Politico

Regarding Josh Kraus­haar’s Sept. 30 article, “Dems Attack GOP Over Privatizing Social Security,” I note Jim Martin, president of the national seniors organization 60 Plus Association, has been combating these scare tactics for more than 15 years. Demagoguing Social Security to get seniors into the voting booth is as familiar a theme every election cycle as there is and, frankly, it’s always Democrats doing the scaring. I read where National Republican Congressional Committee spokesman Ken Spain said the other day, “You can set your watch by it … Democrats … scaring seniors with false and misleading claims that have been debunked by nonpartisan watchdog groups like FactCheck.org.”

As Martin says time and again, “While Social Security is safe for today’s seniors, it is in serious danger insofar as our most beloved assets are concerned: our children and grandchildren.”

No one refutes that Americans today live longer, healthier lives. No one refutes that demographic shifts since the system was created in 1935 have severely altered the number of workers putting into the system as opposed to those taking out. What is in play is how the nation addresses these dynamics to correct system viability going forward.

Every single Republican office-seeker or officeholder who ever supported or voted for the intentionally off-putting concept of “privatization” (60 Plus prefers PRAs, or personal retirement accounts, in civil discourse) has consistently said all system modifications would be voluntary — a choice — and that there would be no benefit change for those receiving Social Security or for those near retirement. But Democrats know a good lie when they see one — and have since Barry Goldwater in the ’60s!

Employing scare tactics and deceit for political advantage is both desperate and despicable.

Ed Fulginiti

Communications Director

60 Plus Association

Arlington, Va.

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Just a few weeks before one of the most contentious presidential elections of our time, the polls say millions of Americans still haven’t made up their minds about whom they will be voting for.

Ironically, never has the choice been clearer. John McCain and Barack Obama have vastly different positions on almost every issue of importance to Americans: the economy, Iraq, health care, abortion and a host of others. In fact, they differ on almost every issue.

So the natural question is, what’s the problem here? Why can’t people make up their minds if the choices are so clear?

To no one’s surprise, the candidates’ positions on the issues of the day are only one small part of voters’ decision making process. To paraphrase James Carville: It’s not the economy, stupid — it’s the narrative.

Quite simply, each candidate has a story to tell. And his ability to shape his story — his narrative — and connect and motivate the American people will ultimately decide who gets to move into the White House in late January.

All powerful narration begins with the motivation of the storyteller. The objective is to connect with an audience, and to do that successfully, the storyteller must have that intention. I always say, “Intention before attention.” It is not enough to inform or sell a position. The payoff is in the emotional aspect of the experience.

I’ve produced a lot of movies that tested well with research audiences but died in the marketplace. What I learned was that it’s not enough to just like a movie — liking the movie has to be actionable. Will audiences tell their friends, take a family member to see it a second time, or call into talk radio to discuss it? That’s the kind of narrative resonance these candidates need.

The public can’t just like their stories — they have to be motivated by them. They need to vote, obviously, but even more, they need to donate money, tell their friends and neighbors, and display a yard sign or volunteer to canvass a neighborhood.

McCain is selling certainty and security. I prefer to think of it as “the pain we know.” Sure, these may be troubled times, but if we put someone else in, it could be worse — a lot worse. People naturally resist change — even when they are in misery.

Obama is selling the American dream. He is the original agent of change. To date, he has been most successful at the viral aspects of the narrative, motivating millions of people to vote, donate and volunteer.

In recent weeks, his steady hand and steely resolve have gotten kudos from the pundits, but the truth is that when you are an agent of change, you have to show that change and mutability to make it resonate.

The suspension of McCain’s campaign was an opportunity to change the dialogue, the story. Had he not been touting the economic fundamentals just days before, it might have been credible. But events overtook his story, and he appeared inauthentic — a fatal flaw unless aggressively addressed.

All winning stories are about endings. We are clearly in the third act, but the end of this campaign will come in the two weeks before Election Day. To see who will win the prize, look to the narrative. Who is connecting? Who is motivating? Whose authenticity is shining through?

Are you buying their stories? Are others? To make your own prediction, don’t look to the pundits or the polls, look to your gut. That’s where all good stories are first felt.

Peter Guber is the chairman and CEO of the Mandalay Entertainment Group, which specializes in motion pictures, television, sports entertainment and new media. The films Guber personally produced have earned more than $3 billion worldwide and more than 50 Academy Award nominations, including the Best Picture Oscar for “Rain Man.”

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My polling over the years has found that about two-thirds of Democrats define themselves as moderate, while two-thirds of Republicans see themselves as conservative. That polling trend was mirrored in the initial unsuccessful Sept. 29 House vote on the financial bailout proposal: Democrats were divided, with 60 percent of members in favor, while Republicans opposed the measure 2-to-1.

