The Battle Over Narrative

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When it comes to political narratives, actions speak louder than words.

Yesterday, I outlined why John McCain's newly aggressive anti-Obama strategy--Question: "Who is Barack Obama?" Answer: Someone who's "palling around with terrorists"--isn't likely to work. One reason: it may be too late to define Obama as a dangerous radical. This isn't a matter of timing, per se; many voters don't tune in until October. It's a matter of actions.

The most effective way to damage a political opponent is by wrapping his personality and policies in a credible metanarrative that works as a single lens through which voters can see everything he says and does. In 2004, for example, Republicans labeled John Kerry an opportunistic flip-flopper. The tag stuck largely because Kerry's claim that he voted for $87 billion in war funding before he voted against it seemed to confirm voters' preexisting suspicions. Similarly, McCain wants the electorate to believe that Obama is a dangerously inexperienced radical.

But the problem for McCain is that he doesn't have an iconic "Voted for It Before I Voted Against" moment to anchor his accusations. Merely saying that Obama is a dangerous radical--perhaps because the Illinois senator crossed paths with some questionable characters in the past--isn't going to cut it. If McCain hopes to sell his salvo, he needs to find real-time, newsmaking examples of Obama acting dangerous, or radical, or inexperienced, or whatever. As former Hillary Clinton spokesman Phil Singer recently wrote, "political attacks work best when the charge they make is echoed by the subject of those attacks." Unfortunately for McCain, Obama has done nothing--again, in real time--to convince voters that he's either dangerous, radical or dangerously, radically inexperienced.

In fact, much the opposite. Here's where actions--namely, the candidates' responses to the Wall Street meltdown--enter into the equation. The collapse of America's financial infrastructure was not only a major historical event; it was the first major event to happen after the country finally tuned in to the presidential race. As such, it had increased potential to shape perceptions of the candidates; after all, many voters were seeing McCain and Obama "in action" for the first time.

Unfortunately for McCain, the electorate preferred Obama's approach to the crisis. In last week's CBS News poll, 44 percent of voters approved of the Democratic nominee's response--12 percent more than than those who disapproved of his performance. McCain's grades, meanwhile, were reversed: 46 percent disapproval; 35 percent approval. Today's NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll discovered a similar disparity: the group of voters that felt reassured by Obama's reaction (34 percent) was 5 points larger than the group that felt less reassured (29 percent). Conversely, McCain's response resulted in a net "less assured" rating of 13 percent (25-38 percent). Whether or not you prefer Obama's crisis-management technique (staying calm and detached) to McCain's (suspending his campaign), the Democratic nominee clearly provided voters with real-time evidence that contradicted--rather than confirmed--the story McCain's trying to tell about him. That's the main reason Obama is rising in the polls.

Making matters worse is the fact that the financial crisis actually helped Obama tell the tale he's been itching to tell about McCain: that he's "erratic," unreliable and too impulsive to be president (the dark side, if you will, of "maverick.") Since then, Chicago has applied this frame--fairly or unfairly--to everything from McCain's health-care plan ("radical") to his sudden decision to attack ("erratic"). Unfortunately for McCain, Obama has basically boxed him in. Over the next month or so, the Arizonan has to shake things up if he hopes to overtake his opponent in the polls--even though every zigzag presents Team Obama with a new opportunity to call McCain "erratic." Meanwhile, Obama must simply avoid acting dangerous, radical or inexperienced to keep McCain's claims from sticking.

Whose shoes would you rather be in?