Winners, losers of '08 Campaign Games
THE OLYMPICS end soon.
To help make the mental leap from international sports back to national politics, let's review how political competitors have fared in the 2008 Campaign Olympics:
WEIGHTLIFTING baggage Bronze: Barack Obama. Carried his pastor, Jeremiah Wright, for weeks, and then dropped the dumbbell.
Silver: John McCain. Held President Bush at arm's length.
Gold: Hillary Clinton. Held Bill Clinton aloft as a symbol of the good ol' days, even after he weighed more than a loose cannon.
DIVING into waterless pool Bronze: Mike Huckabee. "When we were in college we used to . . . fry squirrels in the popcorn popper."
Silver: Joe Biden, who called Obama "the first mainstream African-American (presidential candidate) who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy." Al Sharpton protested that he bathed daily.
Gold: John Edwards. Admitted having an affair with a New Age guru who wanted to bring out his inner Gandhi.
CYCLING backward
Bronze: Hillary. "We face a lot of evil men. And what in my background equips me to deal with evil and bad men?"
Silver: Obama. "The point I was making was not that Grandmother harbors any racial animosity. She doesn't. But she is a typical white person. . . "
Gold: McCain. "Make it a hundred . . . that would be fine with me," when asked if he'd support keeping troops in Iraq for 50 years.
GYMNASTICS (verbal) Bronze: Obama. "In case you missed it this week, there was a tragedy in Kansas. Ten thousand people died." He was referring to a tornado that killed 12 people.
Silver: Hillary. She spoke with a weird Southern drawl at a church service: "Ahh don't feel no-ways tired. I've come too faarrrr from where I started frum."
Gold: Bill Richardson. "I'm a Red Sox fan. . . I'm also a Yankees fan."
SYNCHRONIZED squirming Bronze: Joe Biden and an Indian-American supporter. Biden told him, "You cannot go to a
Silver: John and Cindy McCain. At a biker rally in South Dakota, McCain volunteered his wife for the "Miss Buffalo Chip" pageant, which often features topless contestants.
Gold: Rudy Giuliani and Donald Trump. A video from a 2000 New York City press roast showed Giuliani in drag - kissing, and being groped by, the Donald.
SHOOTING moving targets Bronze: Huckabee. "I'm pretty sure there will be duck-hunting in heaven and I can't wait!"
Silver: Romney. "I've been a hunter pretty much all my life." Later he clarified: "I've always been a rodent and rabbit hunter. Small varmints, if you will. I began when I was 15 or so and I have hunted those kinds of varmints since then. More than two times."
Gold: Dick Cheney. "I am the guy who pulled the trigger and shot my friend," recounting how he'd accidentally wounded a campaign donor during a quail hunt in Texas.
SHOOTING self in foot Bronze: John Kerry. He told college students: "You know, education - if you make the most of it. . . you can do well. If you don't, you get stuck in Iraq."
Silver: Obama. Told San Franciscans that when small-town folks "get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them. . . "
Gold: Hillary. "I remember landing under sniper fire," she said, during a trip to Bosnia. When TV footage showed instead a peaceful welcoming ceremony, she admitted she'd "said some things that I knew not to be the case."
TRAMPOLINE flip-flopping Bronze: McCain. Flipped on taxes, ethanol, religious right, oil drilling. . .
Silver: Obama. Flipped on public financing, NAFTA, Iraq strategy, illegal immigration, Cuba embargo. . .
Gold: Romney. Flipped on abortion, gay rights, gun control, campaign finance, his Guatemalan gardener, and his claim that he and his father marched with Martin Luther King.
WRESTLING with reality Bronze: McCain. "I'm learning to get online myself. . ."
Silver: Obama. "I've now been in 57 states - I think one left to go."
Gold: Dennis Kucinich. Said he had a close encounter with a UFO, "a gigantic triangular craft" that hovered above him for 10 minutes, and he "heard directions" in his mind. He said he would open a campaign office in Roswell, N.M.
Todd Domke is a Boston-area Republican political analyst, public relations strategist, and author. 