Turning Points, 2008 Edition By ANA MARIE COX, BOB KERREY, MICHAEL KINSLEY, KEVIN MADDEN, PAUL MASLIN, and HOWARD WOLFSON

Printer Friendly Format Sponsored By

November 4, 2008
Turning Points, 2008 Edition By ANA MARIE COX, BOB KERREY, MICHAEL KINSLEY, KEVIN MADDEN, PAUL MASLIN, and HOWARD WOLFSON

Barring something really, really unforeseen, the presidential campaign ends today. Really. Op-Ed editors asked a group of experts to write about some of the undernoticed moments from the past 18 months.

What did Celine Dion do to Hillary Clinton?

Fleetwood Mac's "Don't Stop" set the modern standard for campaign songs when Bill Clinton adopted it as his own in 1992. Its admonition, "Don't stop thinking about tomorrow," dovetailed perfectly with the premise of Mr. Clinton's run.

Sixteen years later, Hillary Clinton's campaign spent a considerable amount of time deciding on its song. Those of us who worked for her knew from experience that music could define a campaign — for good and for bad.

Mrs. Clinton's Senate campaign kickoff in 1999 was initially judged a huge success until her opponent, Rudolph Giuliani, began to zero in on one of the warm-up songs played before Mrs. Clinton hit the stage: Billy Joel's "Captain Jack."

"Captain Jack," unfortunately, contains references to masturbation and drug use. Mr. Giuliani said we were sending a clear signal to America's youth: "Let's say yes to drugs. I think it's a very, very dangerous message." The story dominated the local news for days.

For the rest of her Senate campaign and for her presidential race, we instituted strict controls to ensure that every song at a Clinton event had been vetted, both lyrically and rhythmically. Fail-safe devices were put in place. Committees of jurisdiction and oversight formed. It got so that it would have been easier to start a nuclear war than to play an offensive song at a Hillary Clinton rally.

The selection of a presidential campaign song was deemed especially critical. A group was chosen, some for our musical tastes, others to act as censors.

Brainstorming sessions ensued. The Iowa caucuses could wait — this was serious business.

Ideas were put forward: Motown, disco, ballads. I pushed K T Tunstall's "Suddenly I See" because it seemed empowering and upbeat. It was immediately criticized. What about the singer's use of the word "hell"?

Everyone had favorites, and every favorite had its detractors. We studied lyrics and performer biographies. We downloaded possibilities and listened. Some of us danced, while others sat and frowned.

"Get Ready" by the Four Tops? Too sexual. "Rhythm Nation" by Janet Jackson? What about that unfortunate wardrobe malfunction?

To break the stalemate, we sponsored an online contest for supporters and gave them options to choose from. The votes and commentaries rolled in. Celine Dion's "You and I" was selected, a decision I jokingly predicted would signal the end of the campaign.

Sadly, my prediction proved correct.

— HOWARD WOLFSON, a strategist for Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign, blogs about music at GothamAcme.com

Was John McCain's fate within his control?

A professional colleague of mine told me at the beginning of this presidential campaign season that these contests are often shaped by "moments" — still frames from a whirring picture show.

He may have been right about the past, but not about this year. The 2008 race was defined by ocean-size events like the conflict in Iraq and the global credit crisis, phenomena beyond the control of the candidates. Campaigns and fortunes either crested upon these events, or were washed away by them.

John McCain emerged the victor from a crowded Republican primary field because of his vocal and principled alliance with the troop surge in Iraq, a position he arrived at with a practical realization that his political prospects were tied to a policy whose execution he ultimately would not control. Out of this decision, Mr. McCain earned his political salvation.

Then in the fall, Mr. McCain was engulfed by market forces in the economy and in politics; he was yoked to an administration and a party on the target end of a thundering volley of blame.

More than we like to admit, candidates are confronted, and often defeated, by the elusive element of fate.

— KEVIN MADDEN, the press secretary for Mitt Romney's presidential campaign

What medicine brought the Straight Talk Express to an end?

For months, Steve Schmidt, John McCain's chief strategist, tried to bring discipline to the campaign.

Though Mr. Schmidt shared Mr. McCain's affection for individual journalists, he also believed that the senator's rolling press conferences obscured the campaign's "message of the day." And he thought that some journalists — he referred to them as "the bloggers," even if they weren't — promoted the gaffe contests that played out on cable news and were amplified online.

But Mr. McCain had faith in his instincts and his charm, and so the "straight talk" continued against Mr. Schmidt's wishes.

Until the Viagra question. After a female McCain adviser complained about health insurance companies that covered pills for male impotence but not for birth control, a reporter asked Mr. McCain what he thought.

Mr. McCain made a face, expressing silent befuddlement. In the pool report, a TV reporter included the number of seconds that passed between the question and Mr. McCain's first tentative reply. Planned Parenthood put out a commercial. And Mr. McCain realized his love affair with the press was already over.

— ANA MARIE COX, the founding editor of Wonkette and a contributor to Time magazine

What political candidate delivered the finishing blow to the public financing system for presidential campaigns?

