Real, Unreal, Surreal: DFW on the 2000 McCain Campaign

I'm almost finished reading David Foster Wallace's book McCain's Promise. I bought it Friday, first because it was the only book left at the bookstore that was on my list and two because it seems relevant to this election in several ways (ways that probably occurred to the publisher who reprinted DFW's original Rolling Stone and electronic version in bound copy and released in what looks like April or May of 2008): DFW's analysis of the packaging of McCain (who at the time - 2000 - was the rebel/maverick of his party (not that I agree with that assessment, especially when you look at McCain's political career in total) versus the idea of packaging a political candidate and how the "real" gets lost in the decision to sell the package, and the idea that this analysis reads like the playbook for the Obama campaign - as if they picked up the book by luck or whatever and said to themselves, hey this might work for us too! Now don't get all down on my because I said that about Obama, I'm just saying there are parallels w/r/t Foster's writing about a candidate's ability to capitalize or exploit the voting public's or the potential voting public's hidden desire to be hopeful and treated with respect. And finally: Foster's attempts to understand why the Young Vote (18 - 35 year olds) never materializes or when it does only reflects the extreme left or right and how when you don't vote, those extreme votes count double (which everyone should have gotten from civics class either in jr. high or highschool), and how not voting actually serves the Establishment (either Democratic or Republican or both together) who actually take into account and find it desirable for people not to vote (which also makes sense) and build certain strategies around it. Remember what frenzy there was about all the Young Voters turning out in 2004 - which of course didn't materialize - to a collective sigh of relief from both parties. Because that big of a turn out could really change things (why a third party might even gain traction if everyone, not just Young Voters - everyone voted) - in ways that we're not entirely sure of, with results those whose interest is merely to preserve power are not too comfortable with. I mean, that's one lesson that can be taken away from 1968, eh?

At any rate, I highly recommend this book - good luck trying to buy it though. Most of DFW's work is out of stock - reportedly even at Amazon. You can find the original article here.

You can also register to vote by going to Rock the Vote
https://secure5.ctsg.com/rtv/ovr/index.asp?pid=99 or Vote for Change or Project Vote.