MCCAIN:
[youtube:WuRHRRYHKIY]
The McCain camp calls its spot “A Better Way”–but “A Third Way” may have been a more descriptive title. Airing in Oregon–and dovetailing with McCain’s climate change speech today in Portland–the ad seeks to distance McCain from his party’s global-warming deniers while still offering assurance to his conservative base. “One extreme thinks high taxes and crippling regulation is the solution,” says the narrator. “Another denies the problem even exists.” Note the word extreme. For McCain, global warming is “not just a greenhouse gas issue–it’s a national security issue”; according to the ad, he’s a man of the mainstream, moderate middle. Such triangulation–especially on the environment–is a smart strategy for McCain. In running against a Democratic Party that wants to portray him as John W. McBush, his climate change apostasy–he was basically the first Republican to acknowledge it–is useful shorthand for the larger “maverick” brand he wants Independents to buy into (even if his actual climate plan is “behind the curve,” according to Grist). What’s more, framing the issue as a national-security challenge is a good way to get conservatives’ attention (if not their undying adoration). In other words, this isn’t the last time you’ll see the septuagenarian senator standing atop a craggy mesa in his shirtsleeves before November. OBAMA:
[youtube:YvO1xELHp3k]
The content of the pro-Obama ad isn’t especially complex: it’s basically former US Air Force Staff Sergeant John Weiler–a lifelong Republican–speaking directly into the camera about why he’s planning to vote for the Illinois senator this fall. “We need somebody in the White House [who] is strong,” says Weiler. “We need somebody [who’s] going to represent the left and the right, the Democrat and the Republican, everybody.” The interesting thing is who made the ad: a member of MoveOn.org (it then was then chosen by 5.5 million MoveOn voters, including a few celebrities, to air on Ohio, Wisconsin and Colorado TV). If one of the left’s most hyperpartisan groups is choosing to push Obama’s post-partisan argument with testimony from a Republican believer, expect the campaign to follow suit come fall. Republicans like me wasn’t a particularly relevant pitch in the Democratic primary. But it will make a lot more sense in the general election, as Obama struggles to shrug off the liberal label and create a climate in which crossing over seems totally acceptable.
‘Tis the season to reach across the aisle, apparently.
