The Debate We Should Have Heard

The second presidential debate last Tuesday was, at best, uneventful. It isn’t that McCain “lost,” whatever this could mean in the age of nationally televised political “debates.” In fact, he appeared both more relaxed and energized than Obama. Still, there was a goldmine of opportunities that he passed up. Here is what I would have loved to see.

The Economy
When Obama said, as he has been saying ad nauseum for weeks, that it is “deregulation” that is the source of the economic situation -- “the crisis” -- that has been at the center of the news for the last several weeks, McCain could have replied as follows:

Obama’s Narcissism
“Sen. Obama, some of the brightest, most experienced minds have been attending to this matter for quite some time, and if they are in agreement over anything, it is that there are complex reasons for our current condition. Yet, without haste and as soon as anyone was even aware of the crisis, you brazenly proclaimed yourself an expert by offering a diagnosis that can be described at best as grossly over simplistic: 'Deregulation!'

“In fact Senator, you have exploited this national calamity to advance your own political ambitions. Remember, neither of is president yet; we are both still Senators and, as such, we have an obligation, both to the citizens of our respective states, who voted us into office, as well as the citizens of this country whose highest office we seek, to discharge our Senatorial responsibilities. I suspended my presidential campaign to address this problem; you, on the other hand, refused to do so. Furthermore, you said that if anyone needed you, they knew how to reach you. This is about ‘putting country first,’ Sen. Obama, not about winning an election.

Obama’s Meaningless Rhetoric
“You apparently think that ‘deregulation’ is the mother of all evils and ‘regulation’ the only antidote. But these concepts are so vague. Karl Marx, the nineteenth century German philosopher and author of The Communist Manifesto, was an opponent of ‘deregulation’ and staunch champion of ‘regulation.’ The same can be said of Stalin, Lenin, Trotsky, Castro, Chavez, and, for that matter, Hitler and Mussolini. The question, Senator, is not whether we should have ‘regulation’ or ‘deregulation’; the question is what degree of ‘regulation’ is compatible with the unique degree of liberty that has always distinguished America as the freest country in all of world history.

Obama’s Deception
“That you speak untruthfully about my stance on ‘deregulation’ can be readily established by anyone willing to look at my record generally, and in particular the forceful, and in hindsight, prescient remarks concerning the need for stricter regulation of Fannie Mae and Freddy Mac that I began making two years ago and which you, Senator, along with your Democratic cronies -- Barney Frank, Chris Dodd, Maxine Waters and many members of the Congressional Black Caucus -- mightily resisted.”

Foreign Policy
When the discussion shifted to foreign policy, and Obama praised the work of our “troops,” McCain had another nice opening for attack:

Obama’s Contradictions
“Sen. Obama, you have opposed this war from the beginning, and you even now continue to oppose ‘the surge’ in spite of its success. If, as you have continually suggested, the war in Iraq is immoral and illegal, then your laudatory comments concerning the troops are radically incoherent: how can you lavish praise on our soldiers when they are prosecuting a war that you believe is evil and criminal? You can no more congratulate the troops on a job well done than any of us could think to congratulate the soldiers of Hitler’s military for having fought valiantly for the Nazi cause. No, Senator, either you abandon your position on the war or you retract your praise of the troops. Simple logic makes it impossible for you to consistently maintain them both.

Obama’s Scandalous Lies regarding the Troops
“This point aside, however, you are on record accusing our soldiers in Afghanistan of having committed atrocities there. How can you praise the troops when you believe that they are culpable for such crimes? Fortunately, Sen. Obama, you need not answer this, for it is thoroughly false that our troops have done any such thing. Yet it is the height of irresponsibility, at the very least, for a person who aspires to be ‘commander-in-chief’ of our selfless, courageous, honorable men and women in the armed forces to engage in slandering those very men and women at any time, much less during a time of war. Also, charges of the kind that you made sow the seeds of America’s defeat by altering national and international perceptions of America and undermining troop morale. As a veteran of the Vietnam War, another American war effort which opportunistic politicians and their supporters in the media, academia, and Hollywood undermined by slandering those who served in it, your outrageous charges have an intensely personal dimension for me.”

Mccain should have woven the remarks concerning Obama's domestic and foreign policy visions into a narrative within which the friends (not associates) of the latter play a central role.

McCain has one final shot Thursday night to showcase this narrative. I am not, however, going to hold my breath.