Category Archives: Endorsement interviews

McCain-Obama, and other match-ups

As I’ve expressed a number of times in the last few days — although it occurs to me it’s been on video or live TV mostly, and it’s past time I say it in writing if I haven’t already — my fondest wish for the fall is that John McCain will face Barack Obama. It would be a "no-lose proposition for the nation."

In fact, it would be the best choice of my adult lifetime. Yeah, I liked both Jimmy Carter and Gerald Ford pretty much. And I had nothing particular against George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton in 92. But this would be the first time I was ever positively enthusiastic about either eventuality. As I’ve spoken about it in recent days, I’ve had to stop myself several times from referring to it as a "ticket," and remember to say "on the same BALLOT" instead.

As to which I’d prefer — well, I don’t know which I’d prefer. If I’m to be consistent with my constant thought of the past eight years, McCain is the man. Going into last week, I was pretty sure I still preferred him, Obama (AND Clinton) being so much less experienced. There is also his position on the war, which almost exactly matches my own.

But the excitement of the last few days has made me wonder about that. And if Obama wins the nomination — with the Super Tuesday odds still against him at this point — I’ll be even more pumped about his ability to lead us into a new kind of politics.

None of that will diminish my deep respect for McCain. But once my dream is realized — if both are nominees — I’ll be able to compare them more objectively than I can now. Now, I’m just rooting for both of them.

But if only ONE of them is nominated — say, we end up with Obama vs. Romney, or McCain vs. Clinton — that makes my own, personal preference for endorsement the easiest I’ve ever experienced. And I think it would be just as easy for the nation, because the two I prefer are the ONLY ones with appeal among independents and crossover voters.

Then, of course, if NEITHER is nominated… well, that would be what we’re used to, wouldn’t it: A bitter choice between bad and worse. Surely this country can do better than that, for once.

After what we’ve seen happen in South Carolina, my hope is higher than ever for a far better choice for the nation than we have seen in many decades.

Our interview with the winner: Obama speaking to our editorial board

3 Replies

All week, I wanted to stop and edit some of the video I shot during our editorial board interview with Barack Obama Monday morning, but, well… it’s been a busy week.

I finally tried to start putting together a post on it this afternoon, but my internet connection at home crashed. So, now that it’s all over for South Carolina, I’m sitting here on the air at ETV using their Web connection, and putting up some rough unedited clips. Better late than never, right? No? Whatever. I thought you still might like to hear the man who won so hugely here talking at some greater length than what you get on the Boob Tube usually.

As regular viewers will know, my little camera only shoots three-minute clips at a time, which means they can stop and restart in odd places. But I’ve put together four sequential clips here, with only one or two seconds of real time between them, from the opening moments of the meeting.

What you’ll see here in these four clips is Sen. Obama responding to our standard opening question we use in all candidate endorsement interviews for all offices. It’s simple: We ask him to state why he’s running, and why he should be the one to get the nomination — and in this case, presumably, the presidency. Sometimes we couch in terms of a 10-minute version of the candidate’s stump speech.

This serves two purposes. First, we editors don’t get out on the trail the way reporters do, so it’s good to hear the overview of how this candidate chooses to present himself. Second, it helps us cut through the sound-bite, 24/7 news headline of the moment and step back and take a broader view of who this candidate is and what his campaign is about.

Also, it gives us a sort of base line for the rest of our conversation, as we dig further into what the candidate is really about.

The four clips include Obama’s full answer to that question, minus the second or so intervals it takes for my camera to start rolling again after it shuts off at the end of a three-minute clip. A little way through the fourth one, the senator starts answering our second inevitable question that we ask specifically of presidential candidates, which always takes roughly this form: What is America’s proper role in the world, and how should it go about playing that role?

The first segment is at the top of this post. The other three follow:

Part II:

Part III:

Part IV:

Perhaps when things slow down, I can put up some further parts of the interview, for posterity. Anyway, what you see above is the candidate who made such a tremendous impression on our editorial board — and obviously, on South Carolina voters.

This explains SO much: Fowler says he told Hillary not to seek endorsement

17 Replies

When I got this morning’s e-mail from Don Fowler about our Obama endorsement, I immediately answered it as follows:

I guess you and I are just going to have to agree to disagree yet again, Don.

Thanks for sharing your thoughts, though. It’s helpful to me in understanding the way things stand.

If you don’t mind my asking, were you involved at all in discussions within the Clinton campaign about our repeated invitations to an editorial board meeting? And if you were, was this the advice you gave?

