Waiting for the Second Coming... of Reagan?

Michael Gerson laments the collapse of John McCain's campaign, in a piece that is 80% of the way to reading like a parody.

For all their talk about respecting the constraints of reality, conservatives generally hold to the great man theory of history. It is leftists who embrace economic determinism. Conservatives read biographies of Winston Churchill and wait in constant expectation for the second coming of Ronald Reagan. Charisma and truth, in this view, can always overwhelm material conditions.

And this often leads to the small man theory of electoral setbacks. A losing Republican is not merely unfortunate; he must be incompetent, politically blind, and betrayed by his bumbling underlings. If he is not a winner, he is a fool.

This reminds me a bit of the evolution I've seen in a lot of idealistic people who become fascinated with politics at too young an age. The first time he votes, he's backing the great leader of the best party - the man who is going to save the country. A few elections later he's voting for "the lesser of two evils" and hoping that a great man emerges for the next election. A few elections after that, and he's realized that you have only two choices - picking "the lesser of two evils" or not voting. The candidates are human, and humans are flawed. The parties are flawed. The system is flawed. And you gotta live with it.

I think both parties try to present their presidential candidates as a "great man", and many voters happily oblige them by buying into a mindset that their candidate is going to fix the world, while the opposing candidate is going to destroy it (metaphorically, and sometimes perhaps literally, speaking). More sophisticated voters are apt to recognize that while great leaders can transform a nation, no matter what the political parties say, it's unlikely that they're voting for a great leader. They're also apt to note, perhaps particularly if they're conservative, that a great leader out to transform a country can take things in the wrong direction. The opposing party is often happy to emphasize that point - vote for Barry Goldwater and... boom!

Meanwhile, how many attacks have been launched on Obama's supporters for being a "cult of personality", entranced by the man but ignorant of his policies? For goodness sake, McCain even had a "second coming" ad about Obama's rise. Now we're to believe that this conduct, attributed to Obama's supporters, represents their acting like conservatives?

As for "leftists" embracing "economic determinism", it's almost as if Gerson is trying to pick marxist terms out of Wikipedia to create... I'm not sure what. Which "leftists" believe that economics are at the root of all political issues or problems? You point out, "It's the economy, stupid", and suddenly you're a marxist? Then what of Gerson's own argument:

The diverging political fortunes of Barack Obama and McCain can be traced to a single moment. In the middle of September, the net favorable rating for each candidate was about the same. By Oct. 7, Obama was ahead on this measure by about 16 points. Did McCain suddenly become a stumbling failure? No, the world suddenly went into an economic slide.

Clearly, then, you can be something other than a "leftist" and recognize the role - at times the central role - of economic factors in political events and world history. You might even enjoy talking about this - for example, crediting Reagan with winning the cold war by bankrupting the USSR. And what does Gerson believe that "Club for Growth"-type tax policies are about, but the idea that you can create an economic circumstance that forces a political outcome. What of the cult of privatization, ignoring the contexts that markets create efficiencies in favor of a delusional mantra that private entities will always perform better than public entities?

No, really, not all conservatives believe in "the great man theory of history", let alone see it as desirable. There are almost no actual marxists in the United States, and none that I'm aware of with any political influence. And both parties correctly see that economics play a role, often a significant role, in politics - while simultaneously avoiding any endorsement of Marxist theory. Go figure.

Why did Gerson attempt to frame the election as a competition between hero-worshiping "conservatives" and marxist "leftists"? Because:

While America remains a center-right country, this may well be a Marxist election in which economic realities are determining the political superstructure.

Earth to Gerson: Marxists don't play any discernible role in American politics, and neither they nor their theories win elections in center-right countries.

I was amused by Gerson's reaction to other pundits, as he complains about their advice to McCain:

If only the candidate would fire his entire campaign staff and travel the country in a used Yugo, speaking in the parking lots of 7-11s, the gap would be closed. If only the candidate would buy three hours in prime time and give a bold, historic speech (which has been helpfully sent under separate cover), the entire election would be turned around. If only the candidate would finally highlight his opponent's ties to Colombian drug cartels, the illuminati and the British royal family -- or perhaps abandon all this suicidal negativity -- the election could certainly be won. And yes, above all, the candidate must be himself.

I'm not sure who the first target is, but the "buy airtime" comment seems to be about Kristol, and the "smear, baby smear" comment seems to be about Krauthammer. (When even Michael Gerson recognizes your advice as bad....)

Gerson is also much to quick to blame the economy for McCain's problems at the poll. It's been very important, certainly, but there's a lot more to McCain's problem.

In the middle of September, the net favorable rating for each candidate was about the same. By Oct. 7, Obama was ahead on this measure by about 16 points.

I think McCain's problems started with his leading campaign tactic - one Gerson continues to endorse:

But the McCain campaign also proved itself capable of constructing an effective narrative: Obama as lightweight celebrity, McCain as maverick reformer. Until history intervened.

Political junkies forget that, although political buzz and ads can have a significant impression on the voting public, for many people the election doesn't begin until after the political conventions. McCain ran a pre-debate campaign that was largely premised on the notion that, "I'm so much better than him, all I should have to do to win is list my name on the ballot." Then he picked Gov. Palin as his running mate and enjoyed a brief surge in the polls. Then she was interviewed by Charlie Gibson, and independent voters started to shift in large numbers from McCain to Obama. By September 17, he had lost his lead. A couple of days later, we met Henry Paulson's $750 billion bailout plan. McCain was down in the polls, but only by a couple of points - within the margin of error.

