| Clips Extended Remix
First, an expanded look at the clips from above, to get the full flavor, and a sense of what they point to.
Howard Fineman was on Countdown, just one part of Olberman's coverage this week, when he said:
"I think they are going to it way too many times. It's the original story that defined John McCain, that still when you read it in his book 'Faith of my Fathers,' when you read about it in 'The Nightingale's Song,' you can't help but have admiration and respect for the guy. And I think he wisely for many years stayed away from it as a political tool, he really did. But now it not only defines him, it's become a crutch in the campaign. And I think he is in danger of trivializing it. By the time they get to the convention in St. Paul, there might not be much of it left to use."
This is a good representation of where Versailles seems to be heading--still respectful of McCain's service and his ordeal (no talk about how he served Hanoi's propaganda agenda, that's still off-limits), but just on the verge of saying it directly that, yes, crazy old uncle Larry really is crazy.
And at Swampland, Ana Marie Cox puzzles:
In His House There are Many Mansions
The McCain campaign's constant invocation of the candidate's POW past is weird bordering on irrational: yesterday, Nicolle Wallace used it as evidence that McCain didn't "cheat" at Saddleback. By a VERY generous interpretation, she could have meant that POWs don't cheat. Or that once you've been a POW, you've been through so much you're above cheating. Or maybe you can't accuse a POW of cheating unless you're a POW.
Today, spokesman Brian Rogers took the same tack against the "housing crisis" they currently face: "This is a guy who lived in one house for five and a half years -- in prison." So is he arguing that we shouldn't begrudge McCain his multiple house because he once lived in an awful prison? Is he saying POWs deserve multiple houses (and you thought Obama was pro-nanny-state!)? Or maybe he's saying that McCain's several houses are really just prisons... of the soul. Man is entombed by his possessions, it's true.
It's a head-spinning non sequitur...
before returning safely to the fold:
...designed to distract us from something mildly troubling with the assertion of something impressive. As if, say, the Obama campaign countered criticisms of his resume by pointing out that he's black.
Oh, wait...
But the damage is already done.
At The Politico, Ben Smith's headline says as much as his "story":
The POW card
Eric Kleefeld notices that McCain aides referred back to McCain's time as a prisoner of war in Vietnam in defending him from the mockery over his houses.
This is a guy who lived in one house for five and a half years -- in prison," says spokesman Rogers.
It does seem like they're flirting with Giuliani/9/11 territory here, in which at subject that seems utterly immune to humor, used as a first resort, suddenly becomes a running joke among your political enemies and your late night comic friends.
And the fact that MoDo has said anything at all is almost the kiss of death:
His brutal hiatus in the Hanoi Hilton is one of the most stirring narratives ever told on the presidential trail - a trail full of heroic war stories. It created an enormous credit line of good will with the American people. It also allowed McCain, the errant son of the admiral who was the commander of U.S. forces in the Pacific during Vietnam - his jailers dubbed McCain the "Crown Prince" - to give himself some credit.....
So it's hard to believe that John McCain is now in danger of exceeding his credit limit on the equivalent of an American Express black card. His campaign is cheapening his greatest strength - and making a mockery of his already dubious claim that he's reticent to talk about his P.O.W. experience - by flashing the P.O.W. card to rebut any criticism, no matter how unrelated. The captivity is already amply displayed in posters and TV advertisements.
These clips indicate a sea-change of sorts--though only the beginnings of one. There are still powerful elements of the old narrative landscape seascape in place. The statements generally carry more of a "look what's about to happen" perspective, rather than "look what's already happened" one, despite all the examples cited. And McCain's service is honored once again--the old obligations are still in place. But the WTF questioning is right out there, front and center, and that toothpaste is going to be mighty hard to get back into the tube.
Collectively, all the above seems to fully vindicate at least one key aspect of what I take to have been Obama's inside game with Versailles and McCain these past few months, a game perhaps more akin to "give 'em enough rope" than to "rope-a-dope".
Either way, by absorbing so many blows from McCain with a rather passive response, Obama has lost ground nationally, to the point of having almost no lead in national polls, and no longer holding a clear EV majority, but if McCain has finally lost his free pass with Versailles, then that should just about do it for him. Because without that free pass, he's just "A Dangerously Hot-Headed Celebrity POW Who Can't Remember How Many Houses He Owns", which means Clinton/Dole territory for him, at best.
Closing Daou's Triangle
As I noted in a comment to Matt's diary, "The Netroots Created the Housing Gaffe", the synergy between Brave New Films and bloggers, pushing the McCain hosuing story into the traditional media, was an example of something larger:
The Bigger Picture--Slowly, Slowly, Closing Daou's Triangle
The situation that Peter Daou described is starting to shift, and this is the cutting edge of what that shift looks like. We still have light-years, not miles to go, but it's a very significant breakthrough, and the synergy of blogs, YouTube, and producers like Brave New Films is leading the way.
But they're hardly alone. The fact that Glenn Greenwald, for exmple, is now doing web radio interviews is indicative of how the online blogger and media world are expanding and creating new synergetic possibilities. Synergy, intentionality and timing are all key here. And the triangle is slowly starting to close.
To refresh our memories, and see how far we've come, here's a key passage from Peter's original essay at the Internet Archive (no longer available at Salon, at least not readily):
The Triangle
Looking at the political landscape, one proposition seems unambiguous: blog power on both the right and left is a function of the relationship of the netroots to the media and the political establishment. Forming a triangle of blogs, media, and the political establishment is an essential step in creating the kind of sea change we've seen in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.
Simply put, without the participation of the media and the political establishment, the netroots alone cannot generate the critical mass necessary to alter or create conventional wisdom. This is partly a factor of audience size, but it's also a matter, frankly, of trust and legitimacy. Despite the astronomical growth of the netroots (see Bowers and Stoller for hard numbers), and the slow and steady encroachment of bloggers on the hallowed turf of Washington's opinion-makers, it is still the Russerts and Broders and Gergens and Finemans, the WSJ, WaPo and NYT editorial pages, the cable nets, Stewart and Letterman and Leno, and senior elected officials, who play a pivotal role in shaping people's political views. That is not to say that blogs can't be the first to draw attention to an issue, as they often do, but the half-life of an online buzz can be measured in days and weeks, and even when a story has enough netroots momentum to float around for months, it will have little effect on the wider public discourse without the other sides of the triangle in place. Witness the Plame case, an obsession of left-leaning bloggers long before the media and the political establishment got on board and turned it into a political liability for Rove and Bush.
This is what's starting to change, particularly with a combination of different communication forms and practices, as web video--YouTube, Brave New Films, TPM's weekday videos, Bloggingheads, etc.--online reporting (particularly, surprisingly, The Politico), web audio and cable are interacting in ways that are dramatically more powerful and influential on the tradtional media than anything seen in previous election cycles.
This is why flipping the POW card--even though it's only just begun, and is far from a done deal--is such a significant event. It builds on the McCain "housing gaffe" and takes it to the next level, taking it to a direct attack on McCain's brand as the only POW in the world.
This is the shape of an emerging potential counter-hegemonic infrastructure--because that, in essence, is what closing Daou's triangle is all about--counter-hegemonic infrastructure at the news-cycle level that keep things going over much longer stretches of time. And if Obama is smart, he will join right in on this process--"big time," as America's #2 war criminal would say.
Heck, if Paris Hilton can get with it, why the heck shouldn't he?
Angel: "Looks like it's just you and me, Fred. - Well, the worm certainly has turned."
Fred, giggling: "Y-y-yeah. The worm's turning and... (Stops smiling) Am I the worm?" --"Carpe Noctem", Angel, Episode # 48 |
