Campaign Developments

First of all, I want to acknowledge the relatively large amount of time since I last posted anything on this blog. I almost had to start dusting off the various parts of this blog before coming back to it, since it has been so long. The reasons I haven’t posted anything for such a long time are manifold. But basically I’ve been busy and haven’t had anything that I find myself absolutely burning to write about. That and I don’t feel like writing about the obvious or wasting my time saying something that portrays me as shallow or as merely copying an article I’ve read or something I’ve heard. This blog was born of academic roots so I felt that nothing of surface politics, simple preference or conjecture were appropriate or worthy writing.

That said there are a few things that have been on my mind over the last month or so. One thing in particular has been the rhetoric of this campaign. That both campaigns are now choosing to unify behind the rhetoric of “change” is either amusing or frustrating depending upon how you view it. The following are perhaps two very different ways of seeing it:
“Thank goodness both parties are finally agreeing on something and now we are entering a Utopian phase of agreement, bipartisanship, and sound decision making.”
OR
“Wow. Now that one candidate has found success with a particular theme, the other candidate is quickly and desperately trying to copy that theme (minus most of the substance contained within it) out of political necessity.”
Hmmm…??? Well I will let you decide.

But speaking of politicians claiming to rise above politics and offer change, it seems both candidates have promised much and delivered little.
Both candidates have pledged a different sort of campaign and a different sort of presidency. Well, how well have they done? Both Barack Obama and John McCain, pledged supporters of campaign finance reform (getting the influence of money out of politics), have promised to try to accept public financing and the stricter rules and limits for private money that accompany them. Both candidates have been important champions of campaign finance legislation (the McCain-Feingold campaign finance bill and Obama instrumental in passing the strongest campaign finance bill in Illinois history). But Barack Obama broke with his earlier intentions and decided not to accept public financing, citing the massive amount of influence coming from “Swiftboat” style campaigns financed by Political Action Committees (PACs) that are much, much less controlled by such legislation. He may have a very valid point, but he still comes across disingenuous to some. Many will point out that by rejecting public financing he can raise more money privately which might give him a better chance of winning.

Secondly, one candidate promised to run a positive campaign different than those of the past. Yet, as he has fallen in polls and become more desperate, he has become increasingly more negative, dishonest, and has started to show signs of playing on the politics of fear. Because John McCain has been less inspiring (leading to diminished fundraising), he was hoping that he could cancel the already agreed upon set of debates and kick-start his campaign if Obama would agree to numerous townhall-style debates (a style that McCain feels more comfortable in). When Obama refused, McCain seemed to have become more desperate by reaching for stunts, tricks, and gimmicks to try to gain leverage whenever he doesn’t get his way. When he was down in the polls and Republicans didn’t like his preferred VP choices, he acted like a “maverick” and choose someone unknown and unexpected, who very conservative party members happen to love (there goes that whole “maverick” to his own party thing). He has continued to become more negative and erratic in his campaign decisions. Reaching for some ploy to help, he suspended his campaign (if you can call what he did suspension) and tried to use the financial crisis as a photo-op, jockeying to take credit for a bailout that his presence couldn’t help pass. (Read Wall Street Journal Article)

(Caution: the following video is rated TV-14. While some will find it mild, discretion is advised.)

But even more troubling than all of this to me has been Gov. Sarah Palin. She has been used as a wedge to try to peel women (perhaps Hillary supporters) from Obama. She also seems to have been used as a wedge for people on numerous culture war issues relating to faith, race, and class. It may be that she was chosen, at least in part, for her ability to subtly re-interject each of issue of identity politics back into the campaign. She may be supposed to represent the woman, the Christian, the middle-class smalltowner whose folksiness might serve especially to remind you just how different “that one” (McCain-speak referencing Obama) is from your average less elite educated white person. Even more troubling to me has been her apparently shaky grasp of some policy issues and most especially a particular comment that she made during her debate against Joe Biden. I sincerely hope that she doesn’t really want to expand the powers of the Vice Presidency beyond the scope of article one, section three of the Constitution that Biden references. Watch her comment:

And so altogether, while both sides have there faults, I think polls are accurately beginning to signal real division that people are noticing in terms of policy, substance, and style. It can be tiring listening to both candidates avoid serious issues or going negative, but contained within all of the strategy are some helpful hints and cues to each candidate’s temperament, style, and character. The policies are much more important but that can be researched independently, more quantifiably, and in print (I don’t feel much like talking about that now) and what is left over is style and character.

I think that both Presidential debates were pretty close and even, depending upon how you look at it, so they haven’t changed the race that much. Some are giving Obama the first two debates, but there certainly were no resounding victories. I think that I will talk about the specific of the policy and the debates another time.