MRC's Geoff Dickens found that around 7:10 am, Vieira asked these questions to Sen. Obama:
– "I notice the voice is a, is a little weak. How, how are you feeling, other than that? Besides losing your voice?" (He said I feel great, excited at my crowds.)
– "I know that you, you are very excited and you present yourself as a straight-talking candidate, so I'm looking for a straight answer here, sir. How important is it that you win outright tonight? Straight answer." (He acknowledged "We have to do well in Iowa.")
– "And yet some people say despite all the energy, you are short on specifics and that all that energy may not translate into people going to the caucuses. How do you respond to that?" (He suggests it will be a high-turnout election, and he should do well because people are impressed with his ideas, and his ability to deliver on them.)
– "And yet, Senator, the Washington Post is reporting about a rally that you had at the University of Iowa where 1400 students showed up but only nine signed on to attend the caucuses. So how are you gonna get those supporters out there?" (Here, on the toughest inquiry, Obama implausibly changed the subject to how voters are "hungry for change.")
Vieira wrapped up by joking, "Alright Senator Barack Obama, thank you very much. You should rest that voice and don't talk to any other news organizations, okay?" Laughter followed in the studio.
About five minutes earlier, David Gregory began his Romney interview with the obligatory "what happened" ruined-expectations question, assuming that anyone who spends a lot of money in a state should be way ahead in every poll:
Romney concluded "I’m planning on winning tonight." Then Gregory followed up with the notion of mean-spirited Mitt, and Romney protested:
GREGORY: Governor, you had larger leads in both states and you're now facing, as I mentioned a two-front political war. Iowa and New Hampshire. Huckabee and McCain. If you win here in Iowa and in New Hampshire you will have done so by going negative. Is that the tenor of a campaign that Americans can expect from you if you're the nominee?
ROMNEY: Well I'm not negative at all. That's just inaccurate. The truth is that-
GREGORY: You attacked Governor Huckabee on, on immigration-
ROMNEY: No, no, no, no. Let's come back-
GREGORY: -on his record as governor in Iowa-
ROMNEY: Let's come back. Hold on-
GREGORY: -on spending. On immigration against McCain in New Hampshire.
ROMNEY: Hold on David. Let's, wait a second. Didn't attack. No let's talk about our, what we did is we showed what my positions are and what my opponents' positions are and what they're records. If, if they don't like their record that may be considered an attack but was a direct and honest assessment of what their positions are.
Clearly, some of Romney’s ads are negative about his opponents. But it’s also clear that David Gregory is consistently negative and skeptical in his questioning of the Bush administration in the White House briefing room. If NBC is trying to insist that a president can’t or shouldn’t win office with a "tenor"of negativity, how do they defend their own questions, and their often negative stories? Apparently, a candidate should never "go negative," but the media never have to say they’re sorry for playing rough.
From there, Gregory turned to the New York Times critique of Romney:
GREGORY: Despite your explanations you have struggled to overcome an image as a flip-flopper on the big conservative issues. Conservative columnist David Brooks writing in the New York Times this week says the following, about you: "In turning himself into an old-fashioned, orthodox Republican, he has made himself unelectable in the fall." Unelectable in the fall?
ROMNEY: Well David's, you know, saying what he'd like to say, that's just fine. But you can recognize that the only way a Republican is gonna win the White House is by being able to speak to the three branches of conservatism that Ronald Reagan put together. Social conservatives, economic conservatives, foreign policy conservatives. Those are my credentials, that's what I'm running on.
Gregory didn’t mention that Brooks was an enthusiastic backer of the conservative-bashing version of candidate John McCain in 2000, or that many conservatives see Brooks as more allied with his liberal media gigs at the New York Times, National Public Radio, and PBS’s NewsHour with Jim Lehrer. In his New Year’s Day column, Brooks also trashed the idea of a Reagan model of Republicanism. That model, Brooks wrote in his column, was outdated:
With his data-set mentality, Romney has chosen to model himself on a version of Republicanism that is receding into memory. As Walter Mondale was the last gasp of the fading New Deal coalition, Romney has turned himself into the last gasp of the Reagan coalition.
That coalition had its day, but it is shrinking now. The Republican Party is more unpopular than at any point in the past 40 years. Democrats have a 50 to 36 party identification advantage, the widest in a generation. The general public prefers Democratic approaches on health care, corruption, the economy and Iraq by double-digit margins. Republicans’ losses have come across the board, but the G.O.P. has been hemorrhaging support among independent voters. Surveys from the Pew Research Center and The Washington Post, Kaiser Foundation and Harvard University show that independents are moving away from the G.O.P. on social issues, globalization and the roles of religion and government.
The Brooks message is clear: the GOP needs to abandon antiquated Reaganism and move left, toward the liberal establishment, toward the New York Times, if it wants to be elected. The "trauma of transformation" back into Rockefeller liberalism is inevitable:
The leaders of the Republican coalition know Romney will lose. But some would rather remain in control of a party that loses than lose control of a party that wins. Others haven’t yet suffered the agony of defeat, and so are not yet emotionally ready for the trauma of transformation.