That may have seemed a question out of the blue, but it arose from an intuition I had last week when I was trying to imagine why Sen. Clinton didn’t schedule an interview, despite all our invitations. It didn’t make sense to me, and the answer I was getting — pleading the busy schedule — was weirdly inadequate. Barack Obama had a busy schedule. So did Dick Gephardt, Carol Moseley-Brown, Joe Lieberman, John Edwards, Howard Dean and John Kerry in 2004, but they all managed to find the time.

I felt like something else was going on, and Don’s message this morning seemed to support the hunch that he had something to do with it. So as long as I was writing to him, I asked him.

He called me on the phone a little later and left a message, saying in part:

As concerns the matter of the, being involved in conversations about whether Hillary should… come and spend two hours with your folks, I categorically recommended that she not spend her time there, it would be totally wasted time. No chance in the world that you and your crowd would ever endorse a Clinton for anything. I learned that a long time ago. Be glad to talk with you.

Now, I have no idea that Hillary Clinton or her schedulers would make their decision based on this — I certainly wouldn’t. But at least it gives me an explanation from somebody.

I called him back, missed him, and he called me back, and we had one of the most frustrating conversations I’ve had since — well, since this morning, when I chatted with a reader who said he didn’t believe newspapers had a right to endorse candidates at all, so we shouldn’t do it.

But I’d never had such a frustrating conversation with someone as well educated and experienced as Don, his party’s former national chairman. He kept clinging to this notion that we would never endorse anyone with the name Clinton — which made no sense to me — what’s in a name; are we Montagues and Capulets here? I mean, if he knows that, he knows something I don’t know. He said he based his absolute conclusion on a visit he made to the editorial board on Bill Clinton’s behalf in 1996. Not remembering the specifics of that meeting, I didn’t get into it, but I pointed out that of the five current members of the board, I’m the only one who was on the board then. No matter. He suggested that the fix was in, that we would endorse the Republican no matter what, and that it must hold just as true today as then.

Well, you know, this paper has endorsed Republicans — for president — every election for as far back as I am aware, something which I attribute to the fact that the national Democratic Party (which he once chaired) keeps giving us nominees the board won’t go for. But we didn’t even get into that. I pointed out the fact that of all the endorsements we’ve done in all general elections — federal, state, local — since I joined the board in 1994 (and that includes those presidential ones), we have endorsed more Democrats than Republicans. I offered to take him into our smelly, musty archives and show him all those endorsements. He didn’t take me up on it.

He repeated his charge that we endorsed Sanford twice. I told him he was wrong, and asked him if he knew whom we endorsed in 2006 for governor. He said he didn’t know. I told him it was Democrat Tommy Moore.

He kept saying he didn’t have to read what we wrote; he knew all he needed to know about us. So it was no use telling him that while I had liked Barack Obama from early on and hoped we would see fit to endorse him, I believed that Sen. Clinton had a case to make that could persuade us otherwise, and I wanted her to have the chance to make it. As I wrote in the paper, Mike Fitts expressed his sincere disappointment that she didn’t do so. I think, after having had the interview with Obama, he would still have persuaded us. But I can’t know for sure.

But Don Fowler, he knows.

It was a remarkable conversation. I share it with you because it bears — or at least seems to bear — on a subject I’ve tried to keep y’all in the loop on.

It’s officially a trend: Rock Hill backs Obama, too

6 Replies

The Sage of Wichita, Jerry Ratts, once said, “That’s twice. Once more and it’s a trend, and we can send it to Lifestyles.” (You probably have to have worked long, thankless years at a newspaper to fully grok the wisdom of Ratts, but I assure you it’s there.)

By that definition, we officially have us a trend: The Rock Hill Herald has also endorsed Barack Obama, to wit:

Barack Obama, at 46, could have waited four or even eight years to run for the presidency, but decided that this year’s campaign was his moment.
We think he was right; his candidacy is ideally suited for this point in the nation’s history. Obama, more than any other candidate in either party, has based his campaign on the promise of positive change in Washington and an effort to heal the caustic partisan rift that divides not only the nation’s capital but also much of the nation.
The promise of change is nothing unique in the rhetoric of the stump. But we think Obama brings both a unique biography and an impressive set of skills to this campaign.

So I guess this means Editorial can officially drop this subject, and let the Features folks take over…

She got one! MB goes for Hillary

6 Replies

Just to show that the MSM are not one big, fat conspiracy, the Myrtle Beach Sun News has endorsed Hillary Clinton, as this release from Zac proudly announces:

Myrtle Beach Sun News Endorses Hillary for President

COLUMBIA, SC – The Myrtle Beach Sun News, a major daily newspaper serving the Pee Dee and Grand Strand in South Carolina, today endorsed Hillary Clinton for President, calling her "sharp, savvy, highly skilled" and citing her experience and ability to solve problems.
According to the endorsement editorial, the newspaper found that Hillary Clinton “certainly has the brains, toughness and skill-set required to chart her own course.”
The full endorsement follows.

