Barack Obama and John McCain: The Young Turk vs.The Grouchy Old Warrior

By Robert Paul Reyes

After a long and bitter Democratic race, Sen. Barack Obama has finally clinched the nomination, and now it's on to the general election.

I've written scores of essays delineating the vast policy differences between Barack Obama and John McCain. It's been generations since which had such a clear choice: Obama with his message of hope and change, and McCain with his stubborn allegiance to the failed Bush foreign and domestic agendas.

The difference in style between the two presidential hopefuls is also striking; forgive me for my superficiality but today I will briefly note the stylistic differences between these two gentlemen.

A politician's natural habitat is the stage; a candidate who doesn't feel at home speaking before thousands is doomed.

On the stage Obama is a rock star, he strides across the platform, basking in the adulation of tens of thousands. With his lean physique and GQ attire he makes an impressive figure, capturing the hearts of women and the admiration of men.

On the stage McCain is a Karaoke singer, he takes tentative little old man steps as he ambles across the platform, praying the few souls in the audience won't lose interest in his stump speech. With his frumpy clothes and doddering gait, everyone wants to help him back to his seat after he is finished babbling.

Obama is perhaps the most eloquent politician of our generation; he could read a text of the IRS tax law and make it sound riveting.

McCain's speech is difficult to understand, you wonder if he had a "Senior Moment" and put a marble in his mouth thinking it was a mint. He begins almost every discourse with the tiresome words: My friends. I have never had a friend address me as "my friend", it's used car salesman, preachers, lawyers, morticians and other scumbags who've referred to me in that patronizing manner. Isn't there one handler with the guts to tell McCain to can the "my friends" shtick?

With his "one foot in the grave" appearance, McCain's only hope of winning the general election is choosing Brad Pitt as his running-mate.

Robert Paul Reyes is a NewsBlaze writer on Politics, Pop Culture and Pointless Pontificating. Contact him by writing to NewsBlaze.