Misnomer of the Day

Howard Fineman in Newsweek gives an oft-repeated, yet mistaken point of view on our electoral situation:

We know John McCain: as formed and familiar as a well-worn boot. But we don't know Barack Obama very well, and getting to know him has been and remains the basic national task of 2008.

If by "we," he is referring to the corporate news media which has been shuttled around on The Straight Talk Express whilst eating donuts and shooting the shit, I think Fineman is right. However, polling indicates that views toward the senior senator from Arizona are far more soft than they are towards Sen. Obama.

What does America know about McCain? In 2000, his campaign ended only a about a month and a half after the Iowa caucus. Most Americans know little about their own Senator, let alone one from Arizona, and this year's Republican primary did little to reintroduce him to the majority of Americans who don't follow politics and know the co-sponsors of immigration legislation or any such issues.

Obama has been the subject of intensive media scrutiny over the past few months, more so than any other primary candidate in history. McCain has been a side note in the battle between Hillary and Obama. And while I'm sure there are many Americans who don't know all the positions of Barack Obama, its equally true for John McCain, who most people know as a "maverick," but fewer know why exactly.

While I'm sure a good number of people know a bit of the backstory on McCain: war-hero, tortured, Senator, left his disabled wife for hot beer-heiress; they know probably as little, or less, about his actual politics than they do of Barack Obama. They likely don't know that he has abandoned his "Maverick" sensibilities in pursuit of the Republican nomination.

They know they are supposed to like him, but many aren't sure why. The media fawns over his town-halls, but the vast majority of Americans have never seen him give a town-hall presentation; at best they've seen truncated news clips which show his gaffes at these town halls.

In fact, so far as I can tell, the only state that really liked John McCain in 2000 or 2008 was New Hampshire (and the states surrounding it). He only won South Carolina this year because Fred Thompson siphoned off Huckabee votes, and he only won Florida because 9/11 had an incredibly stupid campaign strategy which involved being left out of mainstream news coverage for a month prior to that states primary...and even then, he just barely pulled off a victory.

Barack Obama has campaigned in some form or fashion in nearly all 50 states. He's stumped more in places like Montana and Oregon probably more than the candidates of both parties in 2004 combined. I don't necessarily think this guarantees him a win by any means, and to be sure he still does have a ways to go in solidifying a positive impression in the minds of voters, but John McCain has even more to do with less money, less charisma, and less political skill.