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Obama and Gore: the dream ticket

Posted: March 06, 2008, 8:40 PM by Diane Francis
U.S. Politics

The Democrats are in trouble now that Hillary began to play hardball, and deploy the Politics of Fear, with her dishonest "red phone" TV commercials which raised national security issues and attacked Obama's lack of experience.
The commercials turned the tide in Ohio and Texas and were demographically targetted to older people who would recognize an old-fashioned handset plus one that was to represent the "hot line" -- or the phone link between the Soviet Union and the United States during the Cold War designed to avert nuclear catastrophe.
It marked a shift from the Politics of Hope to McCain's Politics of Fear.

Obama's only choice as running mate
This means that the Democrats have only one dream ticket: Obama and Al Gore who is the only potential candidate with more national security experience, and world profile, than Republican John McCain. Without Gore as Obama's running mate, the party's continuing candidate contest will simply play into McCain's hands and turn the election into the Politics of Fear.
The facts are that neither Obama nor Hillary have as much experience as does McCain. Hillary has an experienced husband, but she never even had security clearance in the White House. No First Lady does and no First Lady, including Bill, should have be privy to national secrets and strategy sessions.
But Gore was privy to everything and therefore trumps McCain's experience which is, by comparison, minimal.

Another reason
If Obama does not get a trophy running mate like Gore -- or perhaps Republican Colin Powell -- then he will be forced to step up his attacks on Hillary and she will against him. This will simply provide juicy soundbytes for Republican advertising campaigners to use against the Democratic winner this fall.
The point is that Hillary is becoming a spoiler and obviously does not care. Obama deserves to be the nominee because he has racked up millions more votes in primaries than she has and almost double what McCain has generated. He is a new bright voice and will give Americans a clear-cut choice between a team looking for new policy ideas and one, such as McCain's or Hillary's, that's simply more of the same which is, by the way, not working very well.

But Obama must outflank the field
It will be interesting to see what Obama does with this type of rough stuff. Flashing pictures of Monica Lewinsky would be way below the belt, but don't be surprised at what may come out, even indirectly. Demanding the Clintons' tax records, plus a list of his Presidential Library donors, is not below the belt and something that Obama should be hammering away about even more than has been the case. All this acrimony will make it tougher for them to run on the same ticket, even more so since she arrogantly hinted this week that she would love to have Obama as her running mate, not the other way around.
Obama may be able to outmaneuvre her by announcing a Dream Team of experienced Democrats and Republicans who he would ask to serve in his cabinet. That way he would underscore his message of hope and collaboration with experienced people rather than allow himself to be isolated as a novice by Hillary and/or McCain.

Of course, Gore has stayed out of the fray and says he is not interested in politics. But his silence has, in part, been because he dislikes the Clinton candidacy. And anything's possible in politics. Together Obama and Gore would be a Teflon Team and McCain would be unable to turn the campaign into The Experienced One Versus The Novice. Then the election would be what it should be: A contest between equals about ideas and the future that engages everyone.

I can say, I love this idea

But you all already know that

:P :clap: :clap: :clap: :clap: :clap:

I love the idea, too.:)

But I think Richardson, Sebelius, or Webb are the more likely VP candidates...