Of course, the Sun News is terribly misguided, but I’m happy for Zac, since he’s from my old stomping grounds in West Tennessee, and I think he’s a good guy.

Mama! Greenville’s copying us! Make ’em stop!

What the Obama campaign learned about The State

3 Replies

After he saw the message from Don Fowler, Kevin Griffis of the Barack Obama campaign send me an e-mail, which I reproduce here in full:

We did very thorough research of The State‘s editorial board’s positions over the last few years, and in addition to endorsing Democrats Jim Clyburn, John Spratt, Robert Barber and Jim Rex in the last cycle, this is what we found that the board has advocated for, among other positions:

Improved government transparency

Energy independence

Alleviating inequalities in educational opportunities

Strenthening consumer safety measures

Reforming No Child Left Behind

Adequately funding public colleges

I assume their campaign supports the aforementioned candidates and policy positions despite the fact the paper has endorsed Republicans. It makes you wonder where they draw the line for the legitimacy of your advocacy.

I didn’t realize we were being studied up on to that extent, but I see now that we were. Ordinarily, you’d expect that Don would have just known all this stuff about us, seeing as how he’s a Columbian. But he is blinded by his partisan view of the world — for him, if you ever endorsed or agreed with a Republican, you apparently are beyond the pale.

Don Fowler likens us to Lucifer

11 Replies

Well, it took him a day and a half, but Columbian and former Democratic National Committee Chairman Don Fowler managed to draft a response to our endorsement of Barack Obama (I received it at 10:46 a.m. today):

Don Fowler’s comments on editorial endorsements by The State
Having The State newspaper render judgments about Democrats is like Lucifer rendering judgments about angels. The crack set of philosopher kings at The State have twice endorsed George Bush and twice endorsed Mark Sanford. No further comment required.

Don Fowler

No, that’s not an excerpt. That’s the whole message, except for his phone number and e-mail address at the end.

Apparently, we didn’t endorse Don’s preferred candidate. For those of you who don’t know Don, you should. At least you should know that his wife, Carol, is the present state party chair. But in his day, Dr. Fowler has operated on a much grander stage.

Over the years, Don and I have disagreed strongly over one thing: He thinks the political parties are a wonderful, essential part of our political system (hence all the time he’s spent serving one of them). I see the Republican and Democratic parties as anathema, the ruination of the country, destructive forces that foster intellectual dishonesty and prevent the deliberative process from functioning as the nation’s Founders intended. Don is a Democrat, through and through. I am the founder and most ardent proponent of the UnParty.

Given that divide between us, it was pretty much inevitable — looking at it now in retrospect — that we would endorse Barack Obama, the one candidate seeking the Democratic nomination with the goal of leading the nation beyond the nauseating polarization that has characterized the Bush-Clinton years. And it was just as inevitable that Don would disagree most vehemently, and in the hyperpartisan terms that he chose.

Don doesn’t even see the truth, which is that this newspaper has endorsed slightly more Democrats than Republicans in the years I’ve been on this editorial board. We haven’t done that on purpose; party is not a consideration in our deliberations. I wasn’t aware of it until I took the time in 2004 to do a study of the past decade’s endorsements. It just worked out that way. (In fact, in 2006 we endorsed 12 Democrats and 5 Republicans — again, not intentionally. And while that skewed our running average toward Democrats, we sometimes go just as strongly for Republicans, depending on the candidates that year.)

But Don’s apparently not a guy who can understand, or forgive, anyone who has backed a Republican ever. And the partisan filter through which he perceives the world is what divides us.

Welcome to our guests just joining us…

The ‘mystery’ of why the press likes McCain

6 Replies

Drudge today links to yet another clueless attempt to explain "The media’s love affair with McCain." An excerpt:

One of the curiosities of American politics is the media’s ongoing infatuation with John McCain. A bit of this is based on things such as McCain’s opposition to torture (unfortunately, we can no longer treat opposing torture like opposing child molestation, i.e., something one assumes is standard equipment in a presidential candidate rather than a luxury upgrade). Yet most of the journalistic love affair with the Republican senator from Arizona is based on other factors.
Consider this typical endorsement from the Orlando Sentinel: While McCain "has stuck to his principles at the risk of sinking his campaign," Mitt Romney "has abandoned positions that would have alienated his party’s conservative base." (Indeed, I checked a computer database and discovered that, in the national media, Romney is at least six times more likely to be described as a flip-flopper than McCain.)…

The author, who is a law professor (thin credentials for expressing the motives of the press), goes on to maintain that nothing could be further from the truth, that McCain’s a big flip-flopper from way back, including such arguments as saying that "McCain has done a 180-degree turn" on abortion, then going on to describe a turn that, even if you accept the characterization provided, certainly doesn’t add up to 180 degrees. (Apparently, law professors are expert in the deepest motivations of journalists, but not too swift on mathematical analogy.)