On June 19, Barack Obama announced he would opt out of the public financing system for presidential campaigns. He might still be the favorite to win today if he had said yes to $85 million of public money, but I doubt it. Obviously he doubted it, too, or he would have accepted the spending cap.

His charisma, talent, message and management skills enabled him to raise and spend an amount several times greater than the public money John McCain had available for television advertisements and paid staff in important states. (To be clear, if Senator McCain thought he could have matched Senator Obama's fund-raising efforts he would have opted out, too.)

For Senator Obama, the principle of doing what is essential to win trumped the principle of support for public financing. He made the right choice. I believe 2008 was the year that federal financing of presidential elections died. It was on life support coming into this election. The ability to raise millions of dollars from small donors over the Internet made the law unnecessary, and it also contributed to one of the most exciting, most watched and best understood campaigns in our nation's history.

— BOB KERREY, a former Democratic senator from Nebraska and the president of New School University

How did John Edwards frame the campaign?

In the John Edwards campaign, we viewed the Netroots Nation candidate forum, attended by many liberal bloggers, as a huge opportunity.

Starting with his first election, Mr. Edwards had refused to accept any contributions from Washington lobbyists or political action committees. At the forum in August 2007, he challenged his opponents to do the same. The moderator followed up by saying, "Senator Edwards has really a very straightforward question here, which is, will you continue to take money from lobbyists?"

"Yes I will," Hillary Clinton said. "A lot of those lobbyists, whether you like it or not, represent real Americans."

That moment was the beginning of the end of her candidacy. Without it, she might have become the nominee and now be on her way to the White House.

— JOE TRIPPI, the author of "The Revolution Will Not Be Televised" and an adviser to John Edwards's presidential campaign

What primary or caucus clinched the Democratic nomination for Barack Obama?

Barack Obama's most decisive victory was his first, on Jan. 3 in Iowa. That win made him the presidential front-runner — a position he has never lost in the succeeding 10 months.

After Iowa, John Edwards was finished as a serious contender for the Democratic nomination. Hillary Clinton was badly wounded, too. A majority of black voters was convinced after the caucuses that Mr. Obama could win among white voters, and a crucial segment of Mrs. Clinton's base disappeared.

Iowa provided another intimation of change. Des Moines was where, almost exactly one year ago, two key advisers to Mrs. Clinton mocked the young Obama supporters. "Our people look like caucus-goers, and his people look like they are 18," one adviser told a reporter. The adviser added that they "look like Facebook."

Mr. Obama's voters didn't look like caucus-goers, but America in 2008 didn't look much like its past in lots of ways.

— PAUL MASLIN, the pollster for Bill Richardson's presidential campaign

When was the last American election with four white guys on the two major-party tickets?

We are surrounded by images of white men in suits. There might be 20 of them photographed sitting around a conference table (the board of directors in 1955) or just three (the founder of this auto dealership, his son-in-law who now runs it and his son who is supervisor of the parts department) or 500 (the class of 1940 at its 25th reunion). Oil paintings of forgotten committee chairmen line the corridors of power in Washington. Cigar boxes still feature illustrations of the Dutch Masters.

These images look quaint, even the ones from the 1950s and 1960s. The haircuts are bad, the smiles are too solemn, the lapels and the ties are too wide, or too narrow. But mainly, the men are all men, and all white. It strikes you immediately. These images don't "look like America," as Bill Clinton used to say.

If the annual portraits of a hospital's trustees are lined up along a hallway, you can see the changes as if through a flip book. Around 1970, a light-skinned, oldish African-American appears in the second row. Then a second black guy, darker and younger. Then a very young white woman, and a black woman, or a white guy in a wheelchair. In 2005, the first Asian-American appears. That guy who shows up the next year in the front row, far left, might or might not be Latino, or perhaps an Indian (of either variety). It's hard to tell. By last year the annual group shot still doesn't exactly look like America, but it looks more like America today than it did in 1955.

Meanwhile (yes, O.K., except for Geraldine Ferraro, chosen in 1984 to help Walter Mondale, a good and extremely white man, lose to Ronald Reagan) the world's most important group shot remained four white men in suits until Aug. 29, when John McCain picked Sarah Palin as his running mate. Since then, there have been hundreds of images of Mr. McCain and Ms. Palin, Barack Obama and Joe Biden, Mr. Obama and Mr. McCain, Ms. Palin and Mr. Biden, or collected shots of all four of them. As of that moment, it became hard to imagine that these pictures would ever again be of four white men. Fine for a cigar box, maybe, but America has moved on.

Thanks for this healthy development go to John McCain, for choosing Sarah Palin, and to Barack Obama, for choosing himself. Also for being himself — a one-man ethnic stew. If America looks like anyone, it looks like him. Sarah Palin deserves, if not credit, then a bit of sympathy. She wants America to keep looking like a small town in western Pennsylvania around 1966. She was the last, victorious shot in a revolution she doesn't support.

— MICHAEL KINSLEY, the founding editor of Slate and a columnist for Time magazine

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/04/opinion/04points.html?pagewanted=print

http://snipurl.com/7shqh