narrative

While I think the "Celeb" moment has been incredibly useful in throwing up a cloud of dust in Obama's face and putting him on the defensive, I don't think it's anywhere close to what McCain's closing argument should be. Ultimately, it's attacking Obama for his popularity, and popular isn't a bad place to be.

Where McCain twists the knife is on Georgia.

Georgia is where McCain highlights the necessary flip side of Celeb -- Obama's naivite and inexperience. Part I of the narrative is that Obama is just a rock star who packs stadiums. Part II is that rock stars don't solve your problems. 

The Georgia/Russia crisis is the reason why Americans have elected Republican Presidents for 28 of the last 40 years, even if they lean a little to the left on domestic issues. In a time of crisis, you need a hard-headed, tough leader who will have his eyes wide open on foreign threats. McCain, a long-time Putin critic, is perfectly suited to that 3 AM role. In a thumbnail way, Obama is the least-well-suited Democratic candidate on this score since McGovern.

For good reasons, the Democrats have successfully tarred Republicans with "corruption." We have and have had criminals in our midst like Ted Stevens, Jack Abramoff, Bob Ney, and others. We have done an inadequate job of shooting our own criminals in public, although the response to Stevens is encouraging.

In that context Sean makes an important point:

Voters who remember the results of liberal excess in the 1970s grow increasingly few and far between. Most voters don’t recall that the scandals which engulfed the GOP Congress were preceded by similar scandals that plagued Democrats for most of the 80s and early 90s; how many people today remember that the Democratic Speaker and Majority Whip both resigned as a result of separate ethical scandals in the 101st Congress?

People have certainly forgotten the old tales of Democratic corruption. We are also failing to tell today's stories of the corruption of Democrats and their allies. Some of this is media bias, but some is that we are not doing a good enough job of generating our own content. We have had Nancy Pelosi raising the minimum wage for everywhere but where she has financial interest. We have Ben Nelson giving earmarks to companies run by his children. Paul Kanjorski, Chris Dodd, John Murtha, etc. We have systemic union corruption. We have groups like ACORN who, at the least, establish incentive structures that encourage election fraud.

Where are we telling these stories?

How can you tell you're losing the fight for the media narrative?  Here's one example.  After month's of criticism about the many years of racism, segregationism, anti-Americanism and vile rhetoric from Obama's mentors and spiritual advisors, Obama resigned from his church.  So, what elements of that made it into the New York Times headline?

Following Months of Criticism, Obama Quits His Church

The story is becoming more about Obama being criticized (a personal story) than about the fringe-radical intellectual culture out of which Obama grew (a policy story).