2008 Matters

A semi-occasional series on the Presidential race, just 22 months away and counting!

• I don't know how long it'll take for the media to understand that their fascination with the Clintons does not match the population's. It'll probably take until January 2008 in Iowa. This inside-baseball piece about who worries Hillary, what's Hillary's strategy, what's Hillary EATING... I think this all has more importance to writers like Adam Nagourney than anybody else. To win, Hillary is going to need to inspire, and not just fascinate the overgrown children that make up the mainstream press corps.

• Speaking of eating, this was a significant shot across Hillary's bow in the article.

Mrs. Clinton has gone to great lengths to try to keep these meetings private. She and her aides have strongly asked Democrats not to report what has taken place there, from what she says to what she eats, and where (she had the lamb at Ruth’s Chris Steak House in Washington, the Dover sole at the Four Seasons in New York).

Ezra Klein noticed this too. The Times writers leak out Hillary's food choices in the same sentence that they state Hillary doesn't want food choices mentioned. This is the first of what one imagines will be 20,000 leaks during her campaign. The Times will use the Clinton rules on her, turning molehills into mountains.

• While Hillary is running proxy campaigns against Obama in the mainstream press and getting attention among the navel-gazers, John Edwards is making podcasts and talking about social networking sites. Somebody's running a 1972 campaign, and someone's running a next-gen one. The podcast's pretty interesting, by the way.

• Pretty hilarious to see that hit piece on Obama's past drug use go out there, and to see Republicans try to jump on it, only to trip up when confronted with the reality of, ahem, the current President.

Fox News ran a segment on "Obama's Cocaine Confession." Their conversation took an unusual turn, however, when Fox reporter Kirian Chetry said President Bush had also admitted to using cocaine.

Obama "talks very candidly, as did our current president, who admitted to using cocaine, correct? [Others demur] Well, who wrote, somebody wrote in a book -- well, he admitted that he had an alcoholic, he had a drinking problem. Who was it who said they witnessed him using cocaine? It was somebody who wrote a book..."

As her colleagues tried to talk her down from the line of discussion, Chetry responded, "Okay, okay, fine, but there were questions about the current president and whether he used cocaine or not as a young guy, but there's something about turning your life around...that people can accept."

The whole "moral high dudgeon" thing is going to be hard to do with an admitted drunk driver in the White House. This shouldn't be an issue on either side if it isn't current.

• The Guiliani campaign memo thing is getting embarrassing. First they blamed McCain or Romney, then they said aides to Florida Gov. Charlie Crist was responsible, then they went back on that. A Guiliani campaign might be as fun as the Bernard Kerik nomination for DHS head.

• Barack Obama wrote an op-ed today about lobbying and ethics reform, and I like this passage:

It would be a mistake, however, to conclude that this message was intended for only one party or politician. The votes hadn't even been counted in November before we heard reports that corporations were already recruiting lobbyists with Democratic connections to carry their water in the next Congress.

That's why it's not enough to just change the players. We have to change the game.

He's also pushing an Office of Public Integrity, as he always has. I like the fact that he's gotten the message on the need to lead. In fact, many of the Democratic candidates - Edwards comes to mind - have come to the conclusion that leading first and politicking later is the way to the nomination.

• And then on the other hand, not leading but being led by the nose, this Vanity Fair piece on John McCain shows a man who will literally do anything to win the approval of his party. While the signature issue that shows his true nature, taking the debacle of Iraq and making it his own with his escalation plan, is backfiring among the public, on virtually every other issue, he's willing to take any position that get him support.

Matthews wants to know McCain's views on the prevalence of gay people in all walks of life, a subject whose predicate is the scandal involving Representative Mark Foley and his come-hither instant-messaging with congressional pages. "Should gay marriage be allowed?," Matthews asks.

"I think that gay marriage should be allowed, if there's a ceremony kind of thing, if you want to call it that," McCain answers, searching in vain for the less loaded phrases he knows are out there somewhere, such as "commitment ceremony" or "civil union." "I don't have any problem with that, but I do believe in preserving the sanctity of the union between man and woman." It may not be clear just what McCain is trying to say, but it's easy to see how his words could be skewed in a direction that the Republican right might not like at all.

Fast-forward to the next commercial break, during which McCain and Matthews reposition themselves from the stage to the auditorium floor to take questions from the students. McCain's longtime political strategist, John Weaver, a lanky, laconic Texan, moves in to whisper some advice. The next question is about the pending federal farm bill, and McCain repeats his long-standing opposition to certain agricultural subsidies.

But then, out of nowhere, he adds, "Could I just mention one other thing? On the issue of the gay marriage, I believe if people want to have private ceremonies, that's fine. I do not believe that gay marriages should be legal." There: he said it, the right words for his right flank.

It's like he needed advice of conservative counsel to get his principles straight. Embarrassing. And that's not where it ends. This is my favorite part.

McCain had been asked how debate over the immigration bill was playing politically. "In the short term, it probably galvanizes our base," he said. "In the long term, if you alienate the Hispanics, you'll pay a heavy price." Then he added, unable to help himself, "By the way, I think the fence is least effective. But I'll build the goddamned fence if they want it."

The whole article is like that. McCain's acting like Zachary Taylor and saying different things to different people, hoping nobody has an Internet connection or a TV set so they'll be able to connect the dots. It's almost hard to watch McCain now. He's a shell of a man, a completely rudderless ship, blubbering to anyone who'll listen that he agrees with them, selling himself out completely out of a lust for power. I have to avert my eyes.