The 228-205 defeat saw the left and right team up against the center, revealing the fundamental unfulfilled divide in American politics today. Centrists viewed it as common sense to shore up the credit markets to stabilize America’s economic condition, which the president and others saw as on the verge of collapse. Yet to the right, it was an unacceptable intrusion by the federal government into the marketplace. And to the left, it was an unacceptable bailout of the rich on Wall Street. Together, they were successful in holding back the winds of change, if only temporarily, as a modified version of the bailout proposal was enacted four days later.

The two-party system works against moderates in Congress: Each side is a fusion of moderate and either left or right elements. So even though voters have repeatedly rejected politics too far to the right or left, the vital center often gets lost in the debate.

Presidential races have for years reflected the same trends. This year’s Democratic presidential primary race was decided by activist-dominated caucuses. In the end, depending upon how you count the Florida and Michigan contests, Hillary Rodham Clinton finished ahead in the primaries by between 40 and 80 delegates. But she was behind Barack Obama by about 160 delegates in the caucuses, especially in red states that are dominated by the most liberal voters, because moderates there tend to side with majority Republicans.

To capture the Republican nomination, John McCain abandoned many of his more centrist, bipartisan initiatives (when was the late time he spoke of immigration reform?). McCain wanted to pick as his running mate independent Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman, the 2000 Democratic vice presidential nominee, but Republican leaders warned him he would be on his own if he did. So he picked an anti-abortion conservative in Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, energizing his base but losing the middle in the process.

Much of today’s gridlock problems are the fault of President Bush, who in his 2000 campaign pledged to defuse partisanship but who, upon entering the White House, pushed it as far as it could go at every turn. Virtually every initiative that would have required the common-sense center to coalesce has collapsed. Immigration and health care reform have been nonstarters. Energy policy has turned into a patchwork agglomeration of gifts to every region and industry, rather than an effort to steer a clear, national direction. Trade and global economic policy are also a mess because the center could not win out.

And yet, freed from the constraints of the left and the right, and under the right leadership, there is a vital center waiting to enact all of these measures. If Obama wins the presidency, it will fall to him to put together coalitions that would earn congressional support. Yet even the likelihood of expanded Democratic congressional majorities does not ensure success. After all, during his first two years in office, President Bill Clinton enjoyed Democratic majorities in the House and Senate, but conservatives succeeded in 1994 by portraying his first two years as surrender to liberal big government.

During President Clinton’s next six years in office, working with Republican congressional majorities, he achieved partial immigration reform, welfare reform, a balanced budget and significant increases to the minimum wage. While some on the left denigrate these achievements as triangulation, it was actually a centrist government molded by the left and right pulls of Clinton and Republican leaders such as House Speaker Newt Gingrich and Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott, each bound by what centrists in both parties would be willing to pass.

This brings us back to the bailout. Solving this immediate economic crisis is just a first step. America needs reform of energy policy, entitlements, immigration and health care, to name just a few pressing national problems, if it is going to remain competitive with the rest of the world in the 21st century. Free and fair trade represent further challenges.

The nation’s center could probably find solutions to all of these problems pretty quickly. On immigration reform, surveys show voters backing a combination of enhanced border security and tougher enforcement measures for illegal immigrants, combined with an earned path to citizenship. But Congress so far has been too fractured to support any set of comprehensive proposals.

If McCain loses the presidential race, along with the almost certain decline in Republicans’ congressional seats, the party’s centrists would probably be better off forming a new caucus, splitting off from the most conservative GOP elements. Such a centrist caucus would wield considerable power and influence and could be the nucleus of a new party. If the Democrats lose the White House, the party will have to look at reforms that give bigger voice to the centrist voters.

The bailout vote shows both sides the value of a centrist coalition in tackling the sorts of challenges the next president — whoever that is — will certainly face. And it is a warning to both parties that voters are generally moderates, who, if dissatisfied with ideological lurches to the left or right under the next administration and Congress, will in two years bring change of their own to end the gridlock, sweeping in lawmakers driven not by ideology but by the country’s needs.

Mark J. Penn served as chief adviser to President Bill Clinton in the 1996 presidential election and to Hillary Rodham Clinton during her Senate and presidential races. He is the author of “Microtrends: The Small Forces Behind Tomorrow’s Big Changes” (Twelve, 2007).

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Elections are a time of accountability, a time when the values of presidential candidates are judged by voters and when incumbents are forced to defend their records and rhetoric against ambitious challengers.

This year, unlike any previous election year, an entire group of voters also will be held accountable: Latinos.

After years of being viewed as the “sleeping giant” — the group whose voter turnout never comes close to matching its voting-age population — the Hispanic vote is expected to be a force this year on Election Day.

Hispanic leadership coalitions, Spanish-language media, and the presidential candidates have spent tens of millions in an unprecedented grass-roots effort to mobilize the Latino vote in as many as 13 states, coast to coast and in the Midwest. In four of those states — Colorado, New Mexico, Nevada and Florida — the Latino vote is large enough to determine the outcome of the presidential contest on Nov. 4.
That is, if Latinos vote.