Anyway, I’ll tell you why news types tend to like McCain (which is not exactly the same as why editorial types like him, but most of us were once news types, too): Access. Ever since 1968, the press has grown used to political campaigns following the Nixon model of limiting access to the candidate, and carefully managing what he says, or at least what the press hears him say.

McCain throws that approach into the rubbish bin where it belongs. He will go to the back of the bus and make himself totally available to the ink-stained wretches who loiter there. And he’ll address anything you want him to, answering questions even to the extent of being available more than we need him to be.

News types love that. And editorial types, most of whom started out as news types, retain a soft spot for that kind of openness. It’s an element in why we like McCain, just as transparency is a factor in why we like Obama. There are other reasons, and we express them. But that straightforward approach is a factor.

Obama inspires board, offers hope

69 Replies

Obamaboard

By BRAD WARTHEN
EDITORIAL PAGE EDITOR
A remarkable thing happened this week to The State’s editorial board — again. For us, it was the equivalent of lightning striking the same place, twice in the same month.
After difficult, agonizing discussions over presidential primary endorsements in both 2000 and 2004, we arrived at a quick consensus on endorsing Sen. Barack Obama for the S.C. Democratic Primary on Saturday.
We met with Sen. Obama Monday morning, before he and the other candidates spoke at the State House. (Neither Hillary Clinton nor John Edwards ever met with us, despite long-standing invitations — repeated invitations, in Sen. Clinton’s case.)
Our decision was made easier by the departure of Sen. Joe Biden. We might have been torn between his experience and foreign policy vision, and fresh hope for the future offered by Sen. Obama.
As it was, Sen. Obama clearly stood out as the best remaining candidate — and he had always been the most exciting and inspiring in the field.
It’s not just that he might be the first black president — Sen. Clinton would make history, too. It’s that he offers a fresh start for American politics. It is his ambition to be a president for all of us — black and white, male and female, Democrat and Republican. The nomination of Sen. Clinton would by contrast kick off another bitter round of the pointless partisanship that has plagued the nation under presidents named “Bush” and “Clinton.”
As he did before the Republican primary, Associate Editor Mike Fitts framed the discussion of our Democratic endorsement, and did a sufficiently thorough job that the rest of us merely elaborated on his observations.
First, he mentioned the support John Edwards had enjoyed among members of our board in 2004, although he did not get our endorsement then (in a grueling three-hour talkathon, I successfully pressed the board to choose Joe Lieberman instead). This time, he was “a substantially different guy” — an unappealing embodiment of class resentment.
Also, his extreme position on Iraq — wanting to pull all troops out, even those who are training Iraqis — made him a nonstarter.
About Hillary Clinton, Mike said the same thing he said about Mitt Romney 10 days earlier — “Boy, I wish she’d come in to see us, because I have so many questions.” Mike cited her obvious intelligence, and the fact that she “knows where the levers of power are” — especially within the Democratic Party. She’s worked the corridors of Washington since well before her time as first lady.
But she could never have built the kind of coalitions that could break the partisan gridlock inside the Beltway — even if she wanted to, and we’ve seen little indication that she would want to.
And her policy prowess is that of the insider. We saw her failed effort to reform our health care system as emblematic of her style — get a bunch of wonks in a room, close the door, and come up with something too complex and nuanced to sell.
Barack Obama, by contrast, would be oriented toward — and more successful at — bringing the American public into the debate, and persuading us to agree to a solution. He has that leadership ability that she lacks.
Sen. Obama has political gifts that are more reminiscent of former President Clinton. Of Sen. Clinton, Mike said, “She’s sort of caught between Obama and her husband, as two of the most evocative leaders we’ve had in a while.”
While Sen. Obama is completely true to the highest traditions of the Democratic Party, he would have the potential to lead others as well. Sen. Clinton’s main interest in Republicans seems to be beating them, prevailing over them, having things go her way rather than theirs.
“I would really like us to be talking about Joe Biden or Bill Richardson,” said Associate Editor Cindi Scoppe. That leaves her with what she sees as “an emotional decision,” which initially makes her uncomfortable. Cindi usually prefers the wonkiest option, but in the end she’s quite OK with “going for the exciting person who gives us hope.”
“Hillary is very smart,” Associate Editor Warren Bolton agrees. But “I think she thinks she is the only one who has the answers.” Publisher Henry Haitz said the same thing, in almost the same words, a moment later.
In the end, we came to a second quick consensus for much the same reason as the first time: We thought among the Republicans, John McCain had the best chance of uniting the country and leading in a positive direction. On the Democratic side, the one person who offers that same hope is Barack Obama.

