The American Spectator

Campaign Crawlers

Overrated Obama

By Robert Stacy McCain on 8.20.08 @ 12:07AM

The mainstream media spent months ignoring the National Enquirer's scoop about John Edwards' mistress. Now they're ignoring a potentially bigger Democratic scandal: The political incompetence of Team Obama.

Sen. Barack Obama's brain trust of David Axelrod and David Plouffe emerged from the Democratic primary campaign with a reputation for strategic genius. That reputation is deeply entwined with the conventional wisdom among the political press that Obama is a sure thing to win in November.

Since Obama clinched the nomination in June, however, evidence has steadily accumulated that Axelrod and Plouffe -- who masterminded the Illinois Democrat's upset of Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton -- are out of their league when matched against a Republican in a national election.

Two months ago, on the same day a Newsweek poll showed Obama ahead by 15 points, the Democrat debuted his own personalized presidential seal. That emblem, with its Latin translation of his "Yes, We Can!" motto ("vero possumus"), quickly became an object of derision, symbolizing the overconfidence of a campaign that now finds itself locked in a neck-and-neck contest with 75 days remaining until Election Day.

Not since Frank Mankiewicz and Gary Hart steered George McGovern to the nomination in 1972 has a Democratic presidential campaign committed such laughable blunders. With few exceptions, however, the media ignore the possibility that the Axelrod-Plouffe magic simply won't work against Republican Sen. John McCain.

And perhaps it was never magic at all.

THE ANALOGY TO the McGovern campaign is apt, because Hillary Clinton's status as the prohibitive favorite -- her nomination apparently inevitable a year ago -- so much resembled Sen. Edmund Muskie's position coming into the 1972 campaign. Hubert Humphrey's 1968 running mate, the "Man from Maine" went from sure thing to lost hope in a matter of weeks.

"As late as February 15th, Ed Muskie was general conceded...to be within an eyelash or two of having the Democratic nomination so skillfully locked up that the primaries wouldn't even be necessary," Hunter S. Thompson observed in March 1972, after the wheels had come off the Muskie bandwagon.

"He had the public endorsements of almost every Big Name in the party, including some who said they were only backing him because he was so far ahead that nobody else had a chance."

All that Muskie lacked was a solid grassroots organization and a coherent roadmap to victory -- the same weaknesses that doomed Hillary against Obama. As revealed in internal communications obtained by the Atlantic's Joshua Green, the Clinton operation found itself broke and with no backup plan after its Jan. 3 loss in the Iowa caucuses.

After Hillary won the New Hampshire primary, her campaign chairman Harold Ickes was forced to confess that, financially, "the cupboard was bare," and "despite spending $100 million, [Team Clinton] had somehow failed to establish ground operations in all but a handful of upcoming states," Green wrote.

"Ground operations" -- teams of professional organizers and volunteer activists -- were and are the unparalleled strength of Team Obama, and proved especially decisive in caucus states, where Hillary's campaign had failed to organize effectively.

Obama's superior organizational strength became apparent on Super Tuesday. Clinton won eight of 14 primaries, including such delegate-rich states as New York, New Jersey, California and Massachusetts. In caucus states like North Dakota and Idaho, however, Obama was 6-and-0 on Feb. 5.

YET LIKE McGOVERN in '72 -- who capitalized on Muskie's early meltdown but had to fight all the way until June against a resurgent Humphrey -- Obama's path to the Democratic nomination revealed weaknesses.

After a poor performance in an April 15 debate with Clinton in Philadelphia, Obama declined all further debates. His subsequent defeat in the April 22 Pennsylvania primary, along with lopsided losses in Kentucky and West Virginia, showed Obama's weak support among white working-class voters.

Letter to the Editor

topics:
Education, John McCain, Barack Obama, Mainstream Media, Africa