“If, in this election, we do not turn out and vote, then we are the dog that’s all bark and no bite,” warned Arturo Vargas, executive director of the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials. “If we don’t do it now, then my question is, ‘When are we going to do it?’”

The foundation has been laid for a record Latino voter turnout of 9.2 million, including 2.6 million Hispanics who will be voting for the first time. In the 2000 presidential election, 5.9 million Latinos voted, and in 2004, there were 7.6 million Latino votes cast.

Despite the rising numbers, this year’s Hispanic vote projection is not good enough, Vargas emphasized recently during a meeting with Latino political activists.

“That is an embarrassment, because there are 17 million Latinos who today could vote because they are U.S. citizens at least 18 years of age,” the Latino leader said. “Our challenge is to reach the native-born Latino — the Chicano, the Puerto Rican — those of us born here, who do take the right to vote for granted.”

In 2004, Hispanic turnout was only 47 percent, compared with 60 percent for African-Americans and 67 percent for non-Hispanic whites.

The backbone of this year’s campaign is “Ya es hora. ¡Ve y vota!” (“It’s Time. Go Vote!”), which builds on the coalition’s 2007 push that produced almost 1.4 million citizenship applications by legal permanent residents. (Not all will become citizens in time to vote because of the federal government’s delay in processing the applications.)

One of the partners, We Are America Alliance, says it is on track to register a half-million new Latino, Asian and other immigrant voters by the end of this week, with a goal of mobilizing 1 million voters in the November election.

During the last weekend of September, another partner, Spanish-language publisher ImpreMedia, inserted 990,500 voter registration forms into its publications in Arizona, California, Colorado, Florida, Illinois, New York and Texas. Media giants Univision and Entravision also are running television and radio spots.

Celebrities are being enlisted. State Farm Insurance Cos. recently sponsored a media tour featuring baseball All-Star David Ortiz, who became a citizen last June. Rock the Vote features pop singer Christina Aguilera in a television spot.

The “Ya es hora” drive also is telephoning Latino households, targeting about 150,000 Latinos who have been registered to vote but tend not to show up.

Separately, the New Policy Institute, a progressive group affiliated with NDN, has paid for Spanish-language radio ads in Colorado, Nevada and the Washington metropolitan area that includes Northern Virginia. The “Adelante” (“Moving Forward”) drive is aimed at first-time Hispanic voters.

Why haven’t Latinos voted more often? Hispanic leaders maintain that one of the biggest blocks to Latino voting is the misinformation given by election officials and poll workers. Organizers are combating that problem by urging Latinos to vote absentee or to call a toll-free telephone bank to get instructions and learn their voting rights.

Certainly, there are plenty of reasons to vote.

Like other voters, Hispanics are worried about the economy, jobs, health care, education and the Iraq war. Unlike other voters, they are disproportionately affected on all of these fronts. They have not forgotten that the first U.S. soldier killed in the Iraq war was an immigrant who had illegally entered the country as a child.

There also is an underlying current of fear shared by Hispanics, regardless of citizenship status, because of the anti-immigrant sentiment that has spread across the country in recent years, according to polls. Like other voters, they want a sensible solution.

The presidential candidates, Republican John McCain and Democrat Barack Obama, are begging for Latino support.

They have saturated the Spanish-language media with advertising and dispatched volunteers to cultural festivals and citizenship ceremonies from California to Florida to enlist voters.

“If you have any doubt about whether you can make a difference, just remember how, back in 2004, 40,000 registered Latino voters in New Mexico didn’t turn out on Election Day. Sen. [John F.] Kerry lost that state by fewer than 6,000 votes,” Obama often reminds Latino audiences.

The Obama campaign pledged to spend $20 million to court the Hispanic vote. The McCain campaign will not say how much it is spending but argues Obama needs to spend more because he is not as well-known as McCain in the Latino community, according to McCain spokeswoman Hessy Fernandez.

McCain won 70 percent of Arizona’s Latino vote during his last Senate reelection effort, but in his presidential campaign, he has been severely criticized by Latino leaders for backing away from his own immigration bill that would have offered illegal immigrants a path to citizenship.

Whether McCain can garner the same level of Latino support in his home state is unknown, Fernandez conceded, but “John McCain is going to work for it” there and everywhere else.

Besides the presidential race, the Latino vote could affect other major contests, such as Senate races in Colorado, New Hampshire, New Mexico, Texas and Virginia.

What if the Hispanic vote does not reach the expected 9.4 million mark?

“It would be a setback to the Hispanic community,” said Andres Ramirez of NDN. But after a better-than-usual performance during the presidential primaries, Ramirez is optimistic. “This is a community that’s engaged and is already voting in very high numbers.”

