Present Prologue
Here’s something instructive. Dean Reynolds, CBS, reporter’s notebook: Obama campaign plane cramped, smells bad, staff clueless and unhelpful, in marked contrast to the McCain camp.
(NASHVILLE, TENN.) - After most of the previous 12 months covering Barack Obama’s campaign for the presidency, it was interesting, instructive and, well, relaxing to follow John McCain for the last few days. The differences between the two are striking.
Obama is the big time orator, McCain is the guy who struggles with a teleprompter or even note cards strategically placed nearby. Obama’s crowds are larger, more enthusiastic. McCain’s events are smaller, but to my eye, better choreographed. And now with the addition of Sarah Palin to some of his events, McCain can boast of crowds that match Obama’s in energy.
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It is true that McCain enjoys taking questions from the audience in town hall-style settings. That doesn’t mean he is the master of that kind of forum, it just means he’s good at it. He likes to converse with voters. Obama does it well too, but seldom achieves that intangible bond with the people that all politicians crave — or fake.
Behind the scenes, where the public is not allowed, there are other differences.
Obama’s campaign schedule is fuller, more hectic and seemingly improvisational. The Obama aides who deal with the national reporters on the campaign plane are often overwhelmed, overworked and un-informed about where, when, why or how the candidate is moving about. Baggage calls are preposterously early with the explanation that it’s all for security reasons.
If so, I would love to have someone from Obama’s campaign explain why the entire press corps, the Secret Service, and the local police idled for two hours in a Miami hotel parking lot recently because there was nothing to do and nowhere to go. It was not an isolated case.
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The McCain folks are more helpful and generally friendly. The schedules are printed on actual books you can hold in your hand, read, and then plan accordingly. The press aides are more knowledgeable and useful to us in the news media. The events are designed with a better eye, and for the simple needs of the press corps. When he is available, John McCain is friendly and loquacious. Obama holds news conferences, but seldom banters with the reporters who’ve been following him for thousands of miles around the country. Go figure.
The McCain campaign plane is better than Obama’s, which is cramped, uncomfortable and smells terrible most of the time. Somehow the McCain folks manage to keep their charter clean, even where the press is seated.
The other day in Albuquerque, N.M., the reporters were given almost no time to file their reports after McCain spoke. It was an important, aggressive speech, lambasting Obama’s past associations. When we asked for more time to write up his remarks and prepare our reports, the campaign readily agreed to it. They understood.
Similar requests are often denied or ignored by the Obama campaign aides, apparently terrified that the candidate may have to wait 20 minutes to allow reporters to chronicle what he’s just said. It’s made all the more maddening when we are rushed to our buses only to sit and wait for 30 minutes or more because nobody seems to know when Obama is actually on the move.
Which makes all the Obamadoration all that much more remarkable, seeing as service on his bus sounds like the kind of punishment that typically turns scribblers virulently against their subjects.
Maybe a front-running campaign like Obama’s that is focused solely on victory doesn’t have the time to do the mundane things like print up schedules or attend to the needs of reporters.
But in politics, everything that goes around comes around.
Yeah, maybe, but I doubt it. Especially given the agenda-pushing by editors. But looking beyond the narrow issue of reporters’ comfort … you think that plane is cramped and smelly and the campaign staff arrogantly unhelpful? Just wait till they are running the country.
With a nod to Drudge.
Posted by Jules Crittenden at 9:33 am on Thursday, October 9, 2008
2 Responses to “Present Prologue”
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October 9th, 2008 at 9:38 am
Perhaps Obama’s press people can follow the stink to this story: http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives2/2008/10/021724.php
October 9th, 2008 at 10:49 am
I’ll second that. Could maybe some mainstream reporter out there, somewhere, somehow, maybe just ask Obama if he was ever a member of the New Party or DSA? Did he sign a pledge? Did he actively seek their endorsements? Were his ties with ACORN related in any way to DSA and/or New Party? Did he attend party meetings, and how often? I know it would be a distraction from digging up the latest trivia on Sarah Palin, but hey, wouldn’t it be at least interesting to know something, ANYTHING, about Obama’s formative years as a state legislator? Which was only 12 years ago, not exactly ancient history?
I think I’ll write a children’s story about Obama. It will be entitled, “From a Tiny ACORN Grew…”