McCain ad is good only for Obama

For the past few months, I’ve harbored the secret belief that Sen. Barack Obama is going to win… For the past few months, I’ve harbored the secret belief that Sen. Barack Obama is going to win the presidential election. I know, I know, I shouldn’t be so sure. I should address the issue logically, or come up with three reasons why he’s going to win instead of someone else, and so on. I’m aware that the news outlets I rely on (I’m looking at you, New York Times) are kinder to Obama than to Sen. John McCain. That’s why I’ve kept the belief to myself. However, after seeing McCain’s ad attacking Obama for being the popular kid at the lunch table, I finally received some objective verification of my belief. The ad I’m talking about starts off with quick shots of Britney Spears, comparing Obama to the unfortunate former pop star through the magic of juxtaposition. To cement the junior senator’s painful relationship with publicity-inflamed celebrities, the ad also uses a shot of Paris Hilton. An announcer smugly begins, ‘He’s the biggest celebrity in the world,’ and goes on to make the obvious conclusion that Obama’s restricting offshore drilling for oil actually means we’ll be using more of it. As tempting as it would be to dissect the argument of the oil issue presented, what I instead find most interesting is how my former belief has been validated. First of all, I’m saying the proof is valid and objective because it comes from McCain. I can talk all day about the good things Obama has told me that he’s done. I could just as easily spend the weekend ticking off Democratic party-line reasons why McCain isn’t the best candidate for president. But when McCain presents an ad that depicts him how he wants to be seen, I’m getting a good view of his ideals. For example, Obama’s well-known ‘Hope’ slogan tells me that Obama finds hope pretty important. Even if he’s a closet cynic and thinks that Iran is dead-set on nuking us within the year, he finds the ‘Hope’ slogan to be agreeable enough to make it his nickname. An ad deriding another candidate for being popular tells me that McCain believes Obama is pretty popular ‘mdash; so popular, we need to be told that he shouldn’t be. Which is a ridiculous move to make, considering the popular vote plays a pretty large role in the presidential election ‘mdash; that is, unless it’s the year 2000. The ad tells me that too many people like Obama. Bad Americans! Silly Americans! You can’t like this guy just because he’s popular! Unfortunately for McCain, his ad is basically saying that we shouldn’t like Obama solely because we like him. It sounds like a question worthy of going into the movie ‘I Heart Huckabees’: Why do you like someone because you like them? Since the ad has indeed been approved by McCain, I know he has enough confidence in its message to put it on the air. But it isn’t his confidence in chiding us for liking a likeable guy that convinces me that Obama’s going to win this election, so much as history itself. Specifically, instead of making some move to establish himself more firmly or spending the money and energy on publicity stunts of his own, McCain has fallen into a defensive position. Instead of using his strongest trait ‘mdash; experience ‘mdash; McCain is attacking his opponent for being too popular. This reminds me of the last presidential election. Remember John Kerry? I remember thinking that the only reason he would win was that he wasn’t Bush. It was a good enough reason for me to vote for Kerry, but some of the more choosy voters of our nation were in more of a predicament. None of them knew much about Kerry, because he spent so much of his time defending himself. Between insisting that he wasn’t comparable to breakfast foods manufactured by Eggo and responding to a splinter group of veterans who may or may not have been telling the truth, he didn’t establish anything about himself so well. So why is McCain making the same mistake and taking this election lying down? I never thought I’d see the admirable ‘Maverick’ acquiesce without at least a few tough-guy barbs. Has he really been reduced to muttering quietly about how this whole election is just a huge popularity contest, and it isn’t fair anymore? Sadly, I believe that’s exactly what’s happening. By supporting the entire Republican Party, McCain has given up his cowboy persona. Instead of bringing the outlaws to justice with the help of a posse of conscientious lawmakers ‘mdash; did you know McCain played a prominent role in denouncing those veterans who attacked Kerry? ‘mdash; he’s receding into the wishes of the Republican Party. I can see only one outcome from McCain’s self-avowed lack of public support: restricted from defining himself as the man who won the west, or at least campaign finance reform, he’s relegated to losing this presidential election. Which makes me wonder: Obama-McCain dream ticket? E-mail Dan at dmv17@pitt.edu.