Gebe Martinez is a longtime journalist in Washington and a frequent lecturer and commentator on the policy and politics of Capitol Hill.

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On Friday, a diverse group of 33 Democrats and 25 Republicans changed their votes to pass a revised financial bailout bill.

The politics of the bailout package are complicated. The bill was seen as a must-pass by elites and congressional leaders, but viewed with great skepticism by large parts of the public. The lion’s share of congressional opposition came from red states and from members running in competitive races. Given the uncertainty of the course and duration of our economic troubles, these votes could have political ramifications this November or even in 2010.

Look at the opponents of the final bill. 108 House Republicans voted against the bill, over half of them from southern or southern Border States. While red state Republicans in competitive races voted against the bill in high numbers, many GOP lawmakers in safe districts oppose the bill on ideological grounds, as they and their voters have deep concerns about the approach taken.

Democratic dissent came disproportionately from freshmen, members from red states and competitive districts, and those in tough races in 2008. The most vulnerable Democratic House freshmen voted against it: Nick Lampson (Texas), Nancy Boyda (Kan.), Carol Shea-Porter (N.H.), and Christopher P. Carney (Pa.). Recent special election winners Don Cazayoux (La.) and Travis Childers (Miss.) also opposed the bill. The most vulnerable Democrats who voted for the bill even in its original form were Paul Kanjorski (Pa.) and Jim Marshall (Ga.), with the latter acknowledging the political danger of his vote. If you look for opposition votes from safe, white, liberal Democrats in cities or suburbs, you find only a handful.

The Senate saw a similar breakdown. Of the 25 votes against the bill, only three senators, Russ Feingold (D-Wis.), Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), and Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) hailed from states that John F. Kerry won in 2004. And the only Democratic incumbent in a competitive race, Mary Landrieu (La.), voted against the bill.

As for Democratic switchers, the largest bloc was a group of 12 black caucus members and was joined by a smaller group of Hispanic Caucus Members. Three freshmen members in relatively competitive districts switched their votes: Gabrielle Giffords (Ariz.), Harry E. Mitchell (Ariz.) and John Yarmuth (Ky.), taking the greatest risk of Democratic switchers.

On the Republican side, a large bloc of safe Republicans switched to support the bill at the urging of their leadership. The 25 switchers also included a few Republicans whose districts are competitive, but who are not facing significant opposition, like Patrick J. Tiberi. And a few from the northeast, who are in competitive races, but where the balance of popular opposition to the bill and the need to act to quell market turmoil is not so unfavorable as it is in some red states such as Charles W. Dent (Pa.) and John R. Kuhl. Two to watch are Kuhl and Joseph Knollenberg (Mich.), who face tough races and hail from districts with economic troubles that predate our financial crisis.

Ultimately, the changes in the bill were only modestly helpful in attracting new votes. The House’s shift in opinion from pressure from home district businesses and from worries that the House would be blamed for a total meltdown of the markets and our financial system provided the oomph needed to turn the vote around.

The future politics of these votes, however, is very uncertain. The passage of the bailout is by no means the end of our economic troubles. If things get worse, will those who voted for the bailout be blamed as wasting billions of dollars and not solving the crisis? Or will those who voted against the package be seen as naïve or ideological if it becomes more apparent that our economic problems are deep and need a series of interventions?

One district to watch is Pennsylvania 11 where the vote of Rep. Paul Kanjorski (D-Pa.) may be the clearest example of a longtime member siding with leadership and voicing establishment concerns of the need to calm markets versus a populist challenger who clearly opposes the bill. But even here the politics are uncertain, for challenger Lou Barletta’s opposition to the bill was not full throated; even he noted the need to do something in the face of a crisis.

But the repercussions from votes on this bill may extend beyond the November 2008 election to the 2010 midterms. Imagine an Obama presidency still in the midst of economic doldrums as the midterm elections approach. Obama and Democrats would certainly blame the economic downturn on the Bush administration and Republican policies. But as Presidents Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton saw, by the time of the midterm elections, the economy belongs to the new president, and midterm election gains that almost always go to the out party can be magnified by economic troubles. One could imagine a populist Republican campaign that uses the bailout bill as the first of failed Democratic measures to resurrect the economy and puts marginal seat Democrats on the hot seat for their votes.

A vote of such magnitude taken in the middle of an intense campaign is extraordinary, and the effects may be felt on our politics for years to come.

John Fortier is a research fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.

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With Election Day just four weeks away, voters are wondering what the next president and Congress will do to get our economy growing in the short term and ensure our long-term global competitiveness? The outcome of this election may hinge on who can best answer that question.

One policy area to start with is protecting the essential building blocks of economic growth and progress in a knowledge-based economy – intellectual property (IP) and innovation.

