RANDOM CAMPAIGN OBSERVATION OF THE DAY…. Recent polling suggests there are basically only three Southern states the Obama campaign hopes to compete in, and has a reasonable shot at winning: Florida, Virginia, and North Carolina. Obama will be in the toughest of the three today, hosting a campaign rally in Charlotte.
It was largely a forgettable moment during the Republican primaries, but as long as Obama is going to contest those three Southern states, I wonder if he might want to consider some remarks John McCain made in Boston in early February.
McCain was running through something of a stand-up routine, telling lawyer jokes and an anecdote about how old his mother is. He then introduced two of his travel companions, former Sen. Phil Gramm and Sen. Lindsey Graham. McCain told his Boston audience:
“After this meeting, if you’d like to talk to senator, either senator Gramm, we will provide translators for any of you that need to, find them hard to understand. I find them hard to.”
Now, almost no one took note of McCain’s remark, but I’ve always wondered what would have happened if Barack Obama, campaigning in Massachusetts, said he couldn’t understand Southerners, and suggested voters might need “translators” to help out. I suspect the story would have gotten some play.
But it wasn’t Obama; it was McCain. Here’s a random thought: Maybe Obama should tell voters in Charlotte today, “John McCain says he doesn’t understand Southerners and wants to offer interpreters to the rest of the country to understand you. I want you to know that I hear you loud and clear.”
Just a thought.
