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Message Needs Refining

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By JOE O'NEILL

Tribune Correspondent

Published: February 6, 2008

The signs were manifest.

The literal ones: "Florida (heart) Straight Talk." "Tampa Loves McCain." "Florida Stands With McCain." "Veterans For McCain." "Supporting The Mac: Martinez, Crist, Stallone." (Take that, Chuck Norris.) And, interestingly enough, "McCain Protecting Your Pocketbook" and "McCain = Prosperity."

The music: upbeat '60s Motown (The Four Tops) - and ironic: "I Can't Help Myself."

The introduction: as politically high profile as it gets in Florida - Gov. Charlie Crist.

The message: Brief and blunt.

The rhetoric: red meat applause lines.

Those who jammed a break-out room at Tampa Convention Center last week to hear feisty, 71-year-old John McCain were not disappointed. "Keeping America safe" was the unvarnished theme. To be sure, there was a sidebar on better veterans' health care and a promise that McCain "will call Americans to serve" a cause "greater than their self-interest."

The Arizona senator also took less than 30 seconds to remind true believers that he's on the right side of technology and innovation and definitely in favor of the government getting "out of the way of business." That was it on the economy. Except for the unspoken fact that his campaign was battling insolvency.

Make no mistake, this whistle stop was all about trenchant warfare - a national security stream of conscious for the masses. Outgoing rhetorical rounds that referenced "The transcendent challenge of Islamic extremism." And reminders that: "The central battleground is Iraq. ... We are succeeding in Iraq. ... Al-Qaida is on the run but not defeated. ... We will never surrender. ... They will. ... We will not. ... The battle is worldwide. ... I am prepared to lead. I know how to do it. If I have to follow him Osama bin Laden to the Gates of Hell, I will."

And to reiterate: "We will never surrender. The goal is victory. America's greatest days are ahead of us. God bless America."

As the next day would show, it had been enough.

Rudy, a better movie than candidate, had formally imploded. Huckabee couldn't find enough evangelicals or Gomer Pyle fans. And Romney still looked like he was prepping for a remake of "The Candidate." Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity just fumed and fulminated.

So it didn't much matter, as it turned out, that a Florida GOP Poll had shown that the economy, at 47 percent, had far outdistanced all other issues for voters, including the combination of terrorism and Iraq at 34 percent. Even though McCain had been hammered hard by Romney for being economically obtuse after McCain had acknowledged to Tim Russert that he was no student of economics. Even though most pundits criticized McCain for not seeing that he needed to put more emphasis on the economy.

But there is still the matter of the obscenely well-financed Romney, whose strength is real-world economic success, and, presumably, general election scenarios that will surely revisit the "It's the economy, stupid" theme.

With that in mind, and since the economy is not going to turn the corner tomorrow, here's what McCain might consider doing with his national security, boilerplate-stump speech to protect his front-running status. It's not a matter of relegating, but revising. Context is key. For openers:

"My friends, these are perilous times for America. And, frankly, it's never mattered more who your commander in chief is. And I am prepared to assume that role.

"And my first priority - as well as my pledge to you - is to keep America safe.

"And safety, my friends, moves on multiple fronts. What is at stake from the transcendent challenge of Islamic extremism is nothing less than our lives - and our way of life.

"That means our democracy and our market economy.

"The best offense against those who would destroy us and all we represent is also the best offense against economic uncertainty, let alone economic disaster. A safe America is a strong America. Strong militarily, strong democratically and strong economically. They are inseparable ..."

The rest is details.

Kennedy-Obama Irony

Anyone looking for irony in the Kennedy-Obama love-in, which has included direct comparisons of Barack Obama to John F. Kennedy, need not look very far.

Recall that when Sen. Ted Kennedy endorsed Sen. Obama, he went out of his way to refute all that former President Bill Clinton had said or intimated about Obama. Including Obama's relative inexperience.

Kennedy even underscored that Obama would be ready on "day one."

Ironically, JFK wasn't.

Anyone remember the Bay of Pigs? President Kennedy didn't have the experience and gravitas to see through a fatally flawed Eisenhower plan and halt it. What he did was halt air cover - and any chance, even remote, that the ill-fated invasion of Cuba could have succeeded.

Kennedy would later prove his mettle by backing down the Joint Chiefs over the Cuban Missile Crisis. But, no, he wasn't ready on "day one."

Clinton Nostalgia

On one hand, it's understandable how the Democratic faithful still get rapturous over the return of Bill Clinton to presidential politics. He is this generation's most gifted retail politician, a wonkish sort who towers intellectually over his successor, and an avatar of better economic times.

But it's that other hand.

The country was two quarters out of a recession when he took office. Neither the irrationally exuberant dotcom bubble nor the peace dividend from the demise of the Soviet Union were his doing.

Commander in chief was not his forte. Alas, he remained "unavailable" and missed a golden opportunity to take out Osama bin Laden long before Sept. 11, 2001.

And he was impeached. Not because of a peccadillo. Not because of right-wing conspirators. Not because he was a victim of high-handed, moral judgments.

But because he was a perjurer, a national security time bomb and an on-the-job philanderer who disgraced his office and country.

But then again, nostalgia isn't logical.

Joe O'Neill is a South Tampa writer who can be contacted at www.OpinionsToGoOnLine.com.

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