Inventors, scientists, and researchers have been at the core of America’s success since our earliest days when the Founding Fathers enshrined IP protection in the Constitution, which states, “To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries.”

America’s global innovation leadership has stemmed from this fundamental principle – protecting IP encourages new ideas and advances. In 2006, the United States led the world in global patent filings, spurred by industry investing more than $223 billion in research and development. America’s IP-intensive industries today account for 18 million jobs, which usually pay better and are expected to grow faster over the next decade than the national average. By staying on the cutting edge of innovation, America can continue leading the world in developing clean energy technology, new medical cures and treatments, and other products and services yet to be dreamed of.

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However, in today’s global society, intellectual property rights are under attack on two fronts.

The most visible is the $600 billion global counterfeiting and piracy enterprise built by organized crime. The second is more sublime and comes from those who refuse to recognize the importance of incentivizing innovation and creativity to generate jobs and economic growth. This movement seeks to curtail IP rights as a misbegotten “solution” for addressing global challenges such as health care, world hunger, and climate change. In both cases, jobs are destroyed, innovation is undermined, and consumers are endangered.

In response to the criminal threat, the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives recently passed the PRO-IP Act of 2008 with almost 400 votes in the House and unanimous consent in the Senate. This legislation will strengthen civil and criminal IP laws, increase law enforcement resources, and improve coordination within the executive branch for IP enforcement. Support for the act came from business, organized labor, and consumer groups – a clear measure of its importance.

Protecting America’s innovation advantage, however, doesn’t end with this law, this Administration, or this Congress. The next president must work with Congress to provide effective leadership and make the protection of innovation a top priority. Key leadership positions across the executive branch must be filled with highly qualified people who understand how critical innovation is to jobs, economic growth, America’s global competitiveness, and the safety and well-being of consumers around the world.

America’s innovation advantage will also be challenged as emerging economies – such as China, India, and Russia – learn that innovation and IP rights are fundamental to economic growth. As governments and the private sector in these countries begin to invest in innovation, the United States must do more to retain our position as the world’s idea factory.

Trade policies must include strong measures that safeguard innovation, and the U.S. government must work with our allies abroad to discourage and defeat anti-innovation policies like compulsory licensing of medicines, weakened patent rights on environmental technology, and other threats in norms-setting forums like the World Health Organization and World Trade Organization. Failing in these efforts will only result in diminished incentives for companies to create the next wonder drug or energy-efficient device.

America’s success in the 21st century economy will be inextricably linked to our ability to innovate. Where innovation is fostered investment and talented people soon follow. By honoring and continuing America’s storied tradition of encouraging innovation through strong intellectual property rights, the next president can help grow the economy, create good-paying American jobs, and solve global challenges.

Caroline Joiner is vice president for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s Global Intellectual Property Center.

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Elections are won by the candidate who connects with the political center and the middle class. But something strange and different is happening in the final stretch of the historic 2008 Campaign: Obama-Biden is focused on the middle class, while McCain-Palin is focused on the political center.

This has implications not just for the campaigns, but also for the winner’s governing coalition.

It’s a cynical truism in American politics that candidates run toward the base of their party in the primaries and then shift to the center in the general election. But the Obama-Biden team may be the first in modern history to rhetorically move to the left down the stretch.

Obama’s primary stump speech was a soaring post-partisan appeal: “I chose to run because I believed that the size of these challenges had outgrown the capacity of our broken and divided politics to solve them; because I believed that Americans of every political stripe were hungry for a new kind of politics…a politics that focused on those values and ideals that we held in common as Americans; a politics that favored common sense over ideology, straight talk over spin…we are not as divided as our politics suggests.”

But his stump speech now is an ideological and economic indictment of the Bush Administration aimed at the hearts and minds of the middle class. It’s a condemnation of “trickle-down economics,” a riff off the ownership society (“you’re on your own”), digs at “tax breaks for Exxon-Mobil” and a very old school Democrat solution to the financial crisis: more regulation. Here’s another gauge of the new message: in the debates to date, Obama and Biden said “regulation” or “deregulation” 14 times, and invoked the “middle class” 12 times.

The reason for this populist shift is understandable—nearly 90% of the American people believe the country is moving in the wrong direction, and President Bush has a 22% approval rating, tying Harry Truman for the polling-era all-time low. Honoring McCain personally but hammering home the point that his election would represent a logical extension of the policies that got us here makes sense.

Since Obama’s September 11th sit-down with Bill Clinton, amid a blip of declining popularity, he has dialed up the passionate “fighting for the middle class” rhetoric—which has dovetailed perfectly with the new financial crisis, playing to the Democrats’ strength on the economy. It also addresses one of the long-standing criticisms of Obama’s cool—some say aloof—style. Finally, it coincides with his campaign’s shift to “Get Out The Vote” mode - motivating the Democratic base while calculating that undecideds in an increasingly angry electorate will vote their pocketbook and against the status quo.

