‘Joe the Plumber’ has people

By Jennifer J. Foster

We talked earlier this week about how Joe Wurzelbacher, a/k/a “Joe the Plumber,“ is now considering a run for Congress.

Well, now he’s hired a Nashville publicity team. This is just getting beyond ridiculous now.

From the Associated Press:

The Press Office in Nashville, where clients include rockers Grand Funk Railroad and Eddie Money, will help (Wurzelbacher) handle the flood of interview and appearance requests that have poured in since he was mentioned during a presidential debate and quickly became a household name.

“It’s like any other celebrity who is in the public eye,“ said Jim Della Croce, who owns the agency. “There needs to be someone acting as a clearinghouse and interpreting the opportunities and coordinating the media requests, and he truly is being inundated.“

The PR folks quickly cleared up one rapidly spreading rumor about the plumber: He’s not planning to release an album, though a book is in the works.

“He’s not doing a country record,“ the AP reported Della Croce as saying Thursday. “I think that was an angle that was presumptuous.“

Della Croce continued:

“Certainly Joe will go down in history and will be a celebrity regardless of which way the election turns,“ Della Croce said. “He is a curiosity. He’s touched a nerve with the common man, and people are curious as to what’s on his mind. I think he speaks for a lot of people.“

Press Office lesson No. 1: Presumption: Not OK for people talking about Joe the Plumber. Totally OK for Joe the Plumber himself.

Before they work on the book deal, they might want to put someone in charge of Wurzelbacher’s schedule. The McCain campaign needs all the help it can get.

Tucker Bounds’ great quote

By Jennifer J. Foster

If you are a regular reader of this blog, you know the absolute disdain I have for canned campaign quotes.

But every now and then, someone comes up with a good one.

Enter Tucker Bounds, one of John McCain’s campaign spokesmen.

Bounds responded to the Obamamercial with a statement Wednesday night. Included in Bounds’s statement was this gem:

As anyone who has bought anything from an infomercial knows, the sales job is always better than the product. Buyer beware.

Come on. I don’t care if you’re Billy Mays; that’s funny.

Not surprisingly, though, some people have just plain lost their sense of humor.

I didn’t even know there was such a thing as the Electronic Retailing Association, but apparently, it is “a trade association that represents direct marketers that use electronic means including infomercials.“

Well, they’re really mad. ERA CEO Rick Petry said:

“To use a political agenda to indict an entire genre of advertising by portraying it in such a negative light is patently unfair. It would be like charging an entire industry and everyone associated with it, say politics for example, as being scurrilous. We at ERA will be the first to tell you that there are some who use this method of advertising inappropriately, which is why we have an independent self-regulation program, ERSP ( http://www.narcpartners.org/ersp/index.aspx ), administered by the National Advertising Review Council in partnership with the Council of Better Business Bureau. With this watchdog mechanism in place, claims have to be proven; a standard that politicians are not required to live up to. The fact is infomercials have been used by not only start-ups with unique products, but successful brands such as Kodak and Mercedes Benz, even the U.S. Navy.“

Oh, get over yourself! Calm down! Have a laugh!

Unless, of course, Petry thinks all this stuff is made up.

Musings on Rogers-Segall

By Jennifer J. Foster

(Editor’s note: This is the third of a three-part series exploring the Third Congressional District race and the editorial endorsement of the Opelika-Auburn News. To read Part 1, “Josh Segall unplugged,“ click here; to read Part 2, “Mike Rogers unplugged,“ click here.)

Recapping:

As I said before, I sat in on the editorial interviews with both U.S. Rep. Mike Rogers and his Democratic challenger, Montgomery attorney Josh Segall. From my perspective, as someone who has participated in editorial endorsement interviews both as a journalist and as a surrogate for a candidate, both candidates had great sessions.

On Sunday, the Opelika-Auburn News endorsed Rogers’ re-election bid.

I am neither an employee of the News nor a member of its editorial board, so I cannot speak to the process by which the endorsement was made. But I was a bit taken aback by the reasons the News gave for backing Rogers.

