Into the Sunset

John McCain took Jackson Square on the road last week.

One could have been swept up by the stagecraft of it all, but anyone with a memory of "mission accomplished" (in the flight suit for Pete's sake, on an aircraft carrier), the Klieg light by generator sympathy spectacle in New Orleans, or who possesses a predisposition to go beyond appearances, surely saw it as social engineering. It will all wind up a staple of McCain's media campaign because these clips will augment while softening his big gun, the chauvinism card.

McClatchy reporter, Matt Stearns, followed the senator along a five photo-op itinerary. What's known inside the beltway as a "full Bush."

McCain wound up on a ferry paid for by an earmark (oopsy), coming across as a progressive (almost) in Kentucky and, in a reminder of the 'whatever he needs me to do so long as he's elected' pledge from the president, felt quite comfortable chewing out the federal responders and making chicken in every pot promises about the future from the Ninth Ward.

It will all be airbrushed for high-def and quick cut for YouTube.


The Republican base can be kept in line by surrogates, and not too high up in pay grade neither.

McCain (if he's not quite mastering the art today, just wait - he's got coaches) has to pull off that trick which propelled Bush in 2000 and which Hillary Clinton's darker advisors would have her do. Look to the future or the past, but not at the same time. It draws too much scrutiny.

McCain has the war hero thing to fall back on. What a luxury. He has been branded as the 'loves his country' candidate who values 'public service' as the 'highest expression of patriotism.' And he doesn't need to play that card until after the Democrats finish their insane, immolating chicken dance.

The 24/7 wasted not one precious "set" stoking the imaginary, while the actual went under-reported. So what else is new? The clip most frequent in Friday's rotation: was it McCain caught pandering with what Stearns described thus: "McCain said there was no inconsistency because the ferry, which connects a tiny, isolated hamlet to a larger town, was a worthy project?" Not hardly.

Was it the pastor/bombthrower whom McCain sought out for an endorsement? The one who blamed Katrina on lifestyle and says he prays currently for similar retributions by his personal Lord and Savior on other locales?

Was it the report from Dallas that FAA controllers conspired to blame pilots for some fifty of their mistakes? More ass-covering from the folks who brought you Rod Paige and Alberto Gonzales?

Or that their many 'experts' being paid to appear 'live' are covering all angles of all issues, so that over time they've spread their wisdom all around? Hardly. They say the same four bullet points over and over until you're sure they're all on video tape replay.

Friday, 'coverage' meant a free airing of an ad so awful that even McCain had to use the word "disavow." Then excerpts from a Moyers interview of Pastor Wright overtook the number one spot. And all day long the bunny would play the clip and turn to two or three of these 'experts' (who could have just as easily left their little index card on her desk to go have a nice lunch) and have them regurgitate the predictable.

But the little 'live' window on your screen was loud and clear; it explained the editorial decision there.

"And... we're clear."

Hardly.


The most frequent Wright clip was of him separating politics and religion. Oh the gasbags pounced on that. Could Wright be saying that God damn America might be acceptable in the context of a sermon, perhaps one about the usurpation of the Lord's name by those in politics?

Not a chance. That cooptation is long complete.

And because we have infused our politics with the gratuitous God bless America, saying the opposite has become suicide by third rail. Not that Obama said it, remember. It was his pastor.

Wright appeared to be trying to distinguish to Moyers and his viewers the two spheres in which the men make a living. Of course, the 'experts' saw that as a distinction worth taking to the infinite degree. So now Obama is 'just a politician' and has been thrown under the bus by his face saving pastor.

Rinse. Repeat.

There will have to come a time when Obama addresses the conditions which feed this misappropriation of politics. In the context of our Constitution, what happens in church, happens in church, no matter the church. Look how casually we accepted the three or four days of God damning America as our staple diet of 'news.' Did one producer on the 24/7 allow the possibility of finding Rev. Wright's context?

Add an intense dose of chauvinism and you have made toxic hay out of Rev. Wright's sermons. Obama may feel he has to give another major speech because of this inharmonic convergence.


It was lapel pins as secret password and "freedom fries" solidarity which lubricated the selling of the war in Iraq. I have a good idea. Let's go back there, say the incoherent 19% among us.

The caricature of Rev. Wright as Obama's Svengali is offensive for two reasons. First, if you're going to compare apples with apples, then McCain's Rasputin is getting a free pass. Evidently barbecue for the press pool actually works.

Secondly, I can fathom a context for the remarks. I can't subscribe to the most "wackadoodle" positions he takes so I am not trying to play his apologist. But I can get to that same fervor thinking about the abject hypocrisy of those who wrap themselves most ostentatiously in the flag.

Here they are denying Rev. Wright's freedom of speech and the protections of his ministry from undue influence by the state and putting him front and center in a political campaign.

So these God bless America types, how do they feel about wrongful executions? Or even just executions? Japanese internment camps? Syphilis testing on unsuspecting blacks? Trumped up destroyer incidents in foreign waters? Giving the country over to foreign money lenders? Manufactured reasons to wage preemptive war? Staying the course so that nobody dies in vain, so long as I'm president? They're of a piece.

So when somebody believes they can take all that back with a simple refrain like God bless America, they are making a strong case that God already has damned America. After all, look at all the crap they're saying is included in His blessings. God, I'd be pissed too.

Maybe the founders (not to mention Noah Webster) had the right idea. Obama has an opportunity to wean the public of its self-destructive infatuation with just the symbols, and through his leadership to assert its actual allegiance to the actual republic.

Hillary just hopes he founders.

Next week: Stuck with Stickin'

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