Nobody likes the byline brigade. The press is either too liberal or too conservative and it’s always being unfair to your candidate while never taking a hard enough look at the other guy. This is especially true when it comes to John McCain, a politician famous for his cozy relationship with the reporters assigned to follow him around. The popular on-line expression of this is to refer to him as Saint McCain. (Put it into Google, the results are a veritable who’s who of liberal websites and blogs.) It’s a cute little epithet, and it’s accurate as far as it goes, but it can’t possibly last.
Writing in last week’s New Yorker, Ryan Lizza gave us the inside story on the press-disarming magic worked by the back of John McCain’s campaign bus. The senator, and now presumptive nominee, sits cheek by jowl with the reporters and holds court until they’re out of questions. He can be gruff, he says some impolite (and impolitic) things, and he repeats his jokes ad nauseam; but it’s so much better for the reporters than the arranged marriage awkwardness they have with other candidates that it gives McCain an advantage. What doesn’t get mentioned in the article is that no bus yet constructed is large enough to accommodate all the press that will be following McCain during the crucial stretch of the campaign from the convention through Election Day.
It’s a scenario that every politician in America, past and present, has probably fantasized about: toe-to-toe against the best candidate and savviest campaign the other side can muster with the most fabulous prize in American politics at stake. The technical rules may be the same as other contests, but the overwhelming attention makes it a completely different beast. The presidential race is as different from other political races as the Super Bowl is from regular season NFL games.
The national attention, especially once the conventions are over, focuses directly on the presidential campaign like nothing else. National television, broadcast and cable, will mention the race every single day. National newspapers won’t let a single edition go to press without at least one story about the campaign on the front page. Even a heavily contested statewide election doesn’t merit that kind of attention from corresponding local outlets. You might not know who your mayor is, or who your congressional representatives are, but everyone knows the president; and for a few months this year everyone will know the two contenders as well.
The nominee of a major party is subject to vastly more scrutiny than even the most outspoken Senator or most flamboyant presidential hopeful. As a Senator who faced no real threat to his seat McCain could afford to take newsworthy positions and give out money quotes like candy (he hasn’t faced a serious electoral fight since he got to Congress). As reporters who needed fresh angles and storylines he was a golden goose. That mutually beneficial relationship has now been fundamentally altered. He is no longer an amusing Senator for Life, now he’s a potential president and the reporters have a real incentive to challenge him and look for dirt and inconsistencies.
McCain the nominee is going to have every public word parsed and scrutinized. His long experience with the press is certainly an advantage, but the kind of intense and unremitting attention he is about to draw is unlike anything he has ever experienced. He will likely always have sympathizers in the press corps, but the free ride is most definitely nearing its end. Once the Democratic nominee is definitively known, and that could be as soon as next Wednesday, the presidential race will gradually fade from view for awhile. It’s not going to stop or anything, and there will always be coverage for those who seek it, but once both contenders are set the great majority of the country is going to pay attention to other things for a few months. But once the conventions roll around and we get into the serious campaign months of September and October it’s going to be open season on both nominees, whatever their past relationships with the byline brigade.
