this fall's election . . .

"It's highly unlikely that McCain will succeed at making Obama look typical or himself especially atypical. For one thing, Obama is young and black and exceptionally thoughtful and eloquent. He could spend every day between now and the election executing plays from the 'typical pol' playbook (not a very interesting read, I assure you) and still look far from typical on November 4.

"Likewise, it's going to be exceedingly difficult for McCain to fend off the taint of typicalness himself . . . McCain has spent much of the last few months moving rightward on issues like tax cuts, immigration, and energy, which is a double-whammy of typicality. First, it moves McCain closer to the party's ideological mainstream. Second, it requires a decent-amount of flip-flopping--a chronic typical-pol maneuver.

"To believe McCain can nonetheless get away with labeling his opponent a typical pol without having the charge boomerang on him reflects a gross misunderstanding of campaign journalism. The political press corps will gladly recite McCain's typical-pol indictment of Obama. But, each time they do, they'll feel obliged to catalogue McCain's own offenses in this regard. In fact, this is already happening."

Time's Michael Scherer raises the question of keeping score:

"The core message of the Obama/DNC campaign is that McCain has flip-flopped on all his old maverick image. The key message of the McCain/RNC campaign is that Obama is an opportunist who will flip-flop when it helps him politically. And so it goes. Every day, flip-flop charges bang up against the political press like moths on a screen door. And we let some of them in, sometimes with the unexamined conceit that any shift in position is a window into the candidate's lack of character, toughness or principle.

"So how do we cull the moths to separate bogus flip-flop charge from valuable one? Does it matter that in Obama's new ad he is boasting of promoting welfare reform that he originally opposed? Should it matter that McCain's call for offshore oil drilling contradicts his past positions? What about Obama's shifts on public financing or the DC gun ban? Or McCain's reversal on the 2001 Bush tax cuts? Or Obama's shift on the FISA bill? Or the unending emails I get about specific votes that prove Senator X or Senator Y has been on two sides of every issue, even though every Senate bills often bundle together a dozen issues forcing senators to vote yes for things they don't like and no for things they like?"

Does the yardstick make sense? Andrew Sullivan doesn't think so:

"It's often a completely idiotic way to analyze a candidate. Sometimes a flip-flop is a sign of real maturity in a politician responding to new events or facts. And sometimes, rigid consistency is disastrous. If Bush had flip-flopped on the Iraq occupation two years earlier, the world would be a much better place. And if he'd flip-flopped on torture and detention after the initial panicked over-reach, he would have been spared an awful and self-defeating ordeal."

Sure, but as I've said, candidates who don't own up to changing their views have to twist themselves into rhetorical pretzels.

But my suggestion would run afoul of the unwritten rules, at least according to Roger Simon:

"The press can be unforgiving about any changes in position, large or small, real or imagined, that a candidate makes. The late George Carlin became famous for his comedy routine on the 'seven words you can never say on TV.' But presidential candidates have four words they can never say on TV or anywhere else: 'I changed my mind.'

"Other words they cannot utter include: 'As circumstances have changed, so have my positions' and 'I have learned a thing or two.' This is not allowed, because it is proof of flip-flopping, pandering, moving to the (gasp) center and, worst of all, trying to get elected."

The Obama evolution looks very different to the editorialists at the Wall Street Journal:

"Most presidential candidates adapt their message after they win their party nomination, but Mr. Obama isn't merely "running to the center." He's fleeing from many of his primary positions so markedly and so rapidly that he's embracing a sizable chunk of President Bush's policy. Who would have thought that a Democrat would rehabilitate the much-maligned Bush agenda?"

Now to the Latest McCain Shake-up, which his staff insists is not a shake-up (in case you haven't noticed, journalists love shake-ups, more so than talking about free trade in Colombia):

"Senator John McCain's presidential campaign has gone through its second shake-up in a year," says the New York Times. "Responding to Republican concerns that his candidacy was faltering, Mr. McCain put a veteran of President Bush's 2004 campaign in charge of day-to-day operations and stepped away from a plan to have the campaign run by 11 regional managers, Mr. McCain's aides said Wednesday.

"The installation of Steve Schmidt, who worked closely with Karl Rove, at Mr. McCain's headquarters represented a sharp diminishment of the responsibilities of Rick Davis, who has been Mr. McCain's campaign manager since the last shake-up nearly a year ago.

"The shift was approved by Mr. McCain after several of his aides, including Mr. Schmidt, went to him about 10 days ago and warned him that he was in danger of losing the presidential election to Senator Barack Obama, the presumptive Democratic nominee, unless he revamped his campaign operation, two officials close to the campaign said."

What you really need, boss, is to give more power to . . . me.

Chris Cillizza: "The contrast between the low quality production values of McCain's [June 3] speech and the perfectly-turned event put together by Barack Obama's team at the Xcel Center in Minnesota was apparent to even the most casual political observer and set off fears among high-level Republicans that the Arizona Senator's campaign was simply not ready for prime time.

"McCain's decision to head to Colombia and Mexico during July 4th week has also been roundly panned; the Post's own Dan Balz wrote a piece today that begins: 'Why is John McCain in Colombia?' "

Ana Marie Cox: "Strategy-wise, Schmidt's been an advocate for some of the boldest moves made by the McCain campaign, including the coyly misrepresentative accusation that Romney was 'for surrender' -- McCain's term -- based on wanting a 'timetable' in Iraq. The charge twisted Romney's words, but many feel that it helped seal Florida -- and thus the nomination -- for McCain. He also hates the press, at least as an organism if not individually; McCain sitting around for hours in bad lighting, with everyone recording everything -- almost alone among the central advisers, Schmidt thinks the benefit is not worth the cost. If you're looking for someone to break up the party between the media and McCain, he's your guy."

