Posted on 10/16/2008 3:02:48 PM PDT by Reagan Man
You can talk all you want about Joe the Plumber, but the moment of the final presidential debate, held last night at Hofstra University on Long Island, came when John McCain said, quickly and cleanly, “Sen. Obama, I am not President Bush. If you wanted to run against President Bush, you should have run four years ago.”
McCain has been trying for two years to highlight his differences with George W. Bush, but only tonight, 20 days before the election, did he come up with a formulation so straightforward. It wasn’t an accident. “We discovered that the arguments we were making weren’t soaking in, that people weren’t getting it, that he isn’t George Bush,” a key McCain aide told me shortly after the debate. “He’s talked about how he’s opposed the president on certain policies, but one of the things that we had told him to really focus on was to keep the answers clear and simple.” So McCain said it clearly and simply. Given that about 70 percent of Americans disapprove of the job Bush is doing as president, it made more than one observer wonder what took McCain so long.
It’s fair to say Team McCain was delighted with the way the Bush line came out, and they were also happy that McCain was able to steer so much of the debate to the issue of Joe Wurzelbacher, a.k.a. Joe the Plumber, an Ohio man who confronted Obama this week with concerns that Obama’s proposals would raise taxes on the business Wurzelbacher hoped to buy. In that encounter, Obama told Wurzelbacher, “I think when you spread the wealth around, it’s good for everybody.” It wasn’t exactly what Wurzelbacher wanted to hear, and it made Obama sound like a classic income-redistributing Democrat.
McCain heard about it when it happened — the exchange was played mostly on Fox News — and brought it up at a debate preparation session yesterday. “We were sitting around and he said, ‘Look, I ought to use this. I ought to look into the camera and talk to Joe the Plumber and say this is what I’m going to do, as opposed to what Sen. Obama is going to do.’“ The whole team thought it was a good idea, and so, seated onstage at Hofstra, McCain carried it off perfectly. “Sen. Obama talks about the very, very rich,” he said. “Joe, I want to tell you, I’ll not only help you buy that business that you worked your whole life for and be able — and I’ll keep your taxes low and I’ll provide available and affordable health care for you and your employees.”
Obama was forced to defend himself at some length, and not very effectively; by the time it was over, McCain had scored a solid win on the Joe issue. And made history, too — in all, the candidates used the word “plumber” eleven times, surely a record for a presidential debate.
As that was happening, members of Team Obama were at their Chicago headquarters, watching the debate with one eye and, with the other, a computer video feed of a private focus group equipped with those electronic dials that Frank Luntz uses on Fox. The private Obama group was made up of swing and undecided voters “in a Midwest state where both campaigns are competing,” one aide told me, declining to say precisely where.
The Obama aides were of course listening closely to what McCain said, but they were also studying what they called McCain’s “nonverbal cues.” “The first huge impression was visual,” the aide told me. “He looked angry, he looked frustrated. It was something that I think people reacted to quite viscerally. People are going to remember the look on John McCain’s face.”
It was, on occasion, kind of an odd look. One of the most appealing things about McCain is that he can’t always hide what he is thinking; try as he might, it just shows in his face. But that can sometimes be a problem in a split-screen close-up televised debate.
When it came to perhaps the most anticipated non-economic subject of the night, Obama’s relationship with former Weather Underground bomber William Ayers, it’s probably fair to say that McCain did not do much damage. In part, that was because Obama knew what was coming. “McCain used — I think it was pretty close to word-for-word the way he has talked about [Ayers] in interviews and on the stump,” the aide told me. “Pretty close to word-for-word.”
The same was true in McCain’s discussion of the radical community organizing group ACORN, with which Obama has sometimes been linked. “There was nothing [McCain] said about ACORN that they hadn’t said in their countless conference calls about it,” the aide told me. “They telegraphed their punches pretty effectively.”
I asked if such predictability made preparing for debates any easier. “It helps,” the aide said.
This was also the only debate that touched on the issue of abortion, when moderator Bob Schieffer of CBS asked whether either man could nominate to the Supreme Court a judicial candidate with whom he disagreed on Roe v. Wade. McCain used the question to disavow any litmus tests for judges, and then brought up Obama’s vote, in the Illinois state senate, against a born-alive protection bill. Pro-lifers were undoubtedly happy to see McCain bring it up, but the Obama aide told me it wasn’t a problem. “When he made the attack on the born-alive legislation, you saw a vertical drop in the dial groups that was pretty astounding,” the aide said. “People didn’t find it credible.” There has been a lot of back-and-forth about what version of the born-alive bill was up for consideration, but you can make a pretty solid case that Obama did indeed do what McCain said he did. Nevertheless, if the aide’s account is correct, people didn’t buy it.