I have planned this post since I read the endorsement in Sunday’s paper. But since I’ve spent much of this week making a Halloween costume for one of my daughters—

SIDEBAR: Note to readers: If you have just taken up sewing in the last year or so, do not attempt to make your child a Halloween costume, no matter how much she begs. Trust me: A $20 investment at Wal-Mart or a winning bid on eBay is a bargain compared to what you’ll spend in materials—and time—trying to get the job done. Just some friendly advice from the voice of experience. END SIDEBAR

—I’m just now getting down to writing it.

Interestingly, when I opened the paper yesterday, I found that I’m not the only one who found the reasoning behind the endorsement curious. Here’s a letter to the editor that appeared on the editorial page this morning:

You’ve got to be joking!

Mike Rogers ran an “incredible misguided campaign that has brought out the worse in politics,” ranks “403 of 435” representatives and last among Alabama’s representatives in congressional influence, “puts the needs of Washington above the needs of Roanoke, Opelika and Phenix City,” and needs to be “more of a Representative.” But he is in office.

Josh Segall “has a number of great ideas” and “fire, wit and intelligence.”

Therefore, you endorse Mike Rogers?

Your endorsement is beyond understanding. In what world is it better to be divisive, lazy and incompetent after four years on the job than to be smart and eager to serve the Third District? We hope the voters can reason this one out.

Roberta Jackel and Dr. Christopher Newland
Auburn

Jackel is a former Auburn city councilwoman.

In politics, there are endorsements—you know, where someone says you can use their name in your ad—and then there are endorsements, when people will stand by you and campaign with you and ask their friends to contribute their hard-earned money to help you.

The difference lies in how much that someone believes in you.

The News produced for Mike Rogers the first kind of endorsement. He can say the paper backed him, but not much else.

Anytime an endorsement begins with the phrase, “Despite the fact ...“ you know that the backing that follows will probably leave something to be desired.

The endorsement does acknowledge a few positives about Rogers—he serves on three committees in the House, he shows an interest in solving America’s financial crisis and he demostrates a “desire for finding solutions toward reducing America’s dependence from foreign oil.“

But congressional committee appointments are part and parcel of the job, and the News says that Segall shares Rogers’ determination to find alternative energy resources.

On the financial crisis, the paper notes that Segall said he would have voted against the not-a-bailout bill. But is that a negative? Segall hasn’t said he doesn’t believe in solving the crisis—in fact, quite the opposite is true. He did say that he would have voted against the not-a-bailout bill, but he also shared with the editorial board his thoughts on what should be done to right the economy. So whether his opposition to the not-a-bailout bill is a positive or a negative for Segall depends on your opinion of that bill and what you think of Segall’s ideas about how we should solve the financial crisis.

That leaves us with only a stated fact—that Rogers’ experience “in local, state and national politics dates back to the 1980s.“

We are left to assume the News considers that experience a positive—perhaps, then, the only positive?—of Rogers’ re-election bid.

So is it?

Again, it depends on the eye of the beholder.

Some people consider it a negative for candidates to be in politics for 20 years or more. The newbies trying to oust the longtimers call them “professional politicians.“

But for the purposes of argument, let’s consider long political experience an asset. It should give the incumbent a lot of good things to say about what he’s done in office, right?

One would think that a congressman with six years invested on Capitol Hill would offer at least a couple of items detailing his own accomplishments. But if you listen to Rogers’ television commercials (and if you live in the Third District, you have listened to them ... and listened to them ... and listened to them ... and then you’ve read his mail—I’ve gotten two pieces from his campaign over the past five days), he doesn’t have much to say about his own record. He’s spending almost all his time—and money—talking about Segall.

Why?

Roll Call magazine, one of the top two or three publications on Capitol Hill, produces “power rankings,“ a rating system that purports to gauge politicians’ effectiveness in Congress. The ratings consider factors including positions on committees, including leadership positions; indirect influence, or how much the congressman can impact the congressional agenda; legislative activity, including bills and amendments that have shaped the laws moving through Congress; and earmarks—i.e., bringin’ home the bacon.