(Both photos from the board’s meeting are by Chip Oglesby of thestate.com. To read The State‘s endorsement of Barack Obama, click here. For video about the endorsement, click here.)

Obamawarthen

Video about the Obama endorsement

1 Reply

Andy Haworth did another nice job of putting together a short video of me talking about our endorsement of Barack Obama, which will appear in Wednesday’s paper. This was done very much on the run — minutes before the endorsement would appear online — but Andy managed to edit it to make my rambling seem halfway coherent, for which I thank him.

If the image above doesn’t start playing automatically, click here.

The clip was shot in our board room, with me sitting in the chair in which Sen. Obama sat yesterday before heading to the Statehouse for King Day at the Dome.

Later today, I’ll post my column about our discussion of this endorsement. I’ll be talking about it in other venues as well — for instance, I’m supposed to do a live phone interview with C-SPAN at 7:10 a.m. Wednesday.

We endorse Barack Obama

31 Replies

Here’s a link to The State editorial board’s endorsement of Barack Obama, folks. As promised, we put it up on thestate.com early. Formally, it will appear in the paper on Wednesday’s editorial page.

Please read it, and react. Needless to say, elaboration follows — in column and video form, as we did with the Republicans.

To read my column about how our board’s discussion of the endorsement, click here.

For a video clip of me talking about the endorsement, click here.

My camera actually DOES work

5 Replies

Just to show you, I can take a photo that looks like something with this camera, unlike what you may have surmised from this post and this one. I just need the right lighting, distance, etc. It helps to be right up in the candidate’s face.

You who have followed the blog will recognize this Barack Obama shot as being from our board room (like this and this and this). We met with him early this morning (early for me, anyway), before the rally at the State House.

I’ll post something from that interview tomorrow when I’m back at the office. Right now, I’m going to sign off for a few hours. I’ve got an interview with Air America at 7:30, then I’m going to try to watch the debate. Maybe I’ll post something live; check and see. Maybe I won’t. This is sorta kinda like my day off, you know.

Video: Obama, Edwards, Clinton at the State House

7 Replies

We had a long, cold wait for the candidates to speak at King Day at the Dome today, although it wasn’t as long or cold for me as for some.

Barack Obama had met with our editorial board earlier (I’ll post about that later today, or tomorrow), and I couldn’t get away from the office for another hour after that, so when I arrived at the State House a little after 11, some folks were already leaving. One acquaintance told me he thought the candidates had been there and left. It seemed pretty clear that the candidates weren’t up there on the steps, but I also surmised that they were yet to speak. The security was there — a real pain, because they artificially compressed the crowd and limited movement so that it was difficult to get close to the steps, and impossible (as it turned out) to get into a good position for my camera. Wherever I stood, the speakers were in shadow, and worse, sometimes backlit. (NOTE: Because of the lighting problem, and the position from which I was shooting with my little camera, this is very low-quality video!)

So the security was still there, and the TV cameras were still in place. I ran into Warren Bolton who had arrived about the same time as I, and we were still wondering whether there was indeed anything to stick around for when Warren nudged me and pointed out Tom Brokaw a few yards away in the crowd (see photo above, which is higher quality than the video because he was in sunlight, and close by). We figured if the hopefuls had spoken before us, Brokaw would have left by now, so we stayed.

Speakers we could not identify from where we stood droned on, saying the things they usually say at these events, and I was beginning to resent the NAACP for letting all these folks (myself included) stand around waiting for what so many had come for. Remember, others had been there much, much longer. I was hardly the only one to feel the crowd was being abused. Warren overhead somebody leaving, muttering about it, and saying the NAACP was going to hear about this the next time he heard from them asking for a contribution.

Finally, just after noon, the main attractions came on. My wife, who was at home comfortably watching on TV, later said she assumed they had waited to go on live at the noon hour. Perhaps that is the logical, fully understandable explanation. Anyway, it was explained that the three candidates had drawn lots to determine their speaking order. Here they are, in the order in which they spoke. The videos are rough, incomplete and unedited, as I wanted to hurry and get them out (and the video quality wasn’t that great anyway); I just provide them to give some flavor of the event:

Barack Obama:

John Edwards:

Hillary Clinton:

Why Andre Bauer likes Huckabee

6 Replies

This afternoon, Andre Bauer and I were in a tent on the State House lawn, informing the Mideast.