But there is a cost to such a play-to-the-base shift so late in the game. America is a center-right nation. Successful realigning elections (especially by Democrats) are achieved by inspiring new coalitions, inviting disaffected Republicans and Independents to join a larger cause—as Obama did consistently during the primaries.

The McCain-Palin team understands they are flying against prevailing political winds. That’s why they’re trying to run under the flag of Independent-Reformer-Mavericks—because the Republican label at the end of the Bush era is looking like a sure loser.

The voters they are trying to target down the stretch are centrists—moderates and independents who are angry at the Bush administration but more conservative on fiscal responsibility and national security than the traditional Democratic brand. Most of all, these voters are sick of the unprincipled and unproductive hyper-partisanship in Washington.

The McCain campaign’s slogan “Country First” is the most obvious sign of this effort. In the debates, the ticket has headed straight to the political center; McCain by reiterating his record—“I’m proud of that work, again, bipartisan, reaching across the aisle, working together, Democrat and Republican alike”— Palin by reframing change—“I’ve joined this team that is a team of mavericks with John McCain, also, with his track record of reform, where we’re known for putting partisan politics aside to just get the job done.”

Normally, this would be a winning message—but the McCain-Palin team is suffering from a Bush-created credibility gap. Bush was elected in 2000 by running under the centrist slogan of “compassionate conservatism,” brandishing his record in Texas as a governor who could get Republicans and Democrats to work together. His White House record has been very different. And so while pollsters are advising clients to condemn partisanship, it’s got less credibility coming from Republicans in this cycle. This message maybe be further undercut as more personal attacks on Obama are deployed in the final weeks.

As they focus on moderate voters, the McCain team is having a hard time connecting with middle class voters on economic issues. While the symbolism of Sarah Palin helps, as a matter of policy Republicans keep going to the Reagan-era well of tax-cuts at a time when the tax burden is not at the top of middle class voters’ economic anxieties—and Obama has offered a deeper middle class tax cut in any case. It’s a reflex that does not fit this fiscal crisis.

Missing from the debates so far is any discussion of a return to fiscal responsibility—a classic appeal to both moderates and the middle class used by independent candidate Ross Perot in 1992. Limiting the debate to regulation versus tax cuts misses the larger long-term issues brought about by this financial crisis and unprecedented taxpayer-funded bailout.

Winning this election with a durable mandate will require bridging appeals to both moderates and the middle class. As Obama looks to seal the deal in these last two debates, he needs to return to his initial post-partisan message. Simply riding economic anxiety or voter anger in a play-to-the-base will lead to a narrow victory that could erode quickly after the election.

Governing in these challenging times will require forming new coalitions, both in Congress and among the American people. The next president needs to unite the country, and dividing to conquer in this campaign will not make that job any easier.

John P. Avlon is the author of “Independent Nation: How Centrists Can Change American Politics.” He served as chief speechwriter and deputy policy director for Rudy Giuliani’s presidential campaign.

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ST. LOUIS — Sarah Palin was supposed to fall off the stage at her vice presidential debate Thursday evening. Instead, she ended up dominating it.

She not only kept Joe Biden on the defensive for much of the debate, she not only repeatedly attacked Barack Obama, but she looked like she was enjoying herself while doing it.

She smiled. She faced the camera. She was warm. She was human. Gosh and golly, she even dropped a bunch of g’s.

“John McCain doesn’t tell one thing to one group and somethin’ else to another,” she said. “Those huge tax breaks aren’t comin’ to those huge multinational corporations.”

She went out of her way to talk in everyday terms, saying things like “I betcha” and “We have a heckuva opportunity to learn” and “Darn right we need tax relief.”

Biden was somber, serious and knowledgeable. And he seemed to think that debates were about facts. He had a ton of them.

Criticizing John McCain’s health care plan, Biden said that McCain would tax health care and “then you’re going to have to replace a $12,000 — that’s the average cost of the plan you get through your employer; it costs $12,000 — you’re going to have to pay — replace $12,000 plan, because 20 million of you are going to be dropped. So you’re going to have to place — replace a $12,000 plan with a $5,000 check you’ve just given to the insurance company.”

Got that?

Palin was a lot more direct in her attacks on Obama and a lot more simple. Criticizing Obama for saying he would meet with some foreign leaders who are hostile to the United States, Palin said: “Some of these dictators hate America and what we stand for. They cannot be met with. That is beyond bad judgment. That is dangerous.”

She also said: “An issue like that taken up by a presidential candidate goes beyond naiveté and goes beyond poor judgment.”

Sarah Palin accusing Barack Obama of being naive? Yep. And she was unabashed about it. And so what if Joe Biden has been in the Senate approximately forever and knows a lot more about a lot more stuff than she does? She doesn’t care.

“You recently said paying taxes is patriotic,” she said to Biden. “In middle-class America, where I have been all my life, that is not considered patriotic.”