Rogers is No. 403 out of 435 in the House.

But he’s only served three terms, his supporters say; in an institution that doesn’t have term limits, it takes time to build influence.

Yes, that’s true. So let’s consider how Rogers is doing just among those with whom he was first elected in 2002.

He’s 44th. Out of 46.

And No. 46 is U.S. Rep. Rick Renzi (R-Ariz.), who’s awaiting trial on 35 felony counts of conspiracy, wire fraud, money laundering, extortion and insurance fraud.

I am not saying that Rogers is a bad candidate. As I noted the other day, the Mike Rogers I met and questioned in the editorial interview was much different than the one his campaign has portrayed for voters. He was engaging and enthusiastic about his job, and he articulated a desire to advance interesting alternative energy legislation if he wins re-election.

As I told Rogers after the interview, his campaign is doing him a disservice with its combative, sour tone. I want to hear from a candidate why he deserves my vote—not why his challenger doesn’t. This is especially true if that person has already spent time serving me as an elected official.

And I’m not saying Rogers’ service is void of redeeming qualities. Indeed, as Roll Call notes, several things that make a congressman effective for his constituents—including casework, legislators’ visibility in his district and cultivated relationships with federal agencies that produce dividends for the district—are unquantifiable, so they aren’t taken into consideration for the power rankings.

I’m just saying that as long as we’re talking experience, it doesn’t appear that the experience Rogers cultivated during his time in state and local government has helped him much in Washington.

The News advises Segall to “use his fire, wit and intelligence toward representing areas on a more local level before joining the ranks of the sharks on Capitol Hill.“ And Rogers made a point of saying—twice—during the interview that his “life experiences”—i.e., being married, having a child—matter.

I know another congressman who was elected as a young man and went on to great things.

Mike Rogers knows him, too.

His name is Adam Putnam. Elected to Congress in 2000 at the ripe old age of 26, he now leads the House Republican Conference and is the third-highest ranking Republican in that chamber.

Roll Call pegs Putnam 3rd among the 37 members elected in his class, and 100th overall.

Incidentally, Putnam, now 34, has just two more years’ experience in the House than Rogers.

I highly doubt that Rogers would say that Putnam was ill-suited to serve when he was elected at 26. You can’t argue with the results he’s produced and tine influence he’s cultivated over the past eight years.

I say all that to say this: Someone’s young age shouldn’t be considered an automatic disqualifier for a leadership position, just as someone’s advanced age shouldn’t be considered an automatic qualifier for a leadership position. Likewise, someone isn’t necessarily unsuited to serve just because he’s never done it, just as someone isn’t necessarily suited to continue serving simply because he is. The News’ sole objection to Segall’s candidacy appears to be that he “has never held public office.“ But every elected official was a newbie once. The voter’s job is to look at the candidates as a whole—their ideas, enthusiasm, aptitude, attitude and everything else—and decide who and where—and when—you want them to serve.

People support incumbents for re-election and return them to city halls and state capitals and Washington primarily because they want to retain the incumbent’s experience.

Whether the people of the Third District return Mike Rogers to Washington likely depends on whether they believe Rogers’ experience is worth keeping.

As for Segall, he’s continued to plug away. His campaign released a poll last month that showed him only nine points behind Rogers; Rogers maintains the race is not now nor has ever been that close. But the Democratic National Campaign Committee recently added the Alabama Third to its “Red-to-Blue” program, a move that gave Segall national exposure and access to the DCCC’s huge donor base. And Segall’s campaign said this week that it has eclipsed the $1 million mark in fundraising. People don’t give money to refurbish a sinking ship.

