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| Last Updated: Jan 20th, 2009 - 19:56:46
John the Candidate
Raging Moderate
By Will Durst
Oct 17, 2008, 18:00 PST
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The viewpoints expressed in this column do not necessarily reflect those of the ClassBrain staff.
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| © John Cole, The Scranton Times-Tribune 2008 |
Take that old saw about not being able to teach an old dog new tricks and toss it in your blue recycling bin on top of your fifth-of-a-quart economic medicinal containers. In his final mano-a-mano confrontation with Barack Obama, the oldest dog of them all, Arizona Sen. John McCain proved that aphorism false by adding a new wrinkle to his typical somnambulant debate strategy; centering his entire debate performance on currying the vote of a single man, Joe the Plumber. McCain targeted Joe Sixpack's brother in law in a last-ditch attempt to peddle his untapped Main Street cred to a public as skitterish as a hummingbird in a wind tunnel.
For the third consecutive debate, the Grand OLD Man of the Grand Old Party neglected to include a single mention of the middle class; but then again, he also failed to talk about three-toed albino tree elves. The general assumption is, to him, that both are fictional. He definitely came out more spirited this time out. Maybe TOO more spirited. Near the end of the Hofstra University debate, at the point where he normally nods off, he went so far as to blink a series of frenzied secret communiqués to Joe Wurzelbacher using Morse code with his eyes.
Something else was happening as well. Either the studio was filled with nitrous or the host, CBS anchor Bob Schieffer, whose avuncularity helped McCain look spry, dropped some happy juice in the green-room pitcher of water, because there was an inordinate amount of smiling going on. Too much smiling. Weird smiling. By everyone. Schieffer with his "you got yourself into this, not get yourself out" patient interruptive beams. Illinois Sen. Barack Obama regularly slipped into his incredulous head-shaking dismissive smirk, verging precariously on the precipice of smug, whenever his doddering opponent spouted what he considered unintelligible nonsense. Which seemed often. And in the finest Republican tradition, McCain mimicked George W. Bush's "grinning for no apparent reason at inappropriate times" creepy grimace kind of smile scarily successfully.
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| © Brian Fairrington, Cagle Cartoons 2008 |
Some whippersnapper on his staff must have taught the Republican nominee how to use air quotes, as he tossed them around like a systems analyst conventioneer with a fistful of singles at a strip bar. Going so far as to claim that too many abortions were allowed on the basis of a woman's "health." Which he spit out like a worse excuse than skipping a spouse's funeral due to a toe throb. Whoa, grandpa. Not sure you want to rile women up. You know? Women. The people Sarah Palin is supposed to attract to the ticket?
McCain has to be frustrated. By his plummeting poll numbers. By Obama's prevent defense knocking down his Hail Marys. And by a continuing failure to meet his daily fiber requirements. But once again he was his own worst enemy, turning cranky into an art form, using the word "cockamamie" to refer to Joe Biden's Iraqi Partition policy. Cockamamie? Are you that worried about the crotchety vote? Or is that considered exciting the base? You'd better screw the base and start to focus on undecideds or it won't be long before John the Candidate has to call Joe the Plumber to clean up the explosive detritus of a toileted campaign.
© Copyright 2008 by Classbrain.com
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