James Prescott

Politics is sexy, but it is money that makes the world go round. While most people today will focus on the latest pearl of wisdom from President Obama, or if they live in Illinois the Greek tragedy that is Rod Blagojevich, many will blow by the fact that today is the day that money became free.

I do not normally read poetry. Generally I do not go in for over the top sentiment. However, the current environment and the government’s reaction to it reminds me of the Rudyard Kipling poem “If.” It seems to me that the international leaders, the markets investors, and pretty much everyone else should read this poem and remember what it is to be a grown up?

Is this a crisis? You betcha. But as is generally the case it is looking more and more like the cure will be more deadly than the disease.

Here is the NLDS Breakdown:

Game 1: Derek Lowe (14-11, 3.24 ERA) vs. Ryan Dempster (17-6, 2.96 ERA)

Derek Lowe has a 4.42 ERA on the Road, and opposing batting averages is .251 vs. lefties and .240 against righties. So look for Fukudome and Edmonds to start, especially with DeRosa having a sore leg. Lowe has 45 BB to 147 SO, so it looks like he will tend to throw a lot of pitches. This is a guy who can be worked to knock him out of the game early to get to the Dodger bullpen, and set up the next game.

Ryan Dempster has defended his house. .243 against lefties, .213 against righties. The Dodgers have have decent lefties in Eithier and Loney. Dempster has a 2.86 at home, so he is pretty consistent. Uncle Lou is putting up his best home pitcher to start the series so look for them to start strong.

The following is what the speech was not.

Soaring oratory. Biting and pithy. Eloquent. A straight up partisan speech. Humorous. A perfect speech.

To me, this is not necessarily a bad thing.

Here is what McCain’s speech was; a good speech where he achieved his goals and provided a good foundation for the next two months. His goals were the following; to divorce himself from George Bush and the failures of the Republican Party and provide a narrative that is not just “I was a POW.”

Halfway through the speech John McCain confessed to the failures of the Republican Party and sought to distance himself from it. “I fight to restore the pride and principles of our party. We were elected to change Washington, and we let Washington change us. We lost the trust of the American people when some Republicans gave in to the temptations of corruption. We lost their trust when rather than reform government, both parties made it bigger. We lost their trust when instead of freeing ourselves from a dangerous dependence on foreign oil, both parties and Senator Obama passed another corporate welfare bill for oil companies. We lost their trust, when we valued our power over our principles.”

This was greeted with dead silence by the convention and was a decisive break from the party. Even Chris Matthews and Keith Olbermann saw it as such, so it is ludicrous to think that Senator McCain “lacked the guts” to break from the party.

As for adding in the “policy” issues after his concluding story, I think this demonstrates why Brian won’t be a political speech writer anytime soon. The point of the story was to describe his evolution from a me-first young kid to a country first individual. You do not clutter up the message by tacking on some heavy handed policy positions. I think he effectively told a story that described his theme of country first, explained his personal connection to that theme, and conveyed it effectively. Yeah, it was a POW story again, but when you have an event like that, that is that important in your development, it bears repeating. It wasn’t just repeating “I was a POW,” but it described how he was broken and vulnerable and a lot of the less pleasant aspects of his imprisonment.

As for people like Brian being bored, I am not overly concerned because he isn’t indicative of the target audience. Brian prefers the high flying oratory of Senator Obama, and Senator McCain didn’t try to do that. Besides, Brian is dedicated to Senator Obama, so there is nothing McCain could have said that would have impressed him. This deliberate decision to not attempt eloquent oratory is a good thing, because any attempt to do that would be a pale imitation and make Senator McCain look desperate.

Instead Senator McCain tried to have a conversation with the American people. Those that were disinclined to listen because they already decided who they were going to vote for probably found the speech boring because Senator McCain didn’t grab their attention. Those that were interested in what he had to say because they were undecided probably found it a bit dry, but thought there was more content in it. I find it unlikely that the speech made up the independents collective mind, but I think it provided inroads for them to listen to Senator McCain more down the road.

Anyway, time will tell. I think the bounces will cancel each other out and at the end of the day (that day being Tuesday or so, once all the tracking polls cycle through), the race will still be close, if not a statistical tie. Everyone will pause and catch their breath and wait until the end of the month. All these conventions will do is hype up the excitement and attention that this election will garner; something I thought before the elections was impossible.

Stay tuned.

Round one goes to Governor Palin.

While not delivering a knock out, Governor Palin delivered some serious body blows and bloodied the nose of the Democratic presidential nominee. And the thing of it is, a significant portion of the damage was caused by serious mismanagement by the Obama campaign.

