Month: February 2008

Kennedy-Obama Irony

Anyone looking for irony in the Kennedy-Obama love-in, which has included direct comparisons of Barack Obama to John F. Kennedy, need not look very far.

Recall that when Sen. Ted Kennedy endorsed Sen. Obama, he went out of his way to refute all that former President Bill Clinton had said or intimated about Obama. Including Obama’s relative inexperience.

Kennedy even underscored that Obama would be ready on “day one.”

Ironically, JFK wasn’t.

Anyone remember the Bay of Pigs? President Kennedy didn’t have the experience and gravitas to see through a fatally flawed Eisenhower plan and halt it. What he did was halt air cover – and any chance, even remote, that the ill-fated invasion of Cuba could have succeeded.

Kennedy would later prove his mettle by backing down the Joint Chiefs over the Cuban Missile Crisis. But, no, he wasn’t ready on “day one.”

McCain’s Message Needs Refining – Not Reforming

The signs were manifest.

The literal ones: “Florida (heart) Straight Talk.” “Tampa Loves McCain.” “Florida Stands With McCain.” “Veterans For McCain.” “Supporting The Mac: Martinez, Crist, Stallone.” (Take that, Chuck Norris.) And, interestingly enough, “McCain Protecting Your Pocketbook” and “McCain = Prosperity.”

The music: upbeat ’60s Motown (The Four Tops) – and ironic: “I Can’t Help Myself.”

The introduction: as politically high profile as it gets in Florida — Gov. Charlie Crist.

The message: Brief and blunt.

The rhetoric: red meat applause lines.

Those who jammed a break-out room at Tampa Convention Center last week to hear feisty, 71-year-old John McCain were not disappointed. “Keeping America safe” was the unvarnished theme. To be sure, there was a sidebar on better veterans’ health care and a promise that McCain “will call Americans to serve” a cause “greater than their self interest.”

The Arizona senator also took less than 30 seconds to remind true believers that he’s on the right side of technology and innovation and definitely in favor of the government getting “out of the way of business.” That was it on the economy. Except for the unspoken fact that his campaign was battling insolvency.

Make no mistake, this whistle stop was all about trenchant warfare — a national security stream of conscious for the masses. Outgoing rhetorical rounds that referenced “The transcendent challenge of Islamic extremism.” And reminders that: “The central battleground is Iraq