How the Democrats can lose

Douglas MacKinnon:

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Why are some Democrats worried that Mr. Obama may not necessarily be headed to the White House?

For starters, the American people like to have checks and balances. With predictions that Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid will grow their liberal power bases in the House and the Senate, more Americans than reflected in various polls may decide to apply the brakes to an Obama presidency.

And I know you’ve heard this before, experience does matter. Joe Biden may have inadvertently made that case for John McCain when he recently said that the world will test Barack Obama in six months. “The world is looking,” he said. “Watch, we’re gonna have an international crisis, a generated crisis, to test the mettle of this guy.”

By saying this, Mr. Biden planted a seed in some voters’ minds that terrorists, rogue nations or even a country like Russia may try to take advantage of Mr. Obama’s inexperience. The implication some may take away from Mr. Biden’s flat-out guarantee is that this would not happen to the combat veteran and vastly more experienced John McCain.

Beyond today’s experience argument, why do Democrats sometimes lose when all indications are that they will coast to victory? One reason that has gained traction in certain quarters is that the people who control the Republican Party understand and respect their opponents. Republicans think Democrats are wrong, but Democrats think Republicans are stupid, and that’s why Democrats lose.

In that vein, there is the often-told story of the movie critic Pauline Kael, who in the face of Richard Nixon crushing George McGovern in the 1972 presidential election allegedly said, “How can he have won? Nobody I know voted for him.” While always vehemently denied, much of the mainstream news media is more comfortable with the mindset of the left and of Barack Obama.

Because of that often unintended bias, the news media lives in a bubble that rarely crosses paths with Sarah Palin’s “real America.” If you don’t cross paths with and understand millions of Americans, how can you accurately poll them and, more important, empathize with them?

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And then there’s the innocuous comment. As one who has worked on presidential campaigns, I’ve learned that you never know what seemingly off-hand comment is going to resonate with voters. All campaigns want to bask under the unexpected glow of such a comment or live in fear of the assist it will provide to the other side.

This year’s candidate may be when Mr. Obama was confronted by “Joe the Plumber” who said, “Your new tax plan is going to tax me more, isn’t it?” To which Mr. Obama countered, “I think when you spread the wealth around, it’s good for everybody.”

Whoops. To some Americans — how many is the worry and hope of both campaigns — that sounds suspiciously like Mr. Obama wants to take some of their hard-earned money and give it to others who maybe don’t work as hard. Obama advisers are taking the issue very seriously as their candidate repeatedly reemphasizes that he won’t raise taxes on the middle class.

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What MacKinnon is pointing out is that the dismissive sentence or paragraph Obama's media allies have used to respond to the Plumber's issue is not working. The media used similar dismissive sentences against the charges raised by the Swift Vets and they did not work then either.

It could be that the media embrace of Obama has so overwhelmed this campaign that the issues can't break through. Certainly they have abused Sarah Palin and her record in a way that distorts what a strong candidate she really is. They set out to destroy her the same way they set out to destroy the Plumber. It is not enough to just prop up their guy they have to bring down any threats to him. In this campaign the media has been the Democrats' Swift Vets.