Alhurra TV, which is a government-funded agency that broadcasts in Arabic to the region — it’s the Mideast version of Voice of America — asked me to do a live deal from their setup at the State House. It was my first direct experience with actual, sure-enough propaganda, and I liked it fine.

It was an unusual gig. Our host, Ephraim (sp?), was sitting to my right asking questions in Arabic. This is going to shock you, but Andre (who was sitting on my left) and I don’t actually understand or speak Arabic. There was a guy in some distant place speaking through a static-y connection into my left ear with a translation, of which I could only make out every other word during the first half of the show. We were getting a remote feed from Las Vegas, and Van Hipp spoke into our ears from Washington.

Andre, who had been out jogging with Mike Huckabee earlier in the day (it was his first jog since his plane crash), talked about why he had endorsed the former Arkansas governor on Thursday.

What’s interesting about his explanation of his decision (the English version, of course). He said he liked his ability to work with a Democratic legislature as governor, and the fact that he was unapologetic about having raised taxes to improve roads and schools. In other words, he was impressed by Huckabee’s understanding that a governor has an obligation to govern. (He specifically said that Huckabee shared his concern for aging issues.)

That’s just what I liked about Huckabee, and a significant reason why we said in our endorsement of John McCain last week that Huckabee would have been our second choice — although a distant second.

Unfortunately, that’s not the way he ran the last few days, which I have found very disturbing. More about that shortly, if I’m able to get to it. I’m typing this from the set at S.C. ETV, where we’re on live.

(Final note: I just realized, watching Mike Campbell doing a live feed on the monitor, that this time, he and Andre were on the same side. OK, it’s not the biggest irony in the history of the world, but I thought I’d mention it.)

Time to do a Ned Ray on the Clintonistas

13 Replies

We’re still waiting, waiting to get Hillary Clinton in for an endorsement interview. We want to give her every opportunity, yet still get our endorsement published in time for folks to digest it.

Here’s my e-mail correspondence over the last few hours with Zac Wright of the campaign. (And Zac is by no means the only Clintonista I’m pestering.) Zac’s an ol’ boy from West Tennessee, where I spend the first decade of my career (’75-’85), so I’ve tried to speak in terms he would fully understand:

ME: Zac, we’ve GOT to get Sen. Clinton in here for an editorial board meeting!
What’s our status?

ZAC: Brad,
Pursuing logistics, but no further developments at this point.

ME: Doggone it, Zac, what would Ned Ray McWherter say about all this lollygaggin’?

ZAC: Now that was spoken like a man with real West TN roots! I’m working on it and hope to know more COB today. Monday is the absolute latest, correct?

ME: It would be damnably hard to go any later. But if you have something later to propose (say, early Tuesday) at least run it by us so we have the chance to refuse.

Our plan at this point — and mind you, this is already plan B, or maybe C — is that the board will assemble here at the paper (it’s a newspaper holiday, so people would be coming in just to deal with this) to meet with Sen. Obama at 11. Figuring that would be the latest candidate we’d see (because Obama wasn’t going to be in SC this week, and we thought Sen. Clinton would be), we were going to go straight into making a decision. (And don’t think having the last word gives him a leg up; McCain had the last word in 2000, and we went with Bush). Then Mike and I would stay the rest of the day to get everything written, but we would not publish until Wednesday, to give other board members a chance to see proofs — and to give me a chance to record a video as we did with McCain, and post online early (3 p.m. Tuesday).

A Wednesday endorsement is really late, in terms of giving folks a chance to respond. But we moved it back to there to give the leading candidates what we thought was plenty of EXTRA time in which to get here. Remember, we had really wanted to endorse on Sunday.

When you talk with the folks in your organization, deal with them the way Ned Ray would have when he was Speaker. I remember once the House was having trouble moving along on an issue the way he’d like, so he rumbled something like, "Y’all better get it together before I come down there and rip off some arms and beat you about the head and shoulders with ’em."

Democratic endorsement delayed

18 Replies

Much to my disappointment, we will not be ready to endorse in the S.C. Democratic Primary on Sunday as planned.

As blog readers should be aware, the only Democratic candidate we have had an endorsement interview with thus far is Joe Biden, and being the current-events whizzes y’all are, you know he dropped out after Iowa. Now if you’re wondering why he’s the only one to have come in before the last-minute crunch (he last visited us on Oct. 1), that’s a good question. If you come up with an answer, let me know. All the major candidates have had standing invitations since well before the first of the year.