True, a lot of her statements were of the fortune cookie variety. “At end of the day,” she said, “if we are all working together for the greater good, it is going to be OK.”

But a lot of people like fortune cookies. She said her strength to the ticket was “my connection to the heartland of America, being a mom, having a son going off to war, a mother of a special needs child.” She said there were times she and her husband sat around the kitchen table wondering how they were going to make it without health insurance.

This led Joe Biden to his most emotional — he appeared to choke up — and one of his most effective moments.

“Look, I understand what it is like to be a single parent, when my wife and child died,” Biden said. “I know what it is like to raise two kids alone. I know what it is like to sit around that kitchen table.”

Then he said of Americans: “They are looking for help, they are not looking for more of the same.”

It might have been his best line of the evening.

Palin made some flubs. Talking about America’s financial crisis, she said, “It’s a toxic mess, really, on Main Street that’s affecting Wall Street.” Isn’t it the other way around? And she also got the name of a general wrong.

But if people thought she was going to look like a dumb bunny for 90 minutes, they were disappointed. She said what she wanted to say, and she was so relaxed she even winked at one point. Really! An actual wink during a national debate, when she said she was going to try to get John McCain to change his mind about not drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.

Do people care about such stuff? Should all that down-home talk and body language really count? Joe Biden doesn’t think so.

“Facts matter,” Biden said.

Yeah? In politics? Since when?

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Boots and lawyers on the ground are key to victory in the 2008 elections.

Block captains, volunteers, national and state party workers, and third-party groups are critical to get-out-the-vote efforts on Election Day. And brigades of lawyers to oversee the balloting are equally important for a fair, unimpeachable vote.

This year’s election is likely to turn on a few battleground states, including Ohio, Florida, Virginia, Pennsylvania, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Mexico, Indiana, Missouri and Colorado. The campaign that executes the best ground game in swing states will likely prevail. But unlike the war in Iraq, there will be no opportunity in this political battle to go back and change the results with a post-election surge. You have one shot to get it right.

In order to get as many of their supporters as possible to the polls, both campaigns must use every tool in their arsenals, including personal e-mails to likely voters from friends and acquaintances, targeted blast e-mails, blogging, direct mail, phone calls, door-to-door contact and Election Day car pools to polling places.

Each campaign must turn out a large majority of its base. But the challenge is identifying voters who are not motivated and who need convincing to go to the polls. Both camps must scrutinize their voting lists. Republicans need to target independents, Reagan Democrats and women who are angry with the Democratic Party over the treatment of Hillary Rodham Clinton and energized by the candidacy of GOP vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin. Democrats also need to fight for the votes of independents, women and blue-collar workers. And they should try to flip angry, disenfranchised, just-right-of-center Republicans. Young voters, who voted heavily in the Democratic primaries but historically do not turn out for general elections, remain a coveted wild card.

Republicans and Democrats alike must run as though they are 10 points down, no matter what the daily tracking polls show. Each party must behave as if the election will be razor-close in order to build momentum and boost the spirits of its rank and file.

Some believe that when Shakespeare wrote in “Henry VI,” “The first thing we do, let’s kill all the lawyers,” he was implying that lawyers were evil. In fact, the message Shakespeare intended was that if lawyers were eliminated, no one would be left to uphold the rule of law and chaos would reign.

In that spirit, thousands of Republican and Democratic lawyers, as well as federal, state and local election officials and judges, will play a pivotal role this year in battleground states. Their mission is to help keep things honest and civil and to make sure that voters are properly registered and have access to the ballot boxes.

Partisan lawyers will fan out in key battleground states to observe and challenge the voting process on many levels. They will try to identify potential problems — involving registration, eligibility and fraud, to name a few — and stop them from occurring. In key precincts, the mere presence of a lawyer might be enough to deter mischief.

The lawyers will rely chiefly on the Help America Vote Act of 2002, which was enacted as a direct result of the turmoil that followed the 2000 presidential recount in Florida and irregularities elsewhere, and which was signed into law by President Bush in 2002.

Despite the good intentions of HAVA, which established minimum standards for administering elections, how Election Day 2008 fares will depend on who abides by the law and who seeks to exploit it. In 2004, having more eyes focused on the election definitely helped, but the vote was once again hampered by antiquated voting machines that caused inequities in tabulating votes in the time prescribed.

In 2004, there were 11 million more votes cast nationally than in 2000. In addition to bigger voter rolls this year, it seems likely, based on the primaries, that the general election turnout will break records in many states. Yet we saw electoral resources stretched to the limit four years ago, with voter lines stretching for blocks in some states, fueling frustration and breakdowns — mechanical, emotional and administrative.

This year, it is important to the integrity of the electoral process that lawyers, laypeople and election officials work together, in good faith, to ensure an open, fair and transparent process from now until the last vote is counted.

