Every political campaign has a theatrical dimension. The archetypal image of a campaign is a man or woman addressing a crowd. Whatever else that may be, it's theater!
Democrats aren't comfortable with theater. Republicans make good use of it. Sarah Palin was a brilliant theatrical move that continues to draw press coverage. So what can the Democrats do?
The Democratic campaign has a latent theatrical element from which the party is averting its eyes: The candidate speaking is black, but the crowd before him is white (symbolically, that is; it's a white nation and everybody knows it, no matter how many black faces appear in the crowd). The candidate has been saying "Let's ignore that difference and talk about the issues". But on the theatrical level the color difference IS the issue.
Obama has brilliantly addressed racism, but it's time he addressed racists. Imagine a black man looking into a sea of white faces in Ohio or West Virginia and saying "I'm told that many of you won't vote for me because I'm black. That's your choice, but it's going to cost you. The only other candidate in this race is a white man who doesn't give a damn about you, your prosperity, your children, or your future. He's a member of a party that rode into the White House on your religious beliefs. Then they put that horse out to pasture until the next election. They turned your mortgage over to reckless financiers, your pension over to the 401k wizards (now you see it, now you don't), and your job over to a foreign country. But you can vote for their man because he's white -- or you can vote for me because I promise to roll that stuff back. Your choice. Thank you".
This would be confronting the issue without being confrontational. I'm guessing that a lot of people who could be tagged "racist" would respect that direct talk and starting thinking twice about their votes. How sweet would it be to see "Rednecks for Obama" signs?"
Sarah Paylin's theater has about 10 percent content at most. Barack Obama could offer sensational theater of the best kind: Rich in content, mesmerizing in effect. If he did, two things would happen at once: (1) The media wouldn't be able to stop covering it, and (2) The Republicans would panic at this direct assault on their base.