Anyway, we have not taken the position that "You should have done your homework before the January crush rather than waiting until the last minute." (No way I could have any moral standing there, as I always do stuff at the last minute, which is one reason I’m in the deadline-oriented newspaper biz.) We’re still doing our best to get folks in here. We’ve grown accustomed in recent elections to having that opportunity, and while we realize the insane front-loaded primary schedule we have this year is pulling them in far more directions than we’re used to, we’re not comfortable with endorsing someone we haven’t had the chance to interview as a board.

As of now, the one remaining candidate we have scheduled is Barack Obama — on Monday morning, MLK Day. His campaign says he won’t be east of Nevada before that. We continue to hope for something earlier if his plans change, but right now this is what we’ve got. I’m hoping rather fervently that we can get Hillary Clinton in before Obama, so that our decision won’t be further delayed, but no time has been set yet. (That this is on MLK Day is ironic, because it underlines the fact that Biden and Chris Dodd were here last MLK Day, campaigning their rear ends off, months before Obama and Clinton entered the race as automatic front-runners, thus crowned by the inside-the-Beltway media without having lifted a finger to seek the votes of South Carolinians.)

As those are the front-runners, those are the two we are really pressing at this point. Our standing invitation remains open to John Edwards (for the rest of this week anyway), but as time runs out, we’re pushing the ones who have the greatest chance of actually becoming president. And as I said last, week, South Carolina is now about these two candidates, as the GOP one is about McCain and Huckabee (don’t look at me; look at the polls).

This is not what I wanted. I wanted both of the endorsements to run on Sunday, as the McCain one did. That gives maximum exposure to something that has high reader interest (our endorsement was the top-rated item on thestate.com over the weekend, I believe), and also gives some time for letters and other reaction before the vote.

But right now, our best-case scenario is that our endorsement will run on Wednesday, Jan. 23. We would also put it online early, as of 3 p.m. Tuesday, as we did with the Republican one.

Speaking of the Republican endorsement — we entertained the idea of delaying that one as well. I brought it up to my colleagues late last week. But the situation was different. We had already met with the two front-runners, and the remaining candidates showed little interest in coming in, even late. No campaign suggested, as Sen. Obama’s did, coming in at the first of the next week. If we tried to go ahead on schedule with the Democratic endorsement the way we did with the GOP, we’d do so with a dearth of input.

(Personally — speaking only for myself here, not my colleagues — I am really counting on these meetings to help me make up my mind. Y’all know I always liked McCain, and hoped that was where we would end up as a group — those meetings for me were about testing my preference through dialogue with him and Huckabee, my second choice. With the Democratic race, I truly don’t know which one I’d pick right now even if I could wave a wand and make it so without regard to the other members of the board.)

So that’s the way things stand. I’ll tell you if I learn more.

Video: McCain about the 2000 campaign in SC, and what’s different now

5 Replies

First, an update. I spoke to someone with the McCain campaign about the "push polls" release, and I doubt that there’s much to it. It seems that staffers doing a phone bank up in Spartanburg ran into a rash of people who were saying they wouldn’t vote for McCain because of his divorce back in the ’70s, saying it was evidence of his immaturity, and the similar wording in each of the "spontaneous" responses struck the phone bank folks as odd.

As I suggested earlier, sensitivity on this is on something of a hair-trigger over at McCain HQ.

Second, on that subject — I was going back through some of my video from the McCain interview back in August, and ran across some stuff I don’t remember using before. Since it bears on something I’ve eluded to in past posts (and columns), namely the 2000 campaign and our interview with him then, I thought I’d share it. Main point, with reference to the above topic, is that McCain himself doesn’t blame the smear campaign for stopping him in South Carolina last time. He said Bush just had the better organization, and more money.

Anyway, here’s the video:

The Media are the Message

7 Replies

Folks, I’m sorry I haven’t posted today, and that it will likely be several more hours before I DO post again. Reaction to our endorsement, plus the increased national and international media interest in South Carolina because of the primaries, are combining to eat up the little bits and pieces of time in which I usually blog while doing my actual job.

(For those who don’t know, I’m the editorial page editor of South Carolina’s largest newspaper, which means I have a lot to do even in normal times. No, the job is NOT simply about sitting around cogitating and then spouting opinions at random; I don’t care what you may have heard.)

