Two questions:
What do you think the odds are that John McCain will act like an asshole tonight?
What do you think the odds are that the cable news bobbleheads’ take-away from the debate is that John McCain acted like an asshole?
About The Author
BooMan
Martin Longman a contributing editor at the Washington Monthly. He is also the founder of Booman Tribune and Progress Pond. He has a degree in philosophy from Western Michigan University.
Those polls have been great. However, if those polls are strong for McCain, the feeding frenzy will be intolerable. I’m more nervous about the post-debate polls than anything in the debate itself.
How can you compute odds on someone so random?
I guess I give it even odds. McCain probably wants to come out swinging, but he has to know that Obama is prepared for it. And if Obama handles the mud well, it will only hurt McCain.
But if McCain acts like an ass, the bobbleheads who aren’t extensions of the RNC will call him on it. The narrative right now is that the McCain campaign is saying ugly, horrible lies about Obama, and anything that plays into that narrative is going to get called out. Especially if Obama handles it with the calm, cool rationality that he’s shown through this entire campaign.
I think, if anything, McCain will only nibble at the edges. I think he will continue the perpetuation of this bi-polar campaign he is running; being one thing on the trail and another at the debate table. If he is drawn into a discussion of the unseemly side of his campaign it will probably be by Bob Schieffer. And he will fall back on his public and one-time soft repudiation of the hate speech and throw it back on Obama as to why he has not repudiated Lewis. At that point, where the conversation goes from there is anyone’s guess. It all depends on whether everyone backs off after the initial broaching of the subject or whether someone wants to continue to pound it out. If they pound it out, I think McCain stands to lose the argument and reinforce the erratic and angry behavior meme that has plagued him all along. And if this scenario plays out I think the bobbleheads come down hard on him.
If he avoids the previous scenario and everything stays sane and generally boring, much like the last debate, then the bobbleheads will most certainly see something positive for McCain. And they will look feverishly for any shred of evidence, whether it be real or circumstantial, to indicate a setup for a new comeback narrative for McCain. They want a horse-race more than they want air to breath. They will be absolutely moribund if they sense they will have to spend the next 20 days just waiting for the clock to run out. So look for them to be turning over every rock they come across, looking for one last piece of evidence that their BBQ Buddy and favorite Maverick has one more Brett Favre-like comeback in his bag.
“Two questions:”
What do you think the odds are that John McCain will act like an asshole tonight?”
I think the odds are 10 percent.
“What do you think the odds are that the cable news bobbleheads’ take-away from the debate is that John McCain acted like an asshole?”
I think the odds are 5 percent.
Other than Rachel Maddow and Keith Olbermann, possibly Campbell Brown, I don’t think anyone will call McSame on it.
Much like Palin’s debate, the bar is so low that all McSame has to do is not call Obama a “spear-chucking coon” on national television and he’ll earn a “Well, I don’t think the debate was the game changer either side needed” level tie.
I think there’s at least a 2% chance McCain will call him something racially derogatory. It’s simmering close to the surface with Johnny Mac, and it wouldn’t take that much to get him to blow.
I think there’s a 25% chance he calls him That One again.
That’s game over…2% might be high. It’s obvious that McCain despises Obama for what he’s been able to accomplish, and I do think we’ll continue to see that.
We’ve seen at least two polls where McCain hasn’t broken 40%. The question McCain needs to be asking himself is what do I want after I lose on Nov. 4? Then adjust his strategy accordingly.
I think Bob Schieffer is going to do McCain’s job for him and directly ask Obama about Ayres. Obama will then patiently explain, as he has before. McCain will go next and distort what Obama just said. Then, Bob will move them on to another subject.
And we’ll all be screaming at out tv screens.
If he asks Obama about Ayers, he is basically little more than a right wing shill ala Charlie Gibson, Sean Hannity, or George Stephanapoulous.
Of course, he could try to equal it out by asking McCain about the Alaska Independence Party or Troopergate or Keating 5, but then again that’s not really the same.
Ayers is a total bullshit controversy, made up out of thin air. Those other things are truthful and troubling. In fact, the Troopergate question should be asked tonight, especially since Sarah Palin is lying about it. If Joe Biden abused power I’d expect Obama to have to talk about it.
Question 1: 100%
Question 2: 0
“act“?
good point. my mistake.
This should set it up. Lugar ENDORSES Obama today!
That’s a little short of an endorsement.
Hey, it’s the headline, but you’re right they were no pom poms involved or signatures in blood.
a TPM link to Wapo:
That’s a maverick
For five and a half years, John McCain couldn’t get portable telecom towers for free at his ranch.
even when he tries to be nice, behind his rictus smile you see a very angry man there. Only once in the last year have I not seen him be an asshole, and that’s when he conceded that Obama was a “decent family man”.
Otherwise, it’s been Asshole John from Jan. 1st until today. And I don’t think Mr. Nice Guy will be showing up tonight.
I just hope Obama has developed a clever comeback to any Ayers discussion. I mentioned this in Steven D’s diary below, but I think Obama should tell the story of South Carolina in 2000 and how sad it is that McCain has now hired those same cretins.
That would both infuriate McCain and shame him, because he knows that Rove made his wife cry back in 2000 and confronting that truth would probably unhinge him further.