The days since the VP announcement have not been kind to the McCain/Palin ticket. The stance taken by the Democrats had taken was this; Sarah Palin is not a serious candidate. She is a cynical choice and does not have the chops to work at this level. She doesn’t know what she is doing, and she cannot and will not build in roads to women because she is prolife. This will ultimately backfire and she will wilt.

Now in the Dems defense, the bar was set almost absurdly low for Governor Palin going into the speech due to over enthusiasm by the Left. But that is their fault for over pursuing, not Governor Palin.

Objectively, Governor Palin gave a very good speech in terms of delivery and rhetoric. The content was neither surprising or off topic. Governor Palin showed she was a team player by not straying. She was Senator McCain’s running mate and stuck to his message and played the role of pitbull well.

And what a pitbull she was. Again, the tactics and arguments she provided were not new. But the delivery of and the genuine character of the candidate evident during the speech made those arguments land in such a way that Senator Clinton and Senator McCain could not match. She was funny and delivered the blows with a smile. She had memorable lines (mayor is community organizers with responsibilities, promising change to promote career vs. career to promote change, when Reid said he can’t stand McCain he meant can’t stand up to, etc.) She took it to Obama and reminded the audience of all the reasons that they were starting to fall out of love with Obama.

Governor Palin was not all about just ripping Senator Obama and the Democratic Party. She reestablished her roots, her connection with rural America, and interestingly, her commitment in pushing for a better world for special interest children. She began to flesh out as a candidate.

Also, I thought it was a nice tactic to link the media with the old boy network in Washington. I think she did that quite effectively. If effective, any further attacks by the media is seen as a ploy by the establishment who fears the maverick ticket of McCain/Palin. This is especially effective given that 49% of people believe that the media is actively trying to help Senator Obama win.

After the speech I turned on MSNBC, which is probably the closest thing we have to Pravda here in the United States. I watch MSNBC because it gives me a better read on what the Democrats are thinking than anything else. Also, that station was more likely to give serious criticism to Palin than anyone else. (The other stations I flipped through were pretty positive about the speech, although George S. on ABC said it could be considered shrill, but even that sounded half hearted).

The official response from the Obama/Biden ticket was announced, but it was pretty much the same old tired line of McCain=Bush, and not a whole lot about Governor Palin. It is still early, but it showed she didn’t make any immediate overwhelming gaffes that anyone could capitalize on.

Buchanan went over the top in the praise, but that is negligible because his role is to be the sole GOP cheerleader and so he has to be positive.

Matthews said the speech was very well done. Olbermann struggled and came up with three criticisms. 1) She announced when her son was deploying which might be against Army regs, but then said that the date she revealed was the deployment ceremony and not actual deployment, but it could be against the law, but he didn’t know. Well, ok, sure. But that sounds like a reach if she just announced when the ceremony was, which sounds like a public event. 2) The community organizer crack might offend some people. Probably will, but I hardly think its going to be that big of a ripple. 3) Was a comment that she was sarcastic and could be considered “elitist” as a result. Although how that works since she spent most of the time emphasizing her humble roots and accusing Obama of elitism is a tad difficult to follow.

I then watched some Larry King who had on all Democrats who pretty much said she was not explicit enough about her view of America, that she did not have a plan, and was just “fear mongering.”

But no one, no one, no one, questioned her ability any more. No one questioned her ability and referred to her as pandering. Sarah Palin stepped up and showed that she was for real at least tonight. While the arguments that she is not ready will persist for the rest of the campaign, those complaints have lost their luster and will fade to the background barring a major gaffe by her later on. In addition, she has put the heat back on Obama, dragging him back into the spot light to answer questions to which there are no easy answers (George S. line, not mine). For this and this alone, the first round goes to the Republican ticket.

Now, please note, this does not mean that I am predicting a Republican win. It is still early and there are a lot of things that can go wrong on either side. However I think it is a much closer race this morning than it was yesterday.

In conclusion, Governor Palin has set the table for Senator McCain. McCain has to answer and provide a concrete and clear vision of a McCain presidency. He must do several things tonight. First he must not fall into the trap of trying to match the drama that was Governor Palin’s speech last night, or trying to use the soaring rhetoric that is Senator Obama’s wheelhouse. Trying to be something you are not is not going to work. Governor Palin showed being genuine gets you much farther than thesaurus does.

Second, do not be baited into giving a dense, complicated, detail oriented speech. The debates are for details, the convention has to be about the candidate. Sell the vision, and give the broad strokes of the plan, but don’t bog down the speech with the details.

Finally, McCain just has to give a very good speech. McCain has to match Palin’s speech tonight, but he needs to scale back the commentary on Senator Obama and instead focus on his ideas.