It is a planned part of the assault on McCain to stress his age, as if someone in his seventies cannot run the country. Conveniently overlooked is Reagan, but we know that Obama fancies himself to be in the mold of Reagan. So who cares that Reagan was in his late seventies when he left office and that nothing was made of age?
We have a war hero here who was abused as a prisoner for five years, and we have no idea what his problems happen to be. We know McCain had cancer. So what if it were skin cancer. Such cancer generally is a sign of age. And age and experience is what we have run against in the primaries and those so-called caucuses and are still running against.
So goes Obama's message. One of change. Of throwing the old out in favor of the new. Of talking about people being over the hill and referring to the "old" politics.
A message of "old" when we are dealing with teenagers voting in abundant numbers (at least that is the claim) and a forty-seven year old. A message of old professors when we are dealing with Masters and Doctorate candidates and recent graduates.
A message of the past when we are ready to start a new future.
Obama has plied the old persons mantra with biased regularity. "Losing bearings." "Helping the old lady across the street." Kennedy and his youth and young children. The whole nine yards.
That this is not mere fanciful rewriting of the "real message of change" is evidenced by how old people feel about Obama.
Older voters are not voting for Clinton in huge numbers merely because she is a woman. Clinton clobbers Obama in the category of over 60 and even beat him in Illinois in the over 65 crowd.
Why is this?
Older people have seen him operate. They do not like or trust him.
In huge numbers, this dislike is in part based on the way he has treated his elders during this election year and those with more legislative experience. As if he got such experience at age 10. As if he is more knowledgeable than those who have plied the legislative wars for generations.
Throw them all under the bus because they have no idea what they are doing and are old.
Exactly why we have so many of the Democratic Party's elder statespersons in Obama's camp obviously has nothing to do with his age bias. They believe that his message really means something else. They see the old guy, a former general, get up and castigate Clinton as if she were a military opponent in some war he once fought. Some guy in his seventies. And they think that he is really going to use older people as part of his administration.
Do not bet on it.
Look at his primary actors. All younger. All inexperienced. Like fawning one year Claire McCaskill.
{If not otherwise clear, the following paragraph is my own view regarding Michelle Robinson and some research on her and her statements after the campaign began, for what they are worth.}
His wife Michelle does not trust what she probably called "whitey" America for a good reason. She does not like those old people, who are whatever they can be called but at base she sees racism where there is little or none. And will not put up with one who is old as her vice president. Because they are old and cannot be trusted. Indeed, who is to say that Obama remained with Reverend Wright not because of his anti-white message but because Michelle Obama insisted that they stay with that church?
So Obama and others have focused on the new, the young, the impressionable.
And the Pelosis and Kennedys and Kerrys see this as marvelous. Wonderful. So Kennedy-like.
But this has nothing to do with Kennedy. Just a lack of trust in anyone who is old.
The latest old versus new issue, now that we have the self-proclaimed victory that occurred well before the finish line was reached, is the vice presidency. That august office that Cheney has made something out of. That Gore is alleged to have had some place when that awful group called the Clintons were running this country.
Whatever excuses you want to use to keep Clinton from the vice presidency, the past has frequently included runners-up as vice presidents. And it has also included many more senior legislative types.
But the Obamas are sticking with youth. They are already arguing that Clinton is too old behind closed doors. And they are making this same group of old Democrats who put Obama where he is see the perfect fit. Go young and run against John McCain by trouncing him agewise. A young ticket, with youth trouncing age.
This is a consistent message. One that has played since day one. A message of hope for and from "youth." The Obamas have no plans to help old lady Clinton across the street.
Why should they? Obama knows it all, and better than those with experience, as the country will find out. And he is going to go after the old in every way he can, including social security.
Trust Obama? If you are old, never.