Having spent the better part of the last three months boxing Hillary Clinton into a rhetorical corner, Obama used last night's victory speech to start working on Sen. McCain. With Clinton his approach was subtle, a series of small moves that shifted from Clinton v. Obama to past v. future, i.e. Bush-Clinton v. Obama. But with McCain, it looks like his strategy will dramatically change. Subtlety is out, and simplicity is in. Check this out from last night's speech:
“John McCain is an American hero. We honor his service to our nation. But his priorities don’t address the real problems of the American people, because they are bound to the failed policies of the past.”
Having previously defined his Sen. McCain as part of the "Bush- McCain Republicans," he then went on to lay out in detail precisely how his administration would break with the past.
McCain did his part to answer, but if he's going to have any hope of staying competitive in the fall, he's going to have to do much better than this:
“To encourage a country with only rhetoric rather than sound and proven ideas that trust in the strength and courage of free people is not a promise of hope. It is a platitude.”
Just to make sure that everyone got that he was referencing Obama, he ended his speech with this:
"My friends. I promise you, I am fired up and ready to go.”
I could do some serious detailed analysis here - exploring how hopeless it is to try and combat a message of hope with one of grim struggle and sacrifice, as just one example - but that probably would only obscure the most important point: McCain is already fighting on Obama's turf. The campaign has only just now begun, and already McCain has been forced to try and adapt Obama's rhetoric as his own. And if you've ever watched the two of them speak, you already know that there is absolutely no way that it going to work. And by "no way" I mean no way.
Obama will paint this as a battle of the past vs. the future. So far, it has allowed him to defeat Sen. Clinton. Given that, does anyone really think it won't also work against 72-year old Sen. McCain?
UPDATE: Don't take my word for it. Watch the speeches yourself. Obama spoke first, and then was immediately followed by McCain. To truly understand how these came across last night, be sure to watch them in that order.
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