WurfWhile

Jonathan Chait’s recent online article, WHAT HILLARY CAN LEARN FROM GORE. Position Statement (login required - if you’re not a subscriber try the original LA Times article) is interesting for what it says about Al Gore, what it doesn’t say and what it shows. In the second half of the piece, Chait writes:

“What [Hillary] Clinton seems not to get is that few people evaluate candidates as the sum of their positions. Voters just don’t know enough about the issues to do it. (Nor, for that matter, do most political journalists.) Instead, they have a basic impression of the candidate’s character, and the issues feed into that.

Mark Schmitt, an extremely smart liberal at the New America Foundation, coined a saying that captures the dynamic: ‘It’s not what you say about the issues, it’s what the issues say about you.’

…George W. Bush in 2000 used a couple of issue positions relatively minuscule in scale (faith-based initiatives, education reform) to craft an image as a compassionate innovator.

Clinton’s problem is that everything she does to staunch her perceived ideology problem compounds her perceived character problem. What she says about the issues may be popular, but what the issues say about her is that she’s a shameless self-reinventor.

Gore is winning plaudits because he’s in the opposite position. A couple of years ago he appeared to be veering too far left when he denounced the Iraq war and the administration’s disregard for civil liberties. But now, almost no one can argue with those positions - certainly not any prospective Democratic voter. And his focus on global warming, which may not rank high on the list of voter concerns in Ohio, points to his genuine conviction on the issue. Gore cared about the environment before it was cool (or, as it were, warm.) The issue helps him more as a character issue than a substance one.

Gore has expressed a reluctance to run, explaining that he lacks much talent or affinity for backslapping and political sound bites. I find his self-awareness admirable….”

Jonathan Chait points out that Al Gore, following Bush, has an issue (environmentalism) that in and of itself isn’t likely to win a majority of votes (like the limited appeal of Bush’s “compassionate conservatism”). But it is an issue that speaks to Gore’s character (as it seemed to for George Bush). It’s a good argument, but it isn’t all that’s happening in the piece.

What Jonathan Chait doesn’t point out is that Al Gore also learned that minimizing expectations permits you to exceed them wonderfully (think of how little was expected of George W. Bush). Gore has been working on this for awhile now, and if anything he’s getting better. When Al Gore endorsed Howard Dean January 2004 in Dubuque, Iowa, he stole the show. He was the by far the funniest and most compelling of the three politicians (Dean and Tom Harkin were both there). He has been highly successful with his Moveon.org speeches and more recently a brilliant Saturday Night Live skit. While I was critical of Gore’s last Moveon.org speech - it is an exception. Gore has mostly hit the right notes. Despite this, Al Gore consistently lowers expectations and exceeds them. Chait’s reference to Gore saying he ” lacks much talent or affinity for backslapping and political sound bites” just reinforces the meme of low expectations - something that the much less capable Bush (with help from Karl Rove) has turned into an art form.

What’s also worth noting is what Jonathan Chait’s article shows - journalists are finding reason to like Al Gore. Al’s certainly earned this kindness after they unfairly devastated him in the 2000 election (and here I’m not pointing at Jonathan Chait who was supportive of Gore as I remember it). And if there are not a few journalists who regret aiding and abetting the rise of George W. Bush, that’s ok. Gore has already paid in advance for decent press. What Gore has learned from George W. Bush in this regard, however, is not to depend on the mainstream media for your press (which is why he has chosen channels that communicate more directly with his audience). Bush depends largely on right-wing talk radio, local press coverage, and both limited and meager information releases to the mainstream media. Gore has found “new media” channels to take his more substantive fare directly to the people, and thus similarly diminishes the power of the mainstream media to control the message.

I don’t have any idea whether Al Gore will run for president in 2008 or not (my guess is there are a lot of factors involved - including who else is running). I do believe, however, that if he runs we won’t see a campaign like 2000. Al Gore has learned his lesson from George Bush.