We first ran this piece last month and here is the line graph with the July totals included. At first glance the July numbers seem to fit with the earlier numbers - both candidates scaled back the number of domestic appearances this month. A closer inspection reveals that Sen. Obama is dominating Sen. McCain on the summer trail. Obama's excuse for the decline in his July appearance numbers was he was part of a hugely successful week-long CODEL trip to Europe and the Middle East. McCain's excuse was . . . well . . . hey, he's 71, it's summertime, you know what that means . . . GOLF CARTS MUTHAFUCKA!
Despite Obama playing Paris Hilton to hundreds of thousands of German "fans" he still managed to outcampaign McCain back in the states by a 29-18 campaign event margin in July. Must have been all of those Met-RX energy bars, or the Black Forest Berry Honest Tea, or maybe it's his freakishly skinny physique. McCain better be careful in August, he might get lapped by the hardest working man in show business.
The Protocol always travels fast, hard, and low to the ground.
Saturday, August 2, 2008
Campaign Appearances: July Update
Thursday, July 31, 2008
Culture Wars Part III: The Turd Blossoms Again
Rick Davis, McCain's campaign manager, and Andrea Mitchell go toe to toe in this remarkable interview.
As Ambinder notes the action starts two and a half minutes in and continues right up till the end.
I wonder if this is the beginning of the end of the media's love affair with Sen. McCain. They've always appreciated his candor and his open-bus policy but this recent string of ads has shown that he, and Davis, are running Karl Rove's third presidential campaign.
The choice to align himself with Bush four years ago was McCain's critical mistake. Had he maintained his maverick persona, channeled the animosity he must have felt toward Bush/Rove and Co. after the South Carolina primary in 2000, he could have remained ever the straight talker, and run as a genuine alternative to the Bush White House. Instead he continues to follow the spirit of the hug by hiring a Rove lackey to run his day-to-day (Steve Schmidt) and allowing his campaign to continue to wage Rove's culture war.
The media has begun to realize that their proud maverick has become a puppet. John McCain might not lead the country like George W. Bush, but he is certainly campaigning like him. That would be a great plan, I mean, GW has won two in a row and if it ain't broke, . . . there must be nothing to fix, right?.
