A Doubly Disappointing Loss

I want to get it on the record that I respect John McCain and what he has done for our country both as a warrior and as a fiery, sometimes contrarian (the word “maverick” has now become unusable), senator. As a fiscal moderate, I have appreciated McCain’s stance on campaign finance and earmarks. And I appreciate his willingness to touch “third rail” issues. One example of this is immigration reform, a policy on which McCain and Bush essentially agree but were unsuccessful in passing. (I understand the opposition of conservatives who rightly ask “what part of illegal do you not understand?”. But the issue is far more complex than building a fence and deporting 12 million people.)

Like any career politician, McCain has had lapses in judgment in matters both personal and political. Hopefully, those past issues will not define his historical legacy. However, history may not be so kind when it comes to McCain the presidential candidate. This is a man who built his brand on three major foundational principles:

1. Put country first. Political ambition should never trump your commitment to the people you serve.
2. Take the high ground. Always frame the debate around policy and the impact of policy on the people you serve (see point 1). Personal attacks and mudslinging are low ground, not befitting the dignity of the office you seek.
3. Straight talk. Be honest with the electorate. Treat them as adults who can handle the truth. This principle precludes making false statements about either your own policies or those of people with whom you disagree.

The McCain campaign has repeatedly and flagrantly ignored all three of these principles (see examples at the end of the article). McCain himself has to be disgusted with how this has all played out. A man of principle whose campaign violates the core principles of the man leaves the impression of an unprincipled man. Or a man whose principles are only valid when conditions are favorable, which really amounts to the same thing.

I believe that McCain is a principled man. I also believed that he hired unprincipled people (a requirement I suppose) to run his campaign.  The dichotomy has become much more evident in the recent attack ads that paint Obama as a friend of terrorists. The ads are clearly designed to scare “the base”. Those ads will have very little effect on undecided voters, except maybe the unintended effect of driving them away. John McCain himself has had to control damage caused by the fallout of such vitriolic hyperbole. McCain rallies have begun to look a little like angry mobs. Some disturbing news clips showed people who were very angry with Obama and calling him names. McCain tried to calm them down and assure people that Obama is not a bad guy, just misguided on policy. If that is what his ads said, then McCain’s brand would remain unblemished and his admonition would be credible. But his ads are worded in such a way to say that Obama is a friend of terrorists, with all of the frightening images that conjures. The negative messaging must have taken some root because McCain himself is being booed by his own crowds when tries to say anything remotely nice about Obama.

I can’t imagine what it must be like to be in those campaign planning sessions. The campaign managers know that they have virtually no shot, so they are throwing everything they’ve got at the Obama campaign. But at what cost? They are sacrificing the reputation of a national hero. They are pushing hyper-partisanship to new limits by further poisoning the relationship between the parties. They are reinforcing the continuing impression that modern Republicans remain the champions of dirty politics.

Whether or not this campaign fairly represents the “true” John McCain, he is paying these people. He approves those campaign ads. This may not be his usual brand of politics but, out of desperation, he has stooped to the level expected of a Washington politician, especially a Republican politician.
 
Ok, you say. But both campaigns have gone negative. Wasn’t Obama going to run a clean campaign, too?

I respect what Obama has done (for the most part) for two reasons:

First, Obama promised that he would not strike first, but that he would respond if he was attacked. As far as I know, that is exactly the way it has played out, even when he was campaigning against Hillary Clinton. I do not remember seeing a nasty ad from Obama that was not an immediate response to a nastier ad from McCain. To my knowledge, he has never launched a preemptive strike. But every time he has been attacked by an ad, he has responded quickly. This tells me he has had the ammunition, but keeps his powder dry unless he is attacked first. (It occurs to me that this used to be the essence of America’s foreign policy. But we as a country have lost that reputation as well.)

The second reason I respect Obama’s ads is that they have been based on facts that are very difficult to refute and they have been relevant to McCain’s policy positions. The only character attack I have seen from Obama is the reference to the Keating five. This was in response to the attack ads tying Obama to Bill Ayers. In fact, past associations should not be off-limits. The point is that McCain struck first with a personal attack that had nothing to do with policy. But McCain lives in a glass house that invites a lot of stones. Even so, the Obama camp was measured in its response and pointed to an area directly relevant to the current financial crisis and McCain’s involvement with the man who served time for his role in the last crisis like it.

Then the McCain camp got really nasty with the terrorist angle. Obama’s response: an ad condemning McCain’s positions on financial regulation, health-care and tax cuts. In short, Obama responded to a very personal attack with a policy ad.

Maybe it’s easier to run a cleaner campaign when you are up in the polls in what could turn out to be a landslide – well, at least by modern standards. What is amazing to me is that this race is at all close when the incumbent administration has demonstrated that its ideals do not work domestically or globally when put to the test.

But, if I were McCain, I’d be doubly disappointed. This was his last shot at the presidency. McCain has never struck me as presidential. He is a force for good in the Senate. But he is also a man who has made many enemies. He prides himself on being unpopular with both parties because he stands on principle not party unity. But if the Democrats don’t like him and Republicans loosely embrace him — and then only because they have no choice — how would he get things done?

The deeper and more lasting disappointment, though, would be knowing that you traded your good name and your legacy as a hero for a shot at power. That you compromised the very things that made you confident that you were the right man for the job. McCain may recover from this and restore his standing. But he needs to retake his position as maverick-in-chief of the Senate and reclaim his legacy. Nobody is going to hand it back to him. He will have a lot fewer friends in Washington as of November 5th. Ironically, many of those remaining may well be prominent Democrats.