When it comes to the constant identity politics Karl Rove and his minions like to force on the American people, it’s hard to think of a candidate in recent history who has had more genuine moments, or more grounded appeal to “regular folks” than the ’socialist elitist’ Barack Obama.
Who can forget the video of him playing basketball with the troops, or that cute moment with his daughters via satellite at the convention, or the interview where his family poked fun at him for leaving his luggage in the living room?
But I have to admit, this most recent one is what had the biggest impact on me. What story is running today? Rick Reilly, of ESPN Magazine and ESPN.com, decided he wanted to co-own a fantasy football team for a week with each of the presidential candidates. He asked both candidates. One responded excitedly. It wasn’t John McCain.
Reilly could have scrapped the project when McCain declined to take him up on it. But no, he wanted to play fantasy ball with a potential president, doggone it, and he was willing to subject himself to years of hate mail accusing him of liberal bias for the opportunity.
The piece runs on the website and in ESPN The Magazine.
Here’s how it began:
I have the absolute worst fantasy league football partner. Just try to get the guy to return a call. Or a text. You need a damn court order.
He’s Barack Obama. And, yeah, I guess he’s busy, but why was I the one who had to fly to Dayton, get frisked and have bomb dogs drool on my bags just so I could meet him getting off his tricked-out, chartered 757? He can’t meet a guy halfway?
I asked each candidate to be my running mate for one week in a fantasy league, just to see what kind of president he’d make—how he’d handle decisions under pressure and balance a budget. (On espn.com’s Gridiron Challenge, you get a mystical $50M to spend on a team.) Only Obama bit. We settled on the Week 6 games.
Now, at this point we could make the cynical assumption that Obama might have just jumped at the chance to get some puff piece published about him in an incredibly high-profile publication (ESPN The Magazine and ESPN.com are the nation’s top sports destinations).
But Reilly addresses this potential criticism right away:
When I got on his campaign bus, all three flat screens were tuned to ESPN. Obama was sitting in a black leather swivel chair, reading the paper. “Hey, man, I’ll be with you in a second,” he said. “I’m poring over the latest economic news.” It was the USA Today NFL stats page.
He is taller, grayer and quicker to laugh than I expected. Moves sort of like an athlete—cool and smooth. “Now, you’re the expert,” he began. “And I’ll gladly be the junior partner in this, but I really think we should take Drew Brees. He could have a big week. Oakland’s secondary is a wreck.”
Ohhhh, so that’s how it’s going to be. “Well, I like Carson Palmer,” I said. “He’s due for a big week, plus he plays in Ohio and I figure that’s a state you need, so …”
He looked at me like I’d stuck my elbow in his soup. “Man, this is more important than politics!” he insisted. “This is football!”
This is a man who could potentially audit me forever. We paid $7.3M for Brees.
The entire piece is hilarious, and I highly recommend it. ESPN will catch eternal hell for giving Obama this insanely positive press less than two weeks before the election — Sports Nation is a noticeably right-wing community — but I, for one, loved it.
And I’m sure this piece will go a lot further into warming the hearts and minds of the Joe the Plumbers out there who love football (like me), than any amount of ad buys or even Bill O’Reilly interviews.
I’ve never been a fan of identity politics — of politicians bending over backwards, almost always comically so, to prove that they are a ‘man of the people.’ But maybe it’s just that no one’s ever pushed my buttons before. Because as absurd as it is for me or anyone else to be swayed by the opinions of our potential leaders on pop culture or Americana, I definitely enjoyed reading Reilly’s article more than I should have.
So perhaps I am now a member of the ‘conservative base’ who so much love the ignoble panderings of the Palins and Bushes of the world. Then again, I’m not going to vote for Obama based on fantasy football or whether or not he owns a ranch. But how many people will?
It’s safe to say, in any case, that this profile — which went viral on Digg — is good news for the Obama campaign. And honestly, it’s one of the better profiles of any candidate I’ve read this fall.
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