fect would have been if a Barack Backer had done his best impersonation from the film “Treasure of the Sierra Madre” in saying, “we don’t need your stinkin’ money.”That is the case for the Obama campaign, which earlier this week became the first presidential nominee to turn down the federal funds that in theory put all presidential campaigns on an even level.
I SAY BECAUSE in theory, it doesn’t work that way. Republicans and their big bucks donors always manage to come up with support groups that take on some of the costs related to supporting their presidential nominees – which means the GOP candidates always are better funded than their Democratic challengers.
So when a candidate like Barack Obama, who has managed to capture the imagination of a segment of the U.S. population so highly that they are donating large amounts of money to his campaign, he can afford to take a pass.
Accepting the federal funds would require the Obama campaign to comply with various restrictions. And while some will argue that the Democratic Party and its followers could do the same tricks that their Republican counterparts do to help Barack, the reality is they are not as well structured in that area.
Obama sees a case where he can gain a great financial advantage over Republican challenger John McCain by taking a pass on the federal cash.
NOW I UNDERSTAND McCain wants to make a campaign issue out of this, although I don’t think he’s going to get much traction on this issue from the general public. Most people are going to hear that Obama wants to pay for this thing himself, and has a campaign that is capable of raising the needed money by itself.
So the average Jose on the street is going to be relieved that taxpayer dollars aren’t paying for the various cheap shot campaign ads that Obama invariably will use against McCain during the next few months.
If anything, the more straightforward-thinking people who don’t follow all the nuances of politics will probably wonder why McCain doesn’t pay for his own campaign.
People who do follow the nuances of politics are going to realize the reason McCain and Republicans are upset about this situation is because they are used to being the ones who have the financial advantage, and they resent being on the short end of available campaign cash.
WHILE I REALIZE the whole concept of public financing of campaigns is meant to give each nominee an equal financial chance of winning, the reality is that it doesn’t work. I have to respect Obama just a bit for being willing to take a pass on about $80 million. The easy thing for him would have been to just take the cash and maintain the status quo.
And I am not convinced that any amount of talks between Obama and McCain would have created any reforms in public financing that would have made it worth accepting the money. This is a case where Obama is literally putting his (campaign) money where his mouth is.
Should we really let McCain and his followers get away with trying to turn this into a campaign issue? Petty jealousy about money is about as non- an issue as this campaign can dig up.
So what other tidbits are worthy of note as the presidential campaign hits what should be the summer doldrums?
DUELING AUTHORS?: Sen. Jim Webb, D-Va., may have been in Chicago only to promote his new book, but there’s something about the conservative with a solid record of military support that seems like a natural to be Obama’s vice presidential running mate.
He’s just the kind of guy who could be trotted out to those places in rural Pennsylvania and Michigan (and Southern Illinois, to be honest) who might be able to credibly tell non-urban types that Obama is willing to listen to their concerns – mainly because he would use his influence to force Barack to pay attention.
While a part of me thinks New Mexico Gov. (and former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations) Bill Richardson would offer a lot, I have always figured Obama was going to have to pick a running mate who fits the extremely conventional mode of electoral politics. He will need a kind of Democrat who has people wonderingwhy they are not a Republican.
Not Hillary. Not any woman. And definitely not anyone who could be labeled by McCain followers as “a liberal.”
It would be interesting if an Obama/Webb ticket were to win on Election Day. Considering that Obama has two published books (and technically is contractually obligated to produce a third), what would happen if the American public were to decide it preferred Webb’s literary work?
“VERO POSSUMUS” IS “SI SE PUEDE?”: The Obama campaign has come up with a new logo, and some people think it looks a bit too much like the official insignia of the president of the United States.
To my mindset, the only difference is that the eagle in the Obama logo bears a shield consisting of the old Obama logo (the great big “O” that doubles as a rising sun).
What caught my attention was the Latin slogan that Obama types say translates into “Yes, We Can.” In Spanish, that has always been a slogan of Latino empowerment dating back to United Farm Workers founder Cesar Chavez.
What I want to know is, how long will it be until the phrase becomes (in the mindset of an unknowing public) the intellectual property of Obama, and people start thinking that the Latinos are stealing it from Barack?
AND ON A FINAL NOTE: I’m not sure what the tackiest moment of the week was – although I’m sure it was an Obama-related moment.
Hearing that his aides were dumb enough to want to get Arab women out of the background at one of their campaign events was ridiculous enough, but then having to watch a television spot (put together by Obama supporters, not the candidate himself) where a beautiful blond woman clings to her baby and tells McCain he can’t have her son as part of his “100-year-long” war in Iraq – that is just low class.
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EDITOR’S NOTES: The one-time “American Paper for Americans” thinks the system for public financing (http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/editorials/chi-0620edit1jun20,0,2973543.story) of campaigns ought to be scrapped, while the most conservative of the national news magazines thinks Obama should have taken (http://www.usnews.com/blogs/mashek/2008/6/20/barack-obamas-bad-decision-on-public-financing.html) the money.
“A Time to Fight,” published as part of the Union League Club’s “author’s group series (http://weblogs.baltimoresun.com/news/politics/blog/2008/06/jim_webb_stays_cage_on_vp_pros.html), probably will not sell as well as “Dreams from My Father” or “The Audacity of Hope.”
Scholars of Latin say Obama’s translation of “Yes, We Can” isn’t exact, but it is close (http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalradar/2008/06/obama-goes-loca.html) enough.
For those of you so culturally deprived that you have never seen “Treasure of the Sierra Madre” (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VqomZQMZQCQ), here is that film’s most quotable moment.
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