The campaign teams Part 1: Ax

"David is the first among all equals" - Rep. Rahm Emanuel, Chairman of the Democratic Caucus

David Axelrod is Barack Obama's chief strategist. He is a journalist and an ad man, and it shows with Obama's campaign. From the logo (see above) to the slogan Change you can believe in, to the idea of staging the acceptance speech in a 80,000-seater stadium, Axelrod has shown a consistent talent for joining his candidate with the elements of selling ideas to people and doing things different enough to get a lot of press attention.

He differs from others in that he is interested in the authentic candidate, not changing the candidate to fit a model of what is perceived the voters want - as in Gore being told to shake off that stiffness and become the man of the people. A big part of his job is emphasis of one thing over the other - what to stress to the voters, and what not to say too. Obama was a community organizer for a few formative years and this has been used by Axelrod as the pivot of Obama's candidacy - more so than, say, Obama being the president of the Harvard Law Review (the first Black president) which there is no doubt pushed him into the echelons of power more than sweeping the floors and putting out the chairs for two years on Chicago's South Side.

In the formidable acceptance speech [http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=kv8eiDvrHJ4] Obama and his writers, with Axelrod in full agreement, coupled his story to the story of the folks he had met on the road (Obama's been on the road now for 20 months.) It sound like an easy thing to do, but its all in the writing, and political speeches fall or fly by the subtlest aspect. In one move, he sketched out his biography and that of his family, and he spoke up for those across the US who have been hit hard by the Bush administration. He also adjoined the people with the values set he knew a lot of the public were waiting to hear he held. Here is an extract:

"Because, in the faces of those young veterans who come back from Iraq and Afghanistan, I see my grandfather, who signed up after Pearl Harbor, marched in Patton's army, and was rewarded by a grateful nation with the chance to go to college on the G.I. Bill.

In the face of that young student, who sleeps just three hours before working the night shift, I think about my mom, who raised my sister and me on her own while she worked and earned her degree, who once turned to food stamps, but was still able to send us to the best schools in the country with the help of student loans and scholarships.

When I listen to another worker tell me that his factory has shut down, I remember all those men and women on the South Side of Chicago who I stood by and fought for two decades ago after the local steel plant closed.

And when I hear a woman talk about the difficulties of starting her own business or making her way in the world, I think about my grandmother, who worked her way up from the secretarial pool to middle management, despite years of being passed over for promotions because she was a woman.

She's the one who taught me about hard work. She's the one who put off buying a new car or a new dress for herself so that I could have a better life. She poured everything she had into me. And although she can no longer travel, I know that she's watching tonight and that tonight is her night, as well.

Now, I don't know what kind of lives John McCain thinks that celebrities lead, but this has been mine.

These are my heroes; theirs are the stories that shaped my life. And it is on behalf of them that I intend to win this election and keep our promise alive as president of the United States."

Analysis - Even if he loses, he’s won: Part 1

Accentuate the positive

This is the first of a series analysing how Obama, in four years, changed the global political landscape.

Obama knows how to campaign. His campaign’s professional, work-harder-than-everybody-else attitude has shone a light onto competing campaigns that have seemed amateurish and petty in comparison. One of the key elements to his success is the motivation of his supporters. This is based on the mutually beneficial relationship his supporters have with the campaign and the candidate himself.

Ten months ago, in December 2007, Obama was on the ropes, not for the first time, and certainly not for the last. He had already created a large grassroots movement through his website, and crucially they were talking to each other, at a time when, as Deepak Chopra said, the only people supporting Obama were either dreamers or intellectuals. (I could never quite decide which of those I would want to be more!) Obama’s supporters had their chant, and knew the Fired Up story [http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=rsLp59Bn9ng] that went with it, Obama was getting better at the debates and speeches, and he was keeping his cool, but there was a sense that he needed to do something to change the dynamic. He then gave this speech [http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=tydfsfSQiYc] at the Jefferson Jackson dinner at Iowa (the first Democrat primary.) This tub-thumper did what it had to do – it pumped up the activists on the ground, leading to the Iowa Get Out The Vote effort which propelled Obama into first place. Winning in Iowa – or, more importantly, the way he won - showed that his candidacy was not a pipe dream or an air balloon – he wasn’t testing the water, he was going to fight hard for the nomination. A string of positives continued; the Yes We Can speech, [http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=Fe751kMBwms] the $55 million raised in February, the iconic images – like the Newsweek cover above - and his insistence that "your voice can change the world." These moments were used by the campaign and the supporters, feeding off each other; the campaign picks up on the enthusiasm, packages it up and sends it back out to them - this video is a good example. [http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=AmUUYo9o9eg]

It was not all smooth sailing of course; the Yes We Can speech came after his failure to clinch the New Hampshire primary and the race speech came after Reverend Wright’s stupid remarks. Every time Obama is on the ropes without fuss he directly addresses the issue, and he asks his supporters to do the same.

Each of these elements allow Obama’s supporters to feel as if they own the campaign, a feeling rooted firmly in reality; without their money, their knocking on doors, their phone calls, their caucusing and getting out the vote Hillary would be the nominee. Obama asked for their active participation in his candidacy and in return the campaign constructed itself around them – they got in on the ground floor at a mass movement, with its own aesthetic, its own cast and supporting cast, its own songs, its own stories, its own superstitions. It was widespread and open to satire, critique and jealousy. On March 2nd, in response to criticism of the motivated Obama crowds, Denise from Saratosa, Florida said; “If it comes across as cult-like, then the cult is called America.”

Obama has changed presidential politics for ever; even if he loses, he’s won. He has reconnected, in a tangible way, the offices and kitchens and beauty parlours and school yards to the highest office in the land. His biography has flattened the distance from the street to the Avenue, but his campaigning never forgot that the presidency taps into the American psyche for big events, for being a part of something you believe in. Only in the last two months, a week before the Democratic National Congress did Obama’s slogan change from Change we can believe in to For the change we need.

While watching the astonishing firework display at the end of Obama’s outdoor acceptance speech (seeing the upbeat and positive message in the stagecraft of the fireworks, an MSNBC commentator noticed how the fireworks were going up, as opposed to the usual end-of-speech balloons, that fall down) millions of viewers loved the spectacle, and asked “when, if not now, will we ever see this in politics again?” It is an indisputable fact that the US presidency is more important than, say the Beijing Olympics. If they can have their celebration, why can’t we have ours? Yes I am very attracted to the spectacle, partly due to the sheer unBritish over-the-topness of it, but also because Obama’s nomination is historic, and that night was imbued with historic and symbolic significance. The moment needed to be marked by a first. The speech and subsequent fireworks sparked off a night of celebration, pause and remembrance across the world. His supporters knew that they were a part of this, an indispensable part of the primaries like never before, and that the night belonged to them too. They remembered how far the US has come, and perhaps for the first time they allowed ourselves to imagine Obama delivering his next big speech, on election night, as President-Elect.