McCain Speech on campaign reform

Senator McCain spoke today at the Carnegie Corporation of New York (which is not a corporation, but one of the major foundations in the U.S., very important on campaign finance reform, education, and other issues.) It was quite a room -- a lot of media people (Morley Safer asked a question, and I was sitting next to Nick Lemann, the new dean of the Columbia Journalism School and a hero of mine), plus a complete who's who of the people interested in campaign finance reform, many of whom came from Washington or California for the even, plus a good number of foundation presidents and key program officers. I was hilariously underdressed for some reason, in a dress shirt and sweater when everyone else had a suit and tie, but everyone said, "Oh, you're dressed like you're on sabbatical." (Last week in San Francisco, I wore a suit to speak at an event, and everyone else was dressed down. All events need dress codes these days.)

McCain was wonderfully charming and incredibly knowledgeable about not just campaign reform but media concentration and energy policy and a bunch of other things. He was completely at home in this crowd, which ranged from pretty far left to super-mainstream foundation-type liberals. I've always liked McCain, but felt that some progressives fell for him without remembering that he is a conservative: very much the direct heir of Barry Goldwater, whose seat he holds in the Senate. But at this point, he's out there on so many issues that he really does have more in common with progressives than with the Bush administration. He fought both the Medicare bill and the energy bill, which is more than I can say for Tom Daschle, Ron Wyden, Tom Harkin, etc.

And yet, McCain is still very much a conservative. He talked about the need for reform, and in his words, it's: "political reform, but also military reform (don't know if he means procurement or force structure), Medicare reform, Social Security reform, tort reform." Again, the other reforms are not necessarily those that most liberals would embrace, although I would argue that some of them we should embrace, and define.

McCain was very generous toward most of the Democratic candidates for president. He described Kerry, Lieberman and Edwards as close personal friends, which surprised me only in that he would include Edwards in that group. He worked very closely with Kerry on a commission in the mid-1990s that defused the politicized issue of POWs and MIAs in Vietnam -- a huge accomplishment, which is one of the few really significant achievements I credit Kerry with. And he's always found common ground with Lieberman, including on campaign reform. But I didn't know he had the same relationship with Edwards. But in response to a question about whether campaign reform should promote political equality, not just reduce corruption, McCain gave a beautiful answer about inequality, and said something like, "and there's a lot of people who want to hear more about that, and the proof of that is in the Edwards campaign and the big crowds he's getting in New Hampshire by talking about inequality and "two nations.""

And towards the President: not one kind word, though nothing really unkind except to say something like, "there's a lot of dissatisfaction out there.