Ad Hawk: McCain's Generation Gap

Dude. I'm totally having a flashback. And it is not particularly groovy.

Boasting a new head honcho and a new economic message, John McCain today "reintroduced" himself to the American electorate with one-minute commercial set to air on national cable and in key swing states. Called "Summer of Love," the spot opens with stock late-Sixties footage of goateed protesters, flamboyant queens and nearly naked longhairs making out in a muddy field. "It was a time of uncertainty, hope and change," announces actor Powers Boothe in his bombastic, History Channel baritone. Then, suddenly, the music fades and images of fighter jets, wrecked fuselage and a captive McCain replace the flower-power iconography. Hushed and reverent, Boothe continues: "Half a world away, another kind of love -- of country. John McCain: Shot down. Bayoneted. Tortured... A man who has always put his country and her people before self." The implicit contrast couldn't be clearer. While McCain stands for service and selflessness, his rival for the White House, Barack Obama, represents "hope," "change," narcissism and "beautiful words [that] cannot make our lives better." In other words, he's a dirty hippie.

As always, McCain's "Hanoi Hilton" years are a compelling testament to his character, and I can understand why his campaign--new motto: "Putting Country First"--continues to highlight them. But casting Obama as a self-obsessed Aquarian--and, in the process, resurrecting the culture wars of the past 40 years--strikes me as unwise. Sure, the boomers are an easy target--even they have loathed themselves for a few decades now. But it's not like Obama is a big fan of their work. In fact, the Democratic nominee rose to prominence largely on his pledge to leave boomer politics behind. In 2006's "The Audacity of Hope," Obama (who was six in 1967) wrote that “in the back and forth between Clinton and Gingrich, and in the elections of 2000 and 2004, I sometimes felt as if I were watching the psychodrama of the baby boom generation--a tale rooted in old grudges and revenge plots hatched on a handful of college campuses long ago--played out on the national stage.” And when he announced his presidential candidacy a few months later in Springfield, Ill., the Democrat bet that Americans of all ages, sick of the squabbling boomers, would rally around "a new generation" that promised to "rise up and do what needs to be done"--a new generation that he would (conveniently) represent. So given that Obama has already defined himself in opposition to the group that McCain's trying to lump him into, the image of the Illinois senator as some sort of Merry Prankster--or even, say, a Clinton--is an awkward fit. Ultimately, by reviving the clashes of the Sixties to score political points, McCain is simply indulging in the very sort of boomer-era politics that Obama's running against. Not a smart way to appeal to swing voters.

Which brings us to the second (and ultimately more damaging) problem with McCain's strategy here: it's completely retrograde. In the commercial, Boothe presents McCain in the past tense: a man who was "offered early release [but] said, "No"; a man who came "home [and] turned to public service"; a man who "tackled campaign reform, military reform, spending reform"; a man who "took on presidents, partisans and popular opinion." I know it's a biographical spot. But Boothe says nothing about how that past would propel McCain into the future. The idea, of course, is to show that the candidate rejects the baby boomer ethos; instead, he's a scion of the "Silent Generation" seeking to revive an earlier era of honor, duty and sacrifice. That's true enough. The trouble is, when given a choice between a non-boomer (McCain) who promises a return to the past and a non-boomer (Obama) who promises to strive for a better tomorrow, voters will inevitably choose to move forward--especially in a "change" election like this one. In 1992, a youthful Democratic novice beat an experienced World War II hero. Four years later, another aged ace told voters that he represented "a bridge to an America that only the unknowing call myth." The Democrat won again. And lest we forget, voters chose a chicken hawk over a decorated Vietnam vet last time around. In presidential elections, biography isn't everything. When not integrated into a larger, forward-looking narrative, it can, in fact, make a candidate seem stale. As he continues his "reintroduction," McCain should remember that rule--unless he wants to experience a flashback of his own.