My take: Reporters love this move because they've been writing for weeks that McCain's campaign is screwed up, and this validates their analysis. And they respect Schmidt as a tough customer.

Politico: "Accounts diverge on the exact nature of the new chain of command. One top McCain source said that Schmidt 'assumed full operational control of the campaign today' and described Davis as 'a general manager.' But Charlie Black, another top adviser, said Davis was still in charge."

Still more thoughts on the Wes Clark/McCain dust-up, from Betsy's Page:

"Although I don't think that the Obama campaign has adopted any tactic to question McCain's war record, it does seem that there are quite a few on the left, both prominent Democrats and lefty bloggers, who either want to disparage or outright slam that service. In a way, this story resembles the Jeremiah Wright story - something easy to understand that contributes to a storyline that makes Obama look bad and throws a spotlight on the milieu in which he swims. There does seem to be a level of discomfort among these guys about a genuinely heroic military record. These are many of the same people who were thrilled to have a candidate in 2004 who was 'reporting for duty.' Is it military heroism and service that they have a problem with or just that of a Republican's heroic past?"

Here's what Clark said at the 2004 Democratic convention: "John Kerry's combination of physical courage and moral values is my definition of what we need as Americans in our commander in chief."

The big test in this election: An AP/Yahoo poll gives Michelle Obama a 30 percent favorable rating and 35 percent unfavorable, compared to Cindy McCain's 27 percent favorable, 17 percent unfavorable. Michelle was significantly more popular with blacks than whites.

Another round of veep-vetting. Salon's Walter Shapiro has a soft spot for Joe Biden:

"Obama must answer two questions to woo wavering voters during the run-up to the Democratic Convention. The easy one -- 'Who are you?' -- undergirds everything from biographical TV ads to the acceptance speech fireworks in Denver. The trickier question for Obama as a new-generation Democrat is, 'How will you govern?' That cannot be answered with gauzy media imagery and inspirational rhetoric. The tenor of an Obama administration will be suggested, more than anything, by his vice-presidential choice."

Biden, he says, is "one of the leading foreign-policy figures in the Democratic Party. For a would-be president like Obama, who would enter the Oval Office facing the challenge of prudently withdrawing from Iraq, Biden's long-standing proposal to acknowledge reality and divide the country into semi-autonomous Sunni, Shiite and Kurdish regions may have appeal. (Salon conducted a lengthy foreign-policy interview with Biden before the Iowa caucuses.) Granted, Biden, who never served in the military (he failed his draft physical during the Vietnam War), cannot play the macho-man war-hero card like Virginia Sen. Jim Webb. But his son Beau Biden, the attorney general of Delaware, will be deploying to Iraq this fall with his national guard unit.

"Despite the dismal results in Iowa, Biden was a spirited campaigner and an adroit, if sometimes loquacious, debater."

Speaking of debates, here's one over Mitt Romney. First, Jonathan Cohn says Romney makes sense because he's "squeaky clean: He's been fully vetted, not just by the national press during the Republican primaries but, before that, by the always-[aggressive] Boston press during his years as governor. Aside from that story about strapping the dog to the roof--yes, the image sticks, but people will get over it--Romney seems to have nothing in his past that would come back to haunt McCain's general election campaign.

"But there are also other factors that recommend Romney, starting with his expertise on economic policy."

In rebuttal, Eve Fairbanks:

"As mega-finance firms like the Blackstone Group and Countrywide come to be seen as villains in our economic slump, I think Romney's CEO manner and private equity background (the private equity firms, remember, were the ones who were splashily accused last summer of exploiting a tax loophole) could be received by your average voter with as much suspicion as warmth . . .

"But Romney's less than squeaky clean in another way: During the primaries, he proved himself perhaps the most deliciously mockable mainstream Republican candidate this side of Lamar Alexander."

And a mystery candidate has surfaced:

"Rep. Chet Edwards was coy Tuesday about whether he has talked with the Barack Obama campaign about a No. 2 spot on the ticket a week after House Speaker Nancy Pelosi singled him out as the best House member for the job."

The Texas Democrat seems to have served his nine terms in almost total obscurity.

Drudge says Rush Limbaugh has signed a $400-million, eight-year contract renewal, and here's the confirmation. Nice work if you can get it.

Everyone's having a gay old time with this:

"Tyson Homosexual was a blur in blue, sprinting 100 meters faster than anyone ever has. . . . 'It means a lot to me,' the 25-year-old Homosexual said."

That's how Tyson Gay found his race reported by the American Family Association, which has an automatic word-replacement program to banish the awful word gay. So much for human judgment.

Finally, look who's taking credit for Obama's success:

"Dennis Haysbert likes to believe his portrayal as the first African-American U.S. president on Fox's '24' may have helped pave the way for Barack Obama. 'If anything, my portrayal of David Palmer, I think, may have helped open the eyes of the American people,' said the actor, who has contributed $2,300 to the Illinois Democrat's presidential campaign."

Does that mean Obama will be adopting President Palmer's position that torture is okay?