What are the low information undecideds and persuadable leaners looking for at this stage? Not a stag fight – that’s strictly for the partisans who will never change their vote. What they do want is:
Facts and logical argument are simply some of the props used to create such a sense around a candidate. Chiefly the candidate has to build a relationship with his audience – undecided or persuadable voters – such that they feel he understands them and has their best interests at heart. A lot of this is done through body language, eye contact, picking up familar themes, refrains, smiling, warmth, and an aura of awareness, smartness, and confidence.
The change Obama is asking people to believe in is embodied in his being. Build a relationship of trust with that and he wins. McCain is simply a prop to assist in the development of this process – he speaks to peoples fears and insecurities. His personalised attacks on Obama actually reflect his own lack of self-confidence. Its like saying – “I don’t have the answers but this guy is no better than me”
The worse McCain behaves, the easier it becomes for Obama to present himself as the epitome of calm, Presidential, reassurance. If McCain plays the attack dog he is only playing to Obama’s strenght.
The problem for McCain is that that is the role he has assumed in the campaign so far, and not to do so during the debate risks disheartening his own supporters who badly need their anger ventillated and their confidence restored. However in giving in to their needs he cedes the middle ground and the game is over. The media want a bunfight and will mark him down if he doesn’t deliver.
Obama’s great strength is that he doesn’t have to appease his partisan base. He is under no pressure to try to demolish McCain, he doesn’t have to. He can be respectful, even kind to McCain, and it doesn’t damage his core vote -whilst reassuring all the persuadable’s out there that this is a guy who can be trusted to deal sensitively with their fears – fears which, at some level, McCain has come to embody in this campaign.
McCain embodies the dark side of the fears and anxieties of an aging generation who are losing control and who need reassurance that they will not be forgotten in the new order. Obama represents their brighter, more optimistic, and more hopeful side, He just needs to reassure them that he understands their needs.
Having painted Obama as a black, Muslim, terrorist loving appeaser, the McCain campaign and its partisans has given Obama a relatively low bar to clear. It is not hard for Obama to exceed those fears and expectations. He doesn’t even have to win the argument.
I like your comments, Frank. But I like anna in philly’s more pithy comments, too.
In her language, Barack Obama and Joe Biden called John McCain a pussy and unless McCain flashes his cock out on the table tonight, the whole country will conclude that Obama and Biden are right.
He must attack even though it is the worst possible strategy for him.
In a way, Obama won this debate before it started.
I agree with other commenters that if Ayers comes up it will be by Schieffer. Probably early so that they can move on.
It looks like McCain is going to pound on Obama’s inexperience all night – some variation of he’s not ready in every answer – and he may try to tie it to Ayers in some form. This is the message, I think, he has settled on.
It’s pretty risky because it opens McCain’s flank with lobbyists, Keating, and maybe even Palin and the AIP. Obama should be prepared to deal with the inexperience argument tonight, similar to how he handled McCain saying “my opponent doesn’t understand” by linking it to not understanding poor decisions McCain made.
Could be interesting. Could be schnooze.
I can see it now:
OBAMA: John, you talk about experience but you’re the guy that thought Sarah Palin was experienced, remember? How’s that working out? And what is it with you Republicans and your veepees? Bill Clinton picks a guy and he goes on to win the Nobel Prize. You give us Dan Qualyle, Darth Vader, and now Sarah Palin? I don’t think you should be talking about experience with that record.
Agreed, and as you pointed out, tonight’s format won’t reward rudeness either. A lot depends on the moderator – what questions he asks, and how much time he gives respondents to go into details. I hope he asks relatively few questions and probes for more detail in the responses. Previous debates have been a mile wide and an inch deep with moderators having too much ground to cover. We never got beyond prepared talking points.
But what happens if, say, he devotes half an hour to Ayres, Troopergate, Alaskan Independence Party, William Timmons, Randy Sheunemann, Rick Davis, and the plethora of dodgy lobbyists on McCain’s team – what happens if they get beyond the prepared talking points and have to think on their feet as their talking points are challenged and undermined? Then we could have a real argument and see how both perform under pressure.
Obama has been very clever – baiting McCain on Ayres, and calling him erratic. This makes it more difficult for McCain to come up with a new hail mary proposal. The strategy is – think what your opponent shouldn’t do and try to goad him into it. Make it difficult for him to do what he wants to do. This debate will probably be a snooze for policy wonks and party partisans. But it will be an interesting game of chess for aficionados of the psychology of persuasion.
Hey, Frank, who do you think is moderating this debate, Olbermann? :>)
The part of me that channels Obama has him turning to McCain when the subject of Ayers comes us and brings up Keating, G. Gordon Liddy, the lobbyists and the AIP.
You’re right about Obama getting into McCain’s head…and from what I’ve been reading, McCain’s getting a wide variety of bad advise. Is it possible we see McCain grasp at straws, stray off message, and look worse than the town hall debate?
Sorry I don’t watch US TV so I know nothing about Schieffer – except his brother has links to Bush?
Are you suggesting McCain attempt to…Barack Out with his Cock Out?
/obvious
Hey – you keep that stuff under wraps here – this isn’t the European Tribune and all them irreligious and irreverent yurpeers talking big and acting small. This is the Real America you’re takin’ to!
McCain will run the gamit tonight. He’s still fighting VietNam, his father and grandfather’s legacies none of which he has managed to bring honor to and I think Obama represents the person he has just never been able to find within himself, so he may end the night with a Bush 2000 moment of ‘never mind then, screw ya’ and just walk off the stage and that might be the first honorable thing he’s done in years. (well that’s my fantasy)
speaking of assholes…i wonder if cindy mccain gets her asshole bleached.