Like a movie that never ends

John Merli
Published: May 1, 2008

While the Democrats continue to peck away at one another like a gaggle of angry geese, giving John McCain an unexpectedly wide range of travel options for unfamiliar GOP territory like New Orleans and Selma, one major factor of the campaign-that-never-ends may be rather overlooked.

It’s not that the Dems will irreparably harm the party and its two remaining opponents by constantly appearing to bicker among themselves and by portraying one another on a daily basis as barely one step above the bottom of the food chain (which I think may be single-celled amoebas?). Democrats are not happy unless they’re fighting for some cause, and if they can’t do it against the GOP or some other guys, they’ll gladly do it among themselves. In the end, they virtually always kiss and make up.

No, it’s not the infighting and self-loathing that Dems should worry about; it’s merely the fact that the longer something goes on (either a presidential campaign or anything else), the less there is to say.

And the less there is to say is when the trouble starts. Even when you’re not ad libbing, even when every word is written down for you on a working teleprompter, the mere fact of having to continue talking about issues that have been talked to death over the past many months can be treacherous.

This need to keep talking, to keep coming up with fresh angles on old stories, is precisely what got Clinton in hot water over sniper fire in Bosnia and Obama in trouble for those “bitter” blue-collar workers in Pennsylvania. The candidates were boring themselves to tears!

I’m no big fan of some of the pundits that pop up every night on those news channels, holding forth on why Hillary will never win, or Barack is doomed, or how John McCain will flash his temper at exactly the wrong time in a debate or wherever. But one of these guys said the other night that the public should understand just how cynical each of the candidates is right now.

When he was quickly challenged on his almost-casual observation of all three candidates’ cynicism, he said the mere fact that each of them is required to basically give the same speeches to the same types of crowds in the same types of places over and over and over again would make even the best of us cynical. He may be right.

Like an actor giving his 400th performance in the same role and trying to make it seem like the first time for his audience, Clinton, Obama and (to as lesser extent) McCain are forced to repeat their three or four basic themes again and again — sometimes five and six times a day — week after week, month after month, for all who will listen and vote. It is a grueling, in some ways inhumane, way to campaign for the top public office in the land. Like the very odd ritual of debates themselves, the travel, and the back-breaking, energy-sapping campaign schedules for months on end by the candidates
are “skills” that no president and commander-in-chief will ever really be called upon to duplicate, once in office. So then what is the point?

The rest of us, like the candidates, also run the risk of being bored to tears with a campaign that will surely make the history books no matter who wins (a woman, a black man or a former POW). Of all things, boring it should not be.

Beyond the notion of the Democrats’ “superdelegates” — an intra-party concept that has merit for its few hundred anointed VIPs, but only if you disregard the votes of several million people in primaries and caucuses — the party of JFK and FDR has to ensure that by 2012 the entire presidential campaign process of selecting delegates (not necessarily the nominee) lasts about half as long as this one, and maybe less. Close races are a good thing (they sure beat early runaway contests any day), but under the current Democratic Party scenario, such fist-a-cuff contests woefully outlast their vibrancy and, eventually, their welcome. Who wouldn’t be a cynic?

John Merli has been a Prince William County resident since 1984, and a Potomac News columnist since 1985. He has worked in the media for more than 30 years. E-mail him at .