… OK, long interruption there. I typed the above around 2:20 p.m.; it’s now 5:40; I’ve been in meetings ever since…

But one thing that took up time this morning — time I might have used to do a blog post or two — was kind of fun. Which brings me to what I was going to write this post about: the intense media interest (and voter interest, I might add, in the South Carolina primaries: Just FYI, here’s what I’ve run into in the last few days…

This morning, I was interviewed by Cyprien d’Haese of French television — precisely, CAPA presse tv. Cyprien’s one of these triple-threat guys — he conducted the interview, and was his own camera and sound man. The interview was about our McCain endorsement. You can see and hear above a video clip I shot of him shooting video of me (talk about medium being the message). This was sort of last-minute thing — someone called me to set it up while I was at breakfast.
Also during breakfast, I got a call from John Durst with the Columbia Rotary, to which I belong, asking if I would give a presentation at today’s meeting about endorsements. This I did, using most of the time for Q and A, which makes it easier on me and more interesting for the audience — there are always plenty of questions. Cyprien came along to shoot some footage of my presentation — after the interview, he had wanted some extra footage, and I suggested that would be more interesting than me sitting at a computer editing copy.
As I stepped down from the podium at Rotary, a young Danish woman named Sara Schlüter who works for this outfit (I give you the link because I’m not sure which is the name of her employer — is it "Avidsen," or "Nyhedsavisen" or what?) gave me her card, said she was on her way back home but wanted to call me later in the week for an interview. I said fine and gave her my contact info.
Just after 7:30 a.m. Sunday, I did a live interview via phone with C-SPAN about our endorsement. I’m sure you were watching then, so I won’t go into any more details…
Last Wednesday, I got a call from NPR’s All Things Considered wanting me on the show that day — something to do with my column that day — but by the time I called back they had lined up somebody else. Bill Putman with the show said he’d call back if they changed again and needed me. Unfortunately, I didn’t check voice mail or e-mail again until late in the day — Mr. Putnam had called me back three times, e-mailed me at least twice, and Michelle Norris had e-mailed me to say, in part, "I am a big fan of your blog [isn’t everyone?] and I think you are just the right person for this segment. Bill is having a tough time reaching you…." So I missed my chance there. But Ms. Norris said she’d be in town this week and would probably call…
One night last week (it tends to be night usually before I can return phone calls) I gave an interview with Jennifer Rubin with Human Events, which I’ve never read. When I mentioned this to my colleagues, Mike observed that "Human Events makes National Review look like Pravda." Be that as it may, she sent me a link to her story, and here it is.
Linda Hurst with The Toronto Star called, also about midweek. She had seen my video from talking to Ted Sorensen (or maybe it was Andy’s video, which is better), and wanted to talk to me about the parallels between JFK and Obama (which she frankly thought were sort of overblown). Here’s the story that she was working on.
I’m going to be on KARN radio in Little Rock this coming Friday morning at 8:40. Something called "First News with Bob Steel." The guy who contacted me said, "We’re looking to get a picture of what the citizens in your state are looking for in the Republican candidates, with a little extra interest in our local man, former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee." OK.
Karen Shiffman of public radio’s "On Point" (I think it’s in Boston) wants me on the show in the 10-11 a.m. slot this Wednesday. I can’t remember where we left that…
I had to cancel something with a radio station in Boston this past Friday; we’re supposed to try again this week. I forget the station. Host’s name is Robin Young, and it will be live. They haven’t called back, but I guess it’s on.
Morgan Till with "The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer" e-mailed me last week wanting an interview this week. I forget where we left that one, too…
I’m supposed to be on "The Dennis Miller Show" again Thursday. Awaiting details.
Carrie Bann, who blogs and produces for NBC, wanted to get together, but that hasn’t happened yet.
Finally, I’ll be on ETV live with Andy Gobeil, as per usual, for the primary results the next two Saturday nights.

OK, so you’re not all that interested. I just needed to make myself a memo of where I was with all that stuff, and since I hadn’t posted anything today, I figured I’d put it on the blog. Also, I thought you might like the video clip with Cyprien.

bradwarthen.com

All The News That Gives You Fits

Category Archives: Endorsement interviews

McCain-Obama, and other match-ups

Our interview with the winner: Obama speaking to our editorial board

This explains SO much: Fowler says he told Hillary not to seek endorsement

It’s officially a trend: Rock Hill backs Obama, too

She got one! MB goes for Hillary

Mama! Greenville’s copying us! Make ’em stop!

What the Obama campaign learned about The State

Don Fowler likens us to Lucifer

Welcome to our guests just joining us…

The ‘mystery’ of why the press likes McCain

Obama inspires board, offers hope

Video about the Obama endorsement

We endorse Barack Obama

My camera actually DOES work

Video: Obama, Edwards, Clinton at the State House

Why Andre Bauer likes Huckabee

Time to do a Ned Ray on the Clintonistas

Democratic endorsement delayed

Video: McCain about the 2000 campaign in SC, and what’s different now

The Media are the Message