Tuesday, February 5, 2008

Personality Rundown

Victor Davis Hanson has a nice roundup of the various personalitites involved in this years election. Here's a peak.
Mr. McCain
I’m neither a political scientist nor working for any particular candidate. Instead, as a historian I simply look at the Republican race empirically, as an observer who came to an understandable conclusion that (1) McCain is not that much more liberal than his Republican rivals or the actual record of recent Republican presidents such as Gerald Ford, the two Bushes, and Ronald Reagan.

Ms. Obama
I have now seen her speak three times on television on C-Span. She is attractive, bright, and educated, an effective communicator (though verbose and prone to go on too long), and the most impressive of the potential first wives still in the race. But she seems right on the edge. As she goes on and on without a scripted text, she starts to tense up and gets a little angry and then makes the implicit case that a vote for her husband is a sort of redemption for the entire country.

Ms. Schwarzenegger
Maria Shriver spoke as well on behalf of Sen. Obama today, even as her husband endorsed Sen. McCain. Rather than try to convince strangers to vote for Obama, she should try to convince the governor to endorse him. But her endorsement was once again framed in religious tones—we find salvation by “going beyond the labels” and voting for a self-labeled black candidate?