Who won? There seems little doubt that McCain scored many more points than Obama. And if you’re talking about dial groups, the graph lines went straight up when McCain declared “I am not President Bush.” But the experience of the first two debates is that the television audience reacted well to Obama’s demeanor, and their impression of him became more favorable as the debates wore on. That was probably no different at Hofstra.
What about “Senator Government”
If he had added Big in that liner, I would have died from laughing so damn hard.
Well, you got that right, "my friend"
You are not half the man, or leader, President George W. Bush has been. My thoughts toward you may be different if you were more like President Bush.
DNH...pffffttt!
McCain was just not closing his arguments.
This one was a good start.
But he might’ve added that he’s the only one in this race who actually ran against G W Bush!
I swear I heard him say ‘ZeroBama’..and not Senator...
How about a little humor:
While walking down the street one day a US senator is tragically hit
by a truck and dies.
His soul arrives in heaven and is met by St. Peter at the entrance.
“Welcome to heaven,” says St. Peter. “Before you settle in, it
seems there is a problem. We seldom see a high official around these
parts, you see, so we’re not sure what to do with you.”
“No problem, just let me in,” says the senator.
“Well, I’d like to, but I have orders from higher up. What we’ll do is
have you spend one day in hell and one in heaven. Then you can choose
where to spend eternity.”
“Really, I’ve made up my mind. I want to be in heaven,” says the
senator.
“I’m sorry, but we have our rules.”
And with that, St. Peter escorts him to the elevator and he goes down,
down, down to hell. The doors open and he finds himself in the middle of a
green golf course. In the distance is a clubhouse and standing in front of it are
all his friends and other politicians who had worked with him.
Everyone is very happy and in evening dress. They run to greet him,
shake his hand, and reminisce about the good times they had while getting rich at the expense of the people.
They play a friendly game of golf and then dine on lobster, caviar and
champagne.
Also present is the devil, who really is a very friendly guy who has a
good time dancing and telling jokes. They are having such a good time that
before he realizes it, it is time to go.
Everyone gives him a hearty farewell and waves while the elevator
rises ...
The elevator goes up, up, up and the door reopens on heaven where St.
Peter is waiting for him.
“Now it’s time to visit heaven.”
So, 24 hours pass with the senator joining a group of contented souls
moving
from cloud to cloud, playing the harp and singing. They have a good
time and, before he realizes it, the 24 hours have gone by and St. Peter
returns.
“Well, then, you’ve spent a day in hell and another in heaven. Now
choose your eternity.”
The senator reflects for a minute, then answers: “Well, I would never
have said it before, I mean heaven has been delightful, but I think I would be better off in hell.”
So St. Peter escorts him to the elevator and he goes down, down, down
to hell.
Now the doors of the elevator open and he’s in the middle of a barren
land covered with waste and garbage.
He sees all his friends, dressed in rags, picking up the trash and
putting it in black bags as more trash falls from above...
The devil comes over to him and puts his arm around his shoulder. “I
don’t understand,” stammers the senator. “Yesterday I was here and there
was a golf course and clubhouse, and we ate lobster and caviar, drank
champagne, and danced and had a great time. Now there’s just a wasteland
full of garbage and my friends look miserable. What happened?”
The devil looks at him, smiles and says.......
“Yesterday we were campaigning. Today you voted.”
Vote like it’s 2012, FRiend! Palin/Steele!
This would have meant a lot to the GOP base
They keep running the clip of Zero mocking “Joe” at a rally today.
“Now he’s trying to suggest that a PLUMBER is the guy he’s fighting for.”
Hard working Joes all over America will love that back-handed insult, I’m sure.
[who knew that Zero considered plumbers to be so irrelevant and beneath him?]
Al Cervik: “Yeah, I’m no door knob either!”
I have been sitting back wondering when any Republican would jump up and have the cajones to say, I AM NOT BUSH!
The only people reacting negatively was the Obama team and the MSM
Other things he could have said:
George Bush was just a guy in my neighborhood. Our kids went to school together.
If I’m George Bush, you’re bill ayres (this traitor does not deserve caps for his name).
I didn’t know anything about George Bush’s policies.
Not bad, Juan. Not bad at all. You may pull this thing out of your arse after all if you keep talking like this.
Exactly, I am voting for him, but I wish he would not remind me he is a shaddow of the towering figure G.W. Bush is.
I Love it! Thanks for the graphic!
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