Clinton vs Obama – the latest TV debate
Open Road’s man in Pennsylvania reports on the television debate between Clinton and Obama prior to the Democratic primary there
One of the great contradictions – and tragedies – about public discourse in the United States these days is that there are many things that must never be said. Americans must always be hopeful, must always see opportunity, must always be patriotic. Frustration, anger, cynicism, and – as Senator Obama has learned the last week, bitterness, must never creep into the national soul or psyche. That is if you listen to the rhetoric of candidates on the campaign trail. Everyone is happy, hopeful and optimistic about the journey we are all on to that bright, shining city on a hill. I wonder if this is what the founders had in mind when they constructed the First Amendment.
Well, today I will risk retribution and say I am disappointed. Last night, watching the first 45 minutes of the Pennsylvania primary debate I couldn’t help feel despair and disappointment. For the first 45 minutes of a 2 hour debate - which had the potential to impact on next Tuesday’s primary outcome - the ABC News team of Charlie Gibson (whom I have always respected and liked) and George Stephanopolous (whom I have always liked and come to respect) fired question after question at Senators Obama and Clinton. Were these about healthcare, education, energy prices and/or conservation, war and peace etc? Oh no, they were more representative of what gets the media salivating than what matters to the country. So instead we got to play the “gotcha game”. Are you culpable for what your pastor preaches? Did you dodge Bosnian bullets or not? Weren’t you being patronising and elitist by calling small town folk “bitter”. This went on and on and on.
Because the truth is that in a race where both candidates have almost identical policy positions on most issues, no one is interested in hearing the nuanced differences that separate their economic policies or their healthcare plans. The media would argue that they are asking these questions because this is what people are talking about. They would tell us that their polls suggest these issues are what keep popping up in the results. Not for them to encourage a more civil, substantative debate. Not for them to direct the public back to the issues of the day – war, recession or the environment. I like to think that the Greeks (ancient that is) – who had a more noble sense of public debate – would be turning in their graves as they watched the Fourth Estate surrender its opportunity to lead.
To give them some due, last night’s moderators did manage to create a few interesting commitments and comments which might matter next Tuesday, moving towards the August Convention and in the fall, the general election.
First, Senator Clinton was forced to admit that Senator Obama can beat Senator McCain in November. Considering that in private she and her husband are vigorously lobbying super delegates that the Illinois Senator “cannot win” this is an obvious contradiction. To some degree – for the sake of the party - she had to say this but if any of the super delegates break ranks and protocol and publicly expose how the Clintons are arguing this in private it will further undermine her “trustworthy” numbers with the broader public. A poll in yesterdays Washington Post found 6 in 10 Americans do not trust her. This is an extraordinary figure (has anyone been elected with numbers this bad?) and one campaign insiders admit in private they are very worried about. Lots of people don’t like John McCain but most American think he is an honourable, honest man. Any event or comment which seems to further illuminate this problem is trouble for Camp Clinton.
Second, and this is a mistake both candidates made to varying degrees, it’s never good policy making to make iron clad commitments and promises months before taking office on issues of great volatility. Senator Clinton gave an absolute commitment to begin withdrawing troops from Iraq on Day 1 – one brigade per month at a minimum – irrespective of the military advice regarding the situation on the ground. Senator Obama gave himself a bit more wiggle room but also emphasised the fact that in the US, military policy making is done by the civilians and it is up to the President to decide on the mission while the military advise on tactics. There is no question that Senator McCain will ridicule such a commitment made months before any assessment of the battlefield situation can be made. In Red (Republican) States this will be positioned as hopelessly naïve and the Republicans will claim that the entire Iraq project and any recent progress will be jeopardized by what will be labelled as pandering to the anti-war left of the Democratic party. This was an interesting commitment to make in Pennsylvania as well, a state with a large military population (veterans and active duty families) and only time will tell if those voters – disproportionately concentrated in the more rural western bits of the state - embrace such an approach.
Tax was the other area where both candidates made blanket promises not to raise them for “middle class families”. Not knowing what the US economy will look like in January 2009 this was also a gamble. Again, after 8 years of the Bush-Cheney administration ensuring the well-off stayed well off there is great appetite for such commitments. Whether fiscal realities will allow them to be kept remains to be seen. As Bush senior remembers too well “No new taxes” can be a noose around a fiscally challenged President’s neck.
In terms of who will be the next Democratic nominee I suspect last night will not have moved the needle very much. Both Senators tried to convince critics that recent gaffes were not windows into bad judgement. It is more likely they bolstered their existing support rather than converted floating voters. There are five days to go before the election and it still feels to me like Mrs. Clinton will prevail here. Varied polls have margins between 6 and 16 points but with as many 10-15 per cent undecided and with margins of error of 5-7 points, anything can happen.
So we wait, knowing that a large Clinton victory means the campaign will continue through June. An Obama victory of any type would put tremendous pressure on Clinton to step aside. Anything in between (a small win for Hillary) will mean the process goes forward with the media and pundits turning North Carolina, Kentucky and West Virginia into the next “decisive battlegrounds”.
Last week it was reported that all the varied candidates, to date, have already spent just under $775 million on their efforts. So, even if no one else is happy that the process continues, I am absolutely sure that the campaign consultants and advertising executives will not mind a few more months of big fat cheques.