Down in the polls and getting desperate

What do you do when your campaign is losing on the issues? When your Hail Mary attempts to look relevant in the face of a financial crisis are intercepted? When you want to divert attention from the fact that your VP is probably the least qualified in American history?

Try more character assaults!

Ah, what an honorable campaign. As Nov. 4 nears, and Obama maintains his steady lead (and demeanor), we can expect much more of the same. Anything that will make voters go into the booth thinking, "Is he really One Of Us?"

The first presidential debate

I tivo'd the debate last night and just watched it. My initial impression was that Obama won on substance, but McCain's style fit the debate format better. I kept wanting to tell Obama to criticize and respond to McCain more directly (although he did more as the debate continued). Obama has gotten better about this throughout the campaign, but he is fundamentally an Explainer, wanting to "clarify the record" in response to attacks. On the other hand, McCain seemed more schooled in the standard debate tactics: Share a tangential story when you can't answer a question directly (e.g. "the bracelet" in response to a question about Pakistan); Repeat your talking points ad nauseum (e.g., "Obama doesn't understand..."); and Stay on the attack.

So while I personally prefer Obama's style (especially as a president rather than a campaigner), I worry that it doesn't play well to a national audience. Instead of saying, "Let me clarify this point," I think he needs to say, "John, once again you're lying about my record." As Obama Explains, it can make him look Defensive.

But maybe my concern is unfounded. Initial post-debate polls seem to give the advantage to Obama. For example, in the CNN poll, people overwhelmingly thought McCain attacked more (60-23%), but favored Obama on every other measure.

Also, in wanting Obama to be more direct in his criticisms, I wasn't thinking about the very narrow tightrope that he has to walk. In that respect, I think he's doing pretty well.

The Paulson bailout plan

Nothing really new here, but I just saw the actual text of the Paulson plan, and this struck me:

"Sec. 6. Maximum Amount of Authorized Purchases.
The Secretary’s authority to purchase mortgage-related assets under this Act shall be limited to $700,000,000,000 outstanding at any one time."

That's a lot of zeros, and a lot of authority for one person.

The other thing that struck me is just how simple the plan is -- the draft is only a couple of pages long. And yet, even though the plan came out last week, McCain admitted that he hadn't actually had time to read it until Tuesday. (It was available to anyone on the web -- Oh yeah, that might help explain it.) This must have been the same day that McCain started planning to suspend his campaign, drop out of the debate, fly to DC, and use his Magical Bipartisan Pixie Dust to save the negotiations over the bailout bill. Negotiations that were already moving along pretty well without him, particularly since he doesn't sit on the Senate Banking Committee.

With McCain's suspension announcement, and the most recent Palin-Couric interview, it's starting to get a bit ridiculous.

(Hat tip: TPM)

McCain's reign is falling in Spain

In an interview with a Spanish-language radio station in Florida yesterday, John McCain seemed unable to identify Prime Minister Zapatero of Spain. In response to the interviewer's attempts to clarify who he was talking about, McCain gave a boilerplate answer about how he will work with friends and confront enemies.

Now, I'm partly willing to give McCain a pass on this one. Perhaps it was a miscommunication because of language differences. Perhaps McCain mixed up Zapatero with the Zapatistas. In fact, I think it's unrealistic to expect the candidates to remember the names of every single foreign leader (although Spain is a pretty important ally). So I'm hesitant to say that this was a big "gotcha" moment. It strikes me as significantly less worrisome and less relevant than, say, Palin's ignorance of the Bush Doctrine.

But here's where McCain doesn't get a pass. He has made his foreign policy experience a central argument in his campaign. Earlier in the very same interview, he tried to draw a contrast with Obama by claiming, "I know the issues and I know the leaders." So McCain should simply be held to the standard that he sets himself. If Obama had made this mistake, McCain would certainly make it Exhibit A in the case against Obama's foreign policy cred.

Incidentally, the same should also hold true for Palin (possibly) getting pregnant before she was married, and McCain committing adultery on his first wife. I don't think these issues are relevant to someone's qualifications to be president. But if the appeal of your own candidacy is based on notions of fidelity, personal integrity, and sexual morality, shouldn't you be held to your own standard?

Will your taxes increase under Obama?

Yes -- if you make over $603,000 or so per year! Chartjunk has a great chart comparing tax plans from Obama and McCain:

Notice the difference in priorities?

(Hat tip: Andrew Sullivan, whose blog is a bit addicting.)

Lipstick, flag pins and elections

One reason I started this blog is because I believe that US presidential elections are deadly serious events. People give their lives to have opportunities like this. So I've been pretty disheartened by the level of public discourse over the past couple of weeks. I know there are strong structural and psychological incentives in every election to pay attention to trivialities rather than issues. Every election has its share of lying, deception, exaggeration, and twisting of facts. But frankly, I expected more from Senator McCain, whose public image has been built around the notion of integrity.

I am an Obama supporter, and have been for some time, so I know I'm biased. But McCain's personal attacks on Obama's integrity and patriotism, the phony sexism charges, and the sex education attack ad were just outright lies. Not accidentally false claims, or exaggerations, but deliberate Rovian lies.

I find McCain's choice of Sarah Palin as VP to be along the same vein. I actually find a lot about Gov. Palin that I personally like. But McCain's decision-making process was cynical, rash, and ill-prepared. Whatever you think about Palin, McCain cannot have been thinking about effective governing when he made this decision. He was thinking about effective politicking-- and even then, only the most cynical form of identity politics that America should be trying to move beyond in 2008.