It seems as though, despite the choice of Sarah Palin as the VP pick, the Republicans are going to shift their rhetoric from no experience to no leadership experience.
The main thing I've taken away from both Markos' excellent new book and Thom Hartmann's latest, Cracking the Code (also highly recommended) is that where liberals get beaten by conservatives is by trying to take them on their own turf.
Where we stand now is the "mommy" problem. It's my firm belief that operating on conservative framing with "leadership" is what's standing in the way of a popular and electoral landslide such as we haven't seen since LBJ vs. Goldwater. So where can we beat them?
For so long we've had it pounded into our heads that the President of the United States is the "leader of the free world" that we've started believing it. This is the attitude that has allowed George W. Bush's imperial presidency; that there's some sort of divine right of kings that goes along with the Oval Office. This plays into the authoritarian mindset wonderfully, which in turn plays into the hands of the right.
So, narrative-wise, what's the difference between Obama/Biden and McCain/Palin? How do we hit them where it hurts? "Leadership" is, despite the fact that Obama clearly knows how to run an organization far better than either of the Republicans is a non-starter. The American mindset is to be distrustful of politicians, especially, counterintuitively enough, ones who seem to be good at getting elected.
So what's the issue that separates our ticket from theirs? Service. Obama went to one of the best colleges in the country. Graduated magna cum laude. Could have written his own ticket anywhere he wanted to go. Where'd he go? To the south side of Chicago, to help poor people. Then he went to the best law school in America. President of the Harvard Law Review. Could have become a trial lawyer and gotten himself rich. Could have been a criminal defense attorney and the way that man can talk he could have gotten Timothy McVeigh off the hook, and gotten himself rich.
But no, he decides to be a civil rights attorney. Not a lot of money in that. And he takes a job teaching law students about the Constitution.
Here's a guy with an enormous wealth of talent, who could have done anything he wanted and been the best in the world at it, and he focuses those talents on improving people's lives in a real, in the trenches way.
Joe Biden is another example of service. He serves in a body of millionaires. He's served alongside Ted Stevens for decades. Now while all these long-time Senators are taking kickbacks and getting their wives onto the boards of corporations, Joe Biden is happy doing the people's work and making his salary, which is by no means inconsiderable, but no one's going to call him rich.
Now let's compare these two men, who could have achieved the shallow greatness that goes from avoiding your conscience, and compare them to John McCain (I'm going to avoid Sarah Palin here. If you want to compare them to Sarah Palin, I invite you to read one of the two or three thousand diaries on that topic). John McCain has never earned anything in his life.
The son and grandson of admirals, McCain graduated near the bottom of his class at Annapolis. In fact, his family history is the only thing that kept him from getting kicked out, and it then landed him the assignment that the people who worked a lot harder than he did were working to get: carrier pilot.
This proved to be a bad move, as McCain quickly crashed three planes, married a model, and shipped off to Vietnam. Yeah, yeah, POW, etc. He came home, started cheating on his wife almost immediately, and eventually hooked up with another beauty, this one a beer heiress. Her father would buy him into the United States House of Representatives, and then later, the Senate.
Do you see a pattern emerging? Is the difference in the integrity of these men not clear enough? It's not about leadership, it's about servitude. Barack Obama has spent his life serving people. While Obama worked for everything he ever got and then dedicated himself to helping those in need, John McCain sought every opportunity to be given things he did not earn.
This is the narrative we should be pushing, this is the contrast that should be drawn: Do we want Barack Obama, son of a poor single mother, living the American dream and dedicating himself to helping others do the same, or do we want John McCain, son of privilege, living by the pirate creed of "Take what you can; give nothing back?"
The President is not the leader of the United States, he's the highest-ranking servant of the People of the United States. Who do you think is going to do a better job at that job?