Following the onset of the crisis, McCain was left with flawed options. He reasonably chose to work for a responsible bailout while hoping the markets would stabilize quickly.

McCain's slide in the polls was continuing. As the nation was introduced to the financial crisis, McCain engaged in some obvious grandstanding, noisily "suspending" his campaign to feign taking leadership of negotiations for a bail-out package. Except he didn't really suspend his campaign, didn't really contribute to the debate over the first bail-out proposal, and came across as trying to grab headlines to obscure his diminishing poll numbers.

Then, on September 26, Obama stood on the same stage as McCain and managed to not only hold his own, but in many ways to appear more presidential than McCain. McCain's "lightweight celebrity" theme crashed and burned and his campaign seemed to lose focus. Recall at this moment that Gerson's complaint is not that McCain's standing in the polls slipped, but that his favorables slipped. The performance of the markets played a part in the erosion of his support, but I suspect that the slide in his favorables had much more to do with his grandstanding on the fiscal crisis, his debate performance as contrasted with Obama's, and the fact that attacks that may well have been fair if raised at a different time or in a different manner seemed small, mean-spirited and misplaced within the context of a major financial crisis - they seemed timed and constructed to try to overcome a slide in the polls. How much of that is perception and how much is reality? It doesn't matter - that perception caused McCain's favorables to slide.

(Can anyone doubt that the past political association of McCain with a right-wing terrorist would attract some attention?)

Letterman had fun with that one.

Gerson's column seems to have three goals: Reinvigorate the failed "Obama's a lightweight celebrity" theme;¹ reinvent McCain as something "close enough" to a great man and second coming of Reagan; and to try to remove the economy and the financial crisis as bona fide election issues. Is it just me, or did he fail on all counts?
________________
1. Gerson attacks Obama, claiming,

His only recent accomplishment has been to say questionable things in the debates - attacking Republicans and capitalism for a credit meltdown congressional Democrats helped to cause, blaming America for Iran's nuclear ambitions, talking piously about genocide prevention when his own early Iraq policies might have resulted in genocide - all while sounding supremely reassuring and presidential.

The first? That's what passes, in this nation, as "good politics". As Gerson concedes, the government's contribution to the meltdown was bipartisan in nature, but this is the season for finger-pointing. The second, a silly exaggeration by Gerson. The third? What's Gerson smoking?

The Foibles Of Memory

Hillary Clinton is taking some pretty hard hits over her faulty memory of a trip to Bosnia. Many have been willing to accuse her of making up a story to augment her claims to be a foreign policy expert and Commander in Chief. While I understand the concept that people should have perfect memories, should be able to recount personal experiences as if they are describing videotape, and should never make mistakes of memory this significant, that's not how memory works.

In psychology, there's a famous example of a faulty memory reconstructed from the stories of others, provided by Jean Piaget.

I can still see, most clearly, the following scene, in which I believed until I was about fifteen. I was sitting in my pram, which my nurse was pushing in the Champs Elysees, when a man tried to kidnap me. I was held in by the strap fastened round me while my nurse bravely tried to stand between me and the thief. She received various scratches and I can still see vaguely those on her face. Then a crowd gathered, a policeman with a cloak and a white baton came up, and the man took to his heels. I can still see the whole scene, and can even place it near the tube station. [Piaget, J., Play, Dreams and Imitation in Childhood, (1951), p. 188]

The problem? Piaget's nanny had fabricated the story in order to try to collect a reward. He learned that the story was false when he was fifteen, but he nonetheless continued to have vivid memories of something that never happened.

What does this have to do with adult memories? Well, our memories are faulty as well. One famous example?

In the 1980 presidential campaign, Ronald Reagan repeatedly told a heartbreaking story of a World War II bomber pilot who ordered his crew to bail out after his plane had been seriously damaged by an enemy hit. His young belly gunner was wounded so seriously that he was unable to evacuate the bomber. Reagan could barely hold back his tears as he uttered the pilot's heroic response: "Never mind. We'll ride it down together." ...this story was an almost exact duplicate of a scene in the 1944 film "A Wing and a Prayer." Reagan had apparently retained the facts but forgotten their source [Schacter, Daniel L., Searching for Memory: The Brain, The Mind, and The Past (New York: Basic Books, 1996), 287).

It now appears that Clinton's memory was contaminated by accounts of a trip to Bosnia, albeit one taken by others six months prior to her trip. It's possible to see how the memory may have been constructed. As Clinton is preparing for her trip, she hears tales of the trip that preceded her. She's traveling with Chelsea, so this worries her. As they fly in, due to concerns about danger, she and Chelsea really are moved to the cockpit and the plane makes a fast descent. What followed? A landing strip greeting probably indistinguishable in any meaningful detail from hundreds of other such greetings she experienced as First Lady. Over time, the mundane details of the trip are forgotten. Meanwhile, she confuses the story of the prior, more harrowing trip with that of her own trip. This didn't happen immediately, but occurred over a period of years. During that time as she retold and built upon her story, nobody stopped to correct her - the memory became historically inaccurate but was real to her.

Everybody's head contains distorted memories; most of us are fortunate enough that nobody cares what we remember, and it's not a media story when our distortions come to light. Here's one of Joe Scarborough's:

…[T]his Bosnia story smacks of gotcha politics. If [Hillary Clinton] had the reputation of being an exaggerator-in-chief, like Al Gore, it would matter. If she had said I invented the Internet, it sticks. One of these gaffes sticks when it compounds an existing problem…

Do you, like Joe Scarborough, remember Al Gore saying that he 'invented the Internet'? If so, you're remembering something that never actually occurred.