The campaign that has fully invested in a superior get-out-the-vote drive and HAVA strategy will dramatically improve its chances of winning on or about Nov. 4, 2008.

Bradley A. Blakeman was a deputy assistant to President Bush from 2001 to 2004.

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Americans this election season are using the Internet to vastly expand their ability to participate directly in our democracy, but it’s just a beginning. Over the next 20 years, our governments will adopt a form of direct democracy envisioned by the Founding Fathers that previously was impossible to carry out.

Two hundred years ago, Thomas Paine, Ben Franklin and the other forefathers of today’s bloggers embraced the notion that government should function with the consent of the governed. Key to the success of the idea was exploiting communications technology, including the printing press and the postal service.

Based on similar efforts in the ancient Roman republic and Britain, the Founders designed a government based on a small number of elected representatives, with a separate judiciary. Checks and balances were provided so that one group couldn’t seize power. A free press served as a further check against tyranny.

In recent years, the balances have seriously eroded, but at the same time, a new communication technology, the Internet, has flourished.

People use the Net as their own printing press, giving them a voice and a reach they’ve never had before, for better or for worse. They are networking at the grass-roots level more effectively than ever before.

In politics, Democrat Howard Dean pioneered use of the Net for organizing and fundraising in his 2004 presidential bid. He was ahead of his time, though, because broadband technology had not yet reached critical mass, with the resulting spike in traffic.

Given the low cost of Net advertising of any sort, it appears the 2008 election starts the transition from very expensive, top-down campaigns to less expensive, network-driven ones.

Following Dean’s example, many candidates this year are using the Net for fundraising and organizing with extraordinary effect. Barack Obama’s campaign is based largely on grass-roots networking and community organizing, with an eye toward boosting grass-roots participation in government. John McCain’s campaign has not tapped into the Net as systematically or effectively, but many McCain supporters are using it among themselves.

People also are using the Net to strengthen or debunk political claims, engaging in levels of fact-checking that the traditional press was unable or unwilling to do.

Currently, even sitting politicians with the best of intentions find it necessary to spend an inordinate amount of time fundraising rather than governing. This election accelerates the trend to something else: People are using the Net for governance in ways that have barely been noticed.

New York and San Francisco are experimenting with telephone customer service systems that soon will be complemented by Net-based systems. Using the Internet, people will be able to navigate through local government to get things done — the ultimate in pothole politics.

Another emerging area of grass-roots, networked democracy involves transparency and accountability. The idea is that if we all see how the sausage is made, it will facilitate reform throughout the country.

A lot of accountability data are already available to the public — but in forms that limit their use and accessibility. For instance, there are loads of information about lobbyist contributions to congressmen and what they presumably get in return, such as sweetheart contracts.

The Sunlight Foundation is harnessing a network of organizations to build online tools so anyone can examine the data. For example, MAPLight.org focuses on the connection between money and politics, and the Center for Media and Democracy runs Congresspedia.org, which is basically a Wikipedia-like site for the U.S. Congress. (Full disclosure: I’m on the board of Sunlight.)

It’s still a struggle sometimes getting the sun to shine in on Capitol Hill. Online access to Senate election data is being obstructed by Sens. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and John Ensign (R-Nev.), but their efforts are being countered online by Pass223.com.

In the fullest expression of direct democracy, every citizen would vote on every piece of legislation; representative democracy was, until now, the best compromise. The new challenge is how to give many millions of citizens a voice in government without overwhelming the system.

There are two approaches, both of which rely on technology that is available but not yet fully exploited. In online democracy, people need verifiable identities, the online equivalent of a driver’s license. Today, one example is the “digital certificate,” which, if widely disseminated, could help positively identify people on the Net and minimize fraud.

Congressmen and Hill staffers tell me that messages from verified people in their districts carry far more weight than blind e-mails that possibly are mass-produced. In other words, communications from known constituents are read, but form e-mails may not be. That’s one step closer to networked democracy.

Another approach involves large-scale discussion boards where citizens with verified identities can discuss issues online. The challenge is sorting the wheat from the chaff, but a solution is to let citizens do the work by filtering up the best ideas. Pioneers in this sort of scheme include Slashdot.org, Digg.com, and even Amazon.com.

Such systems, in theory, need hundreds of millions of citizens. In practice, they would number far fewer. Most people, including myself, would rather not be bothered with politics. From my day job, I’d guess that the number of interested citizens would range from 1 percent to 10 percent of the population.

Universal access to such systems must overcome the “digital divide,” but I believe that could be solved by using mobile phones to almost universally plug citizens into the process.

However it is done, we’re on the verge of realizing the vision of democracy upon which America was formed, from the grass roots up. It’s time to recognize what’s happening and get serious about nurturing it.

Craig Newmark is the founder of and chief of customer service for Craigslist.

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