Though it didn’t endorse Segall, the News noted on Oct. 17 that after editorial interviews with both Rogers and Segall, “we are confident that either candidate would represent this area in Washington well over the next two years.“

In endorsing Rogers, the News said, “Democratic challenger Josh Segall, 29, is a very worthy opponent who has a number of great ideas anyone in either political party should adhere to.“ The paper went on to note Segall’s “fire, wit and intelligence.“

Rogers might have gotten the endorsement. But Segall got the takeaway quotes.

As non-endorsements go, I’m betting the Segall camp will take it.

Wasserman on race

By Jennifer J. Foster

Speaking of race, Ed Wasserman has produced an interesting column about the impact of race on the presidential campaign. In short, Wasserman says race can’t help but be an issue in the campaign—but not in the way you might think.

What’s odd is that while this election is historic precisely because of the major-party candidacy of a man who, under U.S. standards of race, is black, race goes unaddressed. Instead, race is both everywhere and nowhere, overriding and unacknowledged, a presence rather than a set of concrete issues. It stalks the conference room, uninvited, and never gets to sit at the table with the subjects that matter.

It’s as if Obama’s candidacy has both made race a signature fact of the campaign, and removed it—and the policy concerns to which it’s normally linked—as an issue.

... But surely, how race might tilt the vote isn’t the only racial issue worth reporting. What about exploring what an Obama victory would do to race relations? What would become of the myriad, passionately divisive policy issues that have been inextricably tied to race for the past half-century: the huge population of young black males behind bars, early childhood intervention, job training, the war on drugs, poor housing, the whole reality of race-tainted social justice? We’re beyond those? Even the subprime lending debacle, which disproportionately hit minority homeowners, has been whitewashed into a race-neutral industry bailout.

Read the rest here.

Obamamercial

By Jennifer J. Foster

I just got done watching Barack Obama’s 30-minute television ad/infomercial.

As a television production, I thought it was exceptionally done. It was full of striking photography, sweeping landscapes and beautiful colors; it was paced almost perfectly, and it was treated with an even hand that brought it thoughtful balance.

There was one scene that stood out like a sore thumb, and that was when Obama and his wife were playing cards around the table with their daughters. That scene was cheesier than Velveeta.

As a political piece, I thought it was solid enough. Obama did a good job of putting his proposals into terms the average voter can understand. But it may be the campaign’s decision to use real people as illustrations of Obama’s arguments about why we need those policies that makes the production a political winner: People will forget policy details. But they remember other people.

Think about it. If you watched the program, take a minute and think about how many policy pieces Obama mentioned. How specifically do you remember them? For example, do you remember what he said he would do about the transition to more fuel-efficient cars? Or do you just remember that he mentioned something about fuel-efficient cars?

Now, take a minute and think about the people who were spotlighted over the 25 or so minutes of the taped portion of the program. I’ll bet you remember more of them—and their issues.

The Obamamercial had three parts: The “I-know-what-I’m-doing” portion, where Obama discussed his proposals; the “You-can-trust-him, he’s-a-good-guy” portion, where other elected officials (and one former military officer) vouched for his credibility and readiness to be president, and the “Look-at-all-these-excited-people” portion, the conclusion at the live rally in Florida.

Maybe I was the only one who noticed, but I was struck by the sign of an almost all-white first seven minutes or so of the program. There were a couple of black and Latino people in the first few minutes, but they were almost never featured and remained exclusively in the background.

Of course, Obama did spotlight an elderly black couple from Ohio and an Hispanic-American woman and her family in Albuquerque, N.M. But for the most part, the faces—for example, in Obama’s in-the-round discussion about pensions—were a sea of white. It was as if he was trying to say, “Midwestern white folks: I am one of you.“

If I had any other nitpick, it would be the way the taped program transitioned to the live rally in Florida. The taped program was a carefully crafted, highly personal experience; Obama was speaking directly into the camera, from candidate to voter, as he made his case. The rally turned that on its head. Suddenly, viewers were competing for Obama’s attention with thousands of Floridians in a noisy, cavernous arena; since Obama was speaking from a teleprompter and playing to the arena crowd, the competition was no contest.

Anyone else out there watch the Obamamercial? What did you think?