McCain's Houses Gaffe Echoes Bush 41's Scanner Episode
Sometimes, a single gaffe - real or imagined - comes to symbolize an entire presidential campaign. With Americans struggling as unemployment topped 7% in 1992, President George H.W. Bush saw his reelection prospects dimmed by his reported amazement at a simple grocery store checkout scanner. But while Bush 41's defining out-of-touch moment may be the stuff of political mythology, John McCain's stunning ignorance about how many homes he owns may soon come to define his run for the White House.
To be sure, the $100 million man did not endear himself this week to Americans under siege from high gas prices, skyrocketing home foreclosures and rising unemployment. Having defined Saturday the line between middle class and rich at $5 million, John McCain then declared Wednesday "I define rich in other ways besides income." But in the course of that same interview with the Politico, McCain made what could be a momentum-stopping misstep:
Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) said in an interview Wednesday that he was uncertain how many houses he and his wife, Cindy, own.
"I think - I'll have my staff get to you," McCain told Politico in Las Cruces, N.M. "It's condominiums where - I'll have them get to you."
The impact of idle rich presidential candidates appearing oblivious to the hardships of working Americans can't be understated. On February 5th, 1992, the New York Times reported on George H.W. Bush's scanner snafu in a piece titled, "Bush Encounters the Supermarket, Amazed." Attending the National Grocer's Association convention in Orlando, Bush was impressed:
"If some guy came in and spelled George Bush differently, could you catch it?" the President asked. "Yes," he was told, and he shook his head in wonder.
Then he grabbed a quart of milk, a light bulb and a bag of candy and ran them over an electronic scanner. The look of wonder flickered across his face again as he saw the item and price registered on the cash register screen.
"This is for checking out?" asked Mr. Bush. "I just took a tour through the exhibits here," he told the grocers later. "Amazed by some of the technology."
For days, the White House protested that President Bush has seen such scanners "many times" and, as the Times reported on February 13th, 1992, "that he was impressed by a new generation of high-technology devices and not the type most people see every time they go to the supermarket." But the damage was already done. Reviewing the videotape, the Times concluded "Mr. Bush seemed unfamiliar with even basic scanner technology." And the image of the aloof, gin-and-tonic sipping, anyone-for-tennis Bush 41 came to define his failed reelection effort.
Two weeks ago, blogger Brendan Nyhan criticized the Los Angeles Time and the New York Times for perpetuating a myth about Bush the Elder and the dreaded scanner. "The Times," he argued, "had not been at the event in question but instead based its story on a pool report, which indicated that Bush was impressed by new scanner technology that could weigh groceries and read damaged bar codes." So when the New York Times on August 3, 2008 mocked the computer illiterate John McCain as "the analog candidate," Nyhan insists its comparison below to Poppy was unfair:
"Mr. McCain's sense of wonder evoked the episode in the early 1990s when George H. W. Bush became overly impressed upon seeing a price scanner at a supermarket check-out counter. It suggested to some people that the president, who had spent four years in the White House after spending eight years as vice president, was out of touch with the lives of average Americans."
But whatever happened in 1992, there can be no question about John McCain's shocking disconnect from the lives of real Americans. While he can't keep track of the 7, 8 or even 10 homes he owns, millions of Americans are struggling to hold onto the one they know they have - for now.
UPDATE: Marc Ambinder asks the question, "McCain Is To Houses What GWBH Was To Grocery Store Scanners?"
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