We’ve all heard the expression, “90% of life is just showing up.” It seems to be the basis of an LA Times editorial today, praising John McCain’s week-long tour of small towns, urban areas, and other communities that have struggled economically for years. McCain appeared in impoverished areas in Alabama, Kentucky, Louisiana, and Ohio, and the LAT thinks that’s just great — even if he doesn’t have any intention of actually helping the families who live there.
[I]nstead of promising truckloads of aid if he’s elected, McCain talked up his vision of a government that helps more by doing less.
It’s not a new message from the Arizona senator, who follows an unpredictable political muse but typically favors smaller government and less regulation…. In fairness, McCain tailored some of his pitches to please the crowds. For example, his message drifted into government-will-take-care-of-you territory when his tour reached New Orleans, where he condemned the Bush administration’s response to Hurricane Katrina. (Democrats responded by noting that McCain had voted against $28 billion in emergency aid to the region.) And his deregulatory stance rang hollow at times, such as when he argued in Kentucky that improving education and training for women was a better response to employment discrimination than making it more feasible for victims to sue — as if an employer’s bias could be overcome by making female workers even more qualified.
But by making a point of saying things his audiences might not want to hear, he gave voters a better feel for who he is and how he thinks. As Obama and Clinton focused on exposing each other’s weaknesses, it was nice to see one candidate reveal more about himself.
I appreciate the Times’ point — the media loves it when politicians say things voters probably don’t want to hear, especially when it’s John McCain — but the editorial is setting the bar awfully low.
Talk about your soft bigotry of low expectations, the LAT is praising McCain for showing up and telling poor people about policies that won’t do them any good at all. That’s better, I suppose, than blowing off impoverished communities altogether, but only slightly.
The NYT’s Gail Collins highlighted part of the problem in a good column today.
John McCain — this is the guy, you may remember, who’s going to be the Republican presidential nominee — has been visiting the poor lately. Appalachia, New Orleans, Rust Belt factory towns. This is a good thing, and we applaud his efforts to show compassion and interest in people for whom his actual policies are of no use whatsoever.
McCain’s special It’s Time for Action Tour was in the impoverished Kentucky town of Inez on Wednesday, so he was unable to make it to Washington to vote on the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act. This is the bill that would restore workers’ ability to go to court in cases of pay discrimination.
But McCain was not ducking the issue. After all, this is a man who told the folks in Youngstown, Ohio — where most of the working single mothers cannot make it above the poverty line — that the answer to their problems is larger tax deductions. He is fearless when it comes to delivering unpleasant news to people who are probably not going to vote for him anyway.
It’s possible, if not likely, that I’m wildly off base when it comes to voters’ expectations. In this case, McCain spent some time in hard-hit areas, presented the same ideas that have screwed over the people in these areas for years, and yet, there’s some evidence that folks there were just happy to see him there paying lip service to their difficulties.
Whether he was building his brand or expanding his experience, he certainly seemed to connect with voters.
“I just like his character,” said Doug Hammond, a mechanic from Lovely, Ky.
“I just can’t say anything bad about him,” said Irene McCoy, a Wal-Mart employee from Pikeville, Ky.
“I love that he took the time and came here to see about us,” said Mary Lee Bendolph, a quilter from Gee’s Bend. “That meant something.”
When McCain delivers tax cuts for billionaires and spending cuts that might otherwise help lower-income families, all of these people will be left behind and worse off, but they were impressed with him anyway.
Maybe 90% of life is just showing up, and the issues don’t matter at all.