How McCain Can Deliver a Last Round KO
Kristol may be right about the "fire” business, but I appreciate his positive suggestions much more. After all, who wants to be an Obama and offer "solutions” that amount to nothing more than obsessive condemnations of the past.
So, in a positive vein, I offer a few suggestions about how a former fighter pilot can dig down to find his true self and speak to ordinary Americans with passion, truth, and vivid imagery designed not just to wake us up for a few minutes but to get us thinking — really thinking — from the hour and a half we spend watching the last debate to the moment we walk into the booth to cast our vote.
The Economy We know that the most important issue on voters’ minds is the economy, a topic on which polls show Obama as having the upper hand. There is, however, a punch McCain can throw that will get voters thinking, thinking about a risky, inexperienced, unaccomplished far-out-liberal who isn’t really an agent of change but a snake oil salesman trying to slip his fraudulent medicine past a frightened, angry public.
What image will get voters focused on that fact? It’s one that virtually every American knows — the image of the multiplication of the loaves and the fishes.
How does McCain use it to floor his opponent before fifty million viewers?
Employ Obama’s own words, words spoken a thousand times:
"Barack Obama tells us he will tax the rich and then, just as the loaves and fishes were multiplied long ago, multiply the sum to ‘give’ 95% of Americans a tax cut, ‘give’ the American people government controlled health insurance, ‘give’ the nation an economic recovery package, ‘give’ us new energy technology, ‘give’ us money for college tuition, and ‘give’ us a long list of other programs that pander to every conceivable Democratic Party interest group.”
"But the American people know my opponent is simply a human being. He isn’t a messiah. He isn’t "The One.” He is just a man, a man who, in these dangerous times, has the audacity to tell the American people he can work miracles with money.
"Well, he can’t. And that’s why even before this latest crisis — even before this latest crisis — the political moderates at the Tax Policy Center calculated that his spending plans will require the federal government to borrow three trillion dollars.”
"Borrow three trillion dollars and then hope — hope that doing so doesn’t suck up so much capital that job creation is destroyed, hope that interest rates don’t rise through the roof, hope that the dollar doesn’t collapse, hope that China and the Middle East will buy our debt, hope that the whole pie-in-the-sky scheme doesn’t end the way the mortgage fraud ended.”
"That’s my opponent’s idea of change with respect to the economy, my fellow Americans. No discipline, no sacrifice, no reality, no courage, but a lot of danger. Think about it — think about it carefully, because in these times, playing politics as usual with the economy means risking terrible consequences for the lives of every American, whether retired, in the middle of life, or young.”
Energy On the issue of the nation’s energy problem, McCain should attack Obama’s rejection of Ben Franklin’s warning that "He who lives upon hope will die fasting” by focusing on a name and two images.
The name is "T. Boone Pickens.” The images are those of a "bridge” to an independent, affordable energy future and that of a gas station sign that posts the price of a gallon of gas.
"Unlike T. Boone Pickens, my opponent and his party don’t believe we need a bridge to an independent, affordable energy future. That’s why he opposes drilling, opposes nuclear power, and speaks only of ‘investing’ in new technology.”
"What he doesn’t tell you, however, is that he hopes the price of gas doesn’t rise to five or ten dollars a gallon before his new energy even begins to come on line.
"What he doesn’t tell you is that every energy expert knows it will take decades before we can produce huge amounts of energy by alternate means.”
"T. Boone Pickens is one of those experts. He knows we need an energy bridge to the future, a bridge of natural gas, of which our nation has huge reserves. But you have to drill for natural gas just as you have to build nuclear power plants.”
"So, I ask you, my fellow Americans: Without new drilling and without nuclear, where do you think the price of a gallon of gas will be in five years? In ten? And who’s going to pay? You know who’s going to pay. You are going to pay. Gas at five, ten, even fifteen dollars a gallon? Think for yourself about the economic pain and social distress that’s going to cause.”
Alliances Those of us who follow politics know that liberals, from the world of comedy to the elite media, are working overtime to defend the indefensible regarding Obama’s alliances with obnoxious characters and organizations by using the morally and intellectually corrupt tactic that asks, "Doesn’t everyone?”
Of course, we know that "everyone” doesn’t. But regarding the Bill Ayers issue, for example, McCain needs to break through the simplification that "Barack Obama was eight years old when Ayers did those things.”
Here’s how.
"My fellow Americans, it is sad to see my opponent attempt to hide the truth about his alliances with an unrepentant founder of a terrorist group by arguing he was eight years old when the man committed his vile acts.”
"Think of it. Suppose thirty-five years from now, a presidential candidate defends his alliances with a former terrorist by arguing ‘it’s no big deal’ because he or she was eight years old when the person committed those acts.”
"Suppose the terrorist in question played a key role in bin Laden’s terrorist activities.”
"Suppose that the candidate knew that fact but dismissed its significance because the man has been ‘rehabilitated.’”
"Suppose further that the candidate continued his alliance even after the former terrorist proudly stated that he doesn’t ‘regret setting bombs’ and wishes his terror group had ‘done more.’”
"That is exactly the defense my opponent now raises regarding his alliance with Bill Ayers.”
"And don’t be fooled by excuses that the alliance was worth it because its object was to improve education for children in Chicago’s schools. Check it out for yourselves. That alliance wasted 50 million dollars pushing left-wing propaganda on children as participating schools were required to contract with organizations as radical as Mr. Ayers himself.”
"How many of you believe my opponent ‘didn’t know’”?
"How many of you want that kind of change for your schools?”
"The same applies to my opponent’s alliance with ACORN, a group now under investigation for voter registration fraud in eleven states, a group particularly active in every swing state.”
"This, by the way, is the same ACORN that sued banks for not granting enough high risk loans.”
"I’ll be honest with you, my fellow Americans, I spoke once before ACORN. I regret it and will never do it again. But unlike my opponent, I have never served as legal counsel for ACORN. I have never served as a cheerleader for ACORN’S mortgage agenda. And I have never told ACORN that in the days between my election as president and my inauguration, I will involve its members in setting the agenda for my presidency.”
"Organizations such as ACORN helping to set the agenda for the president of the United States of America. No, that’s not the kind of change we’ve been waiting for. That’s the kind of change we never need.”
Those are my suggestions for how John McCain can KO Obama in the final debate. They don’t require the knowledge needed to be a fighter pilot, but they do require the courage of a fighter pilot who will deliver them with sincerity, energy, and a firm, never bitter or sarcastic, scrupulously objective tone. |
