Is John McCain Running for John Kerry's First Term and Obama for Bush's Third?

June 20, 2008— -- Maybe we had it wrong from the start: It's Barack Obama who is running for George Bush's third term, while John McCain just might be pursuing John Kerry's first.

Not on policy, of course (not that Team McCain would much mind that perception these days). But in approach, in temperament, in stability, in take-no-prisoners mindset -- inside which campaign would Karl Rove recognize a piece of himself?

In the one with tightly controlled access, the jugular-aiming (drama-free) political shop, and the temerity to cast aside a fundraising pledge en route to breaking all campaign-finance records?

Or the one with rolling press conferences, scattershot messaging (with missed zingers), and complaints about the other side not playing fair?

We have found the new politics -- and it can spend half a billion dollars to win an election.

There's a signal here that Bush campaign veterans can appreciate: Obama made a coldly calculating decision based on a desire to win. He tossed aside a pledge rather than throwing away the single biggest advantage he enjoys over his rival.

"Sen. Barack Obama's decision to forgo public financing for his presidential campaign clears the way for him to outspend Sen. John McCain by 3-to-1 or substantially more in the general election, a financial edge that dramatically rewrites the playbooks for both candidates," per ABC News. "The comparison with the consistently cash-strapped McCain campaign could hardly be more stark."

If he raises $300 million, $400 million, or $500 million for the general election -- where WOULDN'T he try to compete? (And a new Obama ad that's running in Alaska, Montana, and North Dakota -- and not Minnesota, Oregon, or Washington -- tells that story "straight from the Kansas heartland" on a convenient day for it to be told.)

"Barack Obama faced two critical questions: where to play and how to pay. To answer both, the Democrat reversed course to become the first candidate to reject $85 million in public money for the general election," the AP's Liz Sidoti writes. "The decision will allow the record-shattering fundraiser to raise and spend as much as he wants -- and, thus, implement his strategy to expand the Electoral College playing field."

Not to be lost in all the discussion of broken pledges, broken systems, and broken-down negotiations: Obama, D-Ill., made a very good political move -- probably the only move that spared him the wrath of his own party. It's almost certainly the move that gives him the best chance to actually win. (Which side took that lesson to heart in 2004?)

For Obama, it's another in a series of pragmatic decisions (perish the thought). "He's kept his distance from elements of the Democratic Party that demand purity, from Washington reformers to more ideologically-motivated liberal bloggers," Politico's Ben Smith writes. "Instead, his campaign has sought the Kennedy mantle, modeling the candidate after a revered Democratic family not known for its scruples."

But as Obama would be the first to tell you, 2008 isn't 2004 -- or, for that matter, 1960. A shattered pledge joins non-existent town-hall debates and some shifting positions in the slowly growing all-talk-but-no-action collection being compiled by Team McCain.

"This is a big deal, a big deal," McCain said Thursday of Obama's decision, per ABC's Bret Hovell. "He has completely reversed himself and gone back, not on his word to me, but the commitment he made to the American people."

The calculation really wasn't all that difficult: Obama trades maybe (generously) a few thousand people who care deeply about campaign-finance reform, for maybe (surely) a few million people who will hear his message because he has an extra couple hundred million dollars to spend.

But this is a fact: He never really tried to "aggressively pursue" that agreement. (He's been the presumptive nominee for less than two weeks, and he never had the promised private meeting with McCain.)

(And no one is above reproach -- even if he purports to have created a new, better public-financing system all on his own. We still don't know how far the national press corps is from turning on him entirely.)

"Declaring independence from a 'broken system' by breaking a promise," ABC's Jake Tapper writes. "Obama hopes you'll care more about the former than the latter."

"The Illinois senator, whose campaign mantra has been reform and change, has now put himself in the position of being the candidate who lit the match that allowed the ailing public financing system to finally implode," McClatchy's David Lightman writes.

This is an audacious dance: "The move, never attempted in three decades of public financing for presidential candidates, puts the Illinois senator in the position of being a self-styled reformer, pledged to diminish the influence of money in politics, who now plans to wage the most expensive campaign in history," Christopher Cooper and Brody Mullins write in The Wall Street Journal.

"Barack Obama Thursday became the candidate of change, all right -- he changed his mind on public financing," David Saltonstall writes for the New York Daily News.

Feel the disappointment from friendly ed boards. The Boston Globe: "Senator Barack Obama has presented himself as the candidate of change, but the change he announced yesterday is a throwback to the no-holds-barred rules of campaign finance that prevailed before Watergate."

The Washington Post: "Mr. Obama had an opportunity here to demonstrate that he really is a different kind of politician, willing to put principles and the promises he has made above political calculation. He made a different choice, and anyone can understand why: He's going to raise a ton of money."

This plays into the decision-making, too: "The Obama team is also certain that McCain -- who like Obama portrays himself as a man running against the Washington system -- but who was a central figure in the landmark McCain-Feingold campaign finance reform law -- has enough lapses himself to tarnish his image," Lynn Sweet writes in the Chicago Sun-Times.

"According to aides, Mr. Obama reached his decision knowing he might tarnish his desired reformist image -- he pledged last year to accept public financing if his opponent did as well -- but strategists for the campaign made the calculation that it was worth it, in part, because of the potential for the Republican National Committee to seriously out-raise its Democratic counterpart," Michael Luo and Jeff Zeleny write in The New York Times.