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Opinion: McCain, Clinton and Obama compete over a different ‘character’ issue

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This article was originally on a blog post platform and may be missing photos, graphics or links. See About archive blog posts.

Campaigns, like athletic contests or even chess games, comprise millions of small decisions made by individual staffers or committees, shaping a series of messages into events, speeches, ads and so much more that communicate a consistent positive message about the candidate that accumulates in the minds of voters.

There will be good days and bad days, but generally the message must have sufficient Teflon to resist attacks from competing campaigns, and the staff needs to avoid the ‘Hey, batter batter’ distractions that inevitably arise in political competitions with no written rules or league commissioners and they must maintain a clear vision to objectively judge their own work.

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At the time these decisions seem little. But they are telltale for political watchers. Take, for example, Sen. Hillary Clinton’s concession speech in....

Iowa. Barack Obama’s crowd turned out many new caucus-goers, as they have in virtually all the caucuses, and Clinton was overwhelmed. She vowed to fight on. But no one remembers a word of what she said that night.

What lingers in the mind is the setting. She was onstage, facing her supporters who had their backs to all the cameras and might as well have not been there. Surrounding Clinton were 20 or 30 family and friends, all disappointed and so many of them the same old familiar faces from the 1990s -- Madeleine Albright, Terry McAuliffe, even Bill Clinton himself, et al.

How’s that for showing the watching world how much of a change agent you really are?

The ensuing make-or-break election night in New Hampshire had a far different outcome and the campaign had realized its mistakes. The candidate climbed onto a large platform. Alone. No tired old supporting cast of used-to-bes.

She was surrounded by adoring supporters, so whichever angle any camera caught, it captured enthusiastic faces. During the thunderous ovation, husband Bill and daughter Chelsea made a cameo congratulatory appearance to hug and kiss her. And then they left. And the candidate, walking around, clutching the microphone, thanked everyone sincerely for helping her find her voice.

After subsequent primaries, many of them unsuccessful, her campaign even eliminated the concession appearances altogether, placing her in another state before a new rousing crowd. And any concession was done privately by phone with Obama out of camera range.

In Florida, they even had her give a victory speech for winning a primary that wasn’t supposed to count. And still isn’t.

Our colleague Adam Tschorn has a fascinating feature over on the Image page today. Headlined ‘The character issue,’ it examines the careful attention campaigns lavish on the seemingly minor topic of typography and how just the shape of letters is used to convey certain messages to voters, often subconsciously. Think of the clean simple letters of ‘Change we can believe in.’

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You don’t want to miss his story.

-- Andrew Malcolm

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