John McCain is an American hero. He was a prisoner during the Vietnam War, and has done some great things in the United States Senate. On the campaign trail when he ran for President in 2000, he offered the Republican Party a leader who I my judgment obviously would have been far more intelligent and visionary than the one eventually nominated.

But John McCain 2008 is off-message and off-key, and seems to be an inferior clone to his 2000 self. His campaign seems badly-exhausted rather than well-tested. He sounds like he's reaching for a message rather than on message.

I watched his announcement speech in Portsmouth on Wednesday, April 25th, with the hope that I would be inspired by a Republican -- not that I expect to be very easily (in the interest of disclosure I'm supporting Hillary Clinton.) But I was expecting the straight talk and clear idealism of McCain 2000 which motivated thousands and thousands in New Hampshire and elsewhere to get excited about this man.

Instead, I saw someone stumbling over his words. Worse, he couldn't seem to go through a sentence without reading it almost word by word. One would expect if you're giving about the most important speech of your campaign -- an announcement speech -- you'd know it fairly well before walking up to the podium. But he didn't.

Whether he was prepared by his campaign consultants or not isn't the point, although it tells us something about the state of his campaign if he wasn't. Either way, he tumbled over some of his words, and his pacing was way off. The audience didn't seem particularly excited or motivated. It was more like they were just being courteous, which if so is the nice and polite thing to do.

His apparent thematic approach, if he had one, was something like "...that's not good enough for America and when I'm President it won't be good enough for me." Those words followed a few statements of things that aren't going well. But the gesturing he used seemed forced, as were his words. I also found that he raced through much of his speech, not waiting for expected applause at appropriate places. Yes, it was overcast but rain was a long time off, so I don't know why he suddenly became the Hurried-Up Express.

And I didn't hear "the vision thing." Maybe he's been talking too much with his friend George W. Bush?

But, this man is an American hero. A genuine one. He fought for us. He defended us. I wasn't a fan of the Vietnam War no more than I am of the Iraq War, but when a man or woman goes to war in answer to a decision of our government -- right or wrong -- he or she deserves respect and appreciation. He went. He fought. He suffered. Many other heroes went, and didn't come back. Fortunately, John McCain did.

One speech does not make a candidate or a campaign -- although one given by Barack Obama in 2004 at the Democratic National Convention certainly got some attention. So, here's hoping we'll see John McCain catch his breath and become a star again in the Republican Party.

Let's hope his campaign reinvigorates and reinvents itself. His party needs him in the debate. And the Democratic candidates need to be challenged by quality opposition as well. The election season of 2007-2008 will be all the better with John McCain as an important player, whether or not he goes all the way.

Posted by Jim Splaine at 12:46 PM| Permalink | Comments (0)

Another early Presidential Primary is coming, and it's a good one. It shows the power and value of the Internet -- you know, that computer network highway that Al Gore invented, or whatever. (Actually, he did have a lot with "pulling it all" together, having a vision some two decades ago of what it could become.)

The CEO of MySpace, Chris DeWolfe, and Tom Anderson, the MySpace President -- real names there, not screen names, so this is on the level -- announced that the 65 million monthly American MySpace visitors, most of whom are actually of voting age, will be able to vote their preference on January 1st and 2nd, 2008.

At the moment, that's three weeks before the tentative date of the New Hampshire Primary, although that date is likely to change. In the MySpace election, there will be some provisions to keep repeat visitors from voting twice, supposedly. But smart computer users, and it doesn't take long to get computer savvy these days, will probably figure out ways around the cookies and security systems software that MySpace will create.

Nevertheless, the MySpace Presidential Primary will get plenty of media, and thus attention. You can bet campaign bloggers -- the paid and the unpaid -- will work up their organizational skills by then to get their supporters to vote. That can have exciting possibilities at motivating those who usually spend way too many hours in front of their monitors to get out and vote when the real election day comes around. And that's a good thing.

The NH Presidential Primary, of course, will still be the first "real election," but the MySpace Presidential Primary will contribute to the buildup of ideas and information sharing, and will likely increase interest in all the candidates. It will also force the candidates and their supporters to get online and say things of substance, instead of just hide behind some Madison Avenue advertising gimmicks. And that's another good thing.

Yet another good result of all this is that since the Internet and Blogs and talk is actually "free," the MySpace Presidential Primary will empower those candidates and their supporters who haven't by then become the stars of the millionaires and special interest lobbyists giving their money away for promises yet kept. Someone other than the big cash hounds might win the MySpace Primary, and that will get more attention to alternatives to the cash rush. After all, ideas DO count on the Internet, because it's people talking with people, talking with more people and more people. Well, you know what I mean.

Who knows. Al Gore might win this one without even announcing as a candidate. Maybe he was even more of a visionary some 20 years ago than even he knew!

Posted by Jim Splaine at 07:16 PM| Permalink | Comments (0)