{"id":1538,"date":"2008-10-02T19:51:15","date_gmt":"2008-10-02T19:51:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/\/mccain-and-obama-character-consistency-in-storytelling\/"},"modified":"2021-07-30T21:08:01","modified_gmt":"2021-07-30T21:08:01","slug":"mccain-and-obama-character-consistency-in-storytelling","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/mccain-and-obama-character-consistency-in-storytelling\/","title":{"rendered":"McCain and Obama: Character Consistency in Storytelling"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Obama

Here is what the co-author of McCain’s memoirs said about the stories McCain loves and how they connect with his own story:<\/p>\n

The John McCain (as he describes himself in) \u201cFaith of My Fathers,\u201d for example, bears more than a little resemblance to the fictional Robert Jordan of \u201cFor Whom the Bell Tolls.\u201d Mr. McCain later celebrated (this Hemmingway hero) in another book (about himself) with Mr. Salter, \u201cWorth the Fighting For,\u201d which was named for a line of Jordan\u2019s dying thoughts. (Jordan) was \u201ca man who would risk his life but never his honor,\u201d Mr. McCain wrote with Mr. Salter, a model of \u201chow a great man should style himself.\u201d<\/p>\n

Each book is heavy with premonitions of mortality. Robert Jordan and John McCain each confront great tests (the temptation to escape a doomed mission for one, the offer of early prison release for the other) in the service of a lost cause (the socialists in the Spanish Civil War, the Americans in Vietnam). And in accepting his fate, each makes peace with his father and grandfather.<\/p>\n

Mr. McCain\u2019s admirers, like Mr. Timberg, have often puzzled over what drew him to Maugham\u2019s \u201cOf Human Bondage.\u201d It is a convoluted psychodrama about a young man with a club foot; he seethes with resentment over his disability and nearly ruins his life in the thrall of a waitress-turned-prostitute who rejects him. But the character\u2019s final realization could fit almost as well near the conclusion of Mr. McCain\u2019s memoir: \u201cIt might be that to surrender happiness was to accept defeat, but it was a defeat better than many victories.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThat explains it,\u201d Mr. Salter said when he heard the line. \u201cPerfect McCainism.\u201d<\/p>\n

The full New York Times article can be found at:\u00a0 http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2008\/10\/13\/us\/politics\/13mccain.html?hp<\/p>\n

Power of Idealism characters have a sense of doomed destiny.\u00a0 They reject the offer of ordinary escape (and a happy life) in favor of the valiant, but doomed attempt.\u00a0 They embrace glorious defeat (or death on the battle field) in order to live out their own scenario of courage and personal honor.<\/p>\n

Here’s what a recent article by a conservative New York Times columnist said about Obama:<\/p>\n

“(O)ver the past two years, Obama has… shown the same untroubled self-confidence day after day. There has never been a moment when, at least in public, he seems gripped by inner turmoil. It\u2019s not willpower or self-discipline he shows as much as an organized unconscious (or I might add the collective unconscious). Through some deep, bottom-up process, he has developed strategies for equanimity…<\/p>\n

They say we are products of our environments, but Obama, the sojourner (on his quest), seems to go through various situations without being overly touched by them. Over the past two years, he has been the subject of nearly unparalleled public worship, but far from getting drunk on it, he has become less grandiloquent as the campaign has gone along.<\/p>\n

…It could be that Obama (as a president) will be an observer, not a leader. Rather than throwing himself passionately into his causes, he will stand back. Congressional leaders, put off by his supposed intellectual superiority, will just go their own way. Lost in his own nuance, he will be passive and ineffectual. Lack of passion will produce lack of courage. The Obama greatness will give way to the Obama anti-climax.<\/p>\n

We can each guess how the story ends. But over the past two years, Obama has clearly worn well with voters. Far from a celebrity fad, he is self-contained, self-controlled and maybe even a little dull”<\/p>\n

The full New York Times article can be found at:\u00a0 http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2008\/10\/17\/opinion\/17brooks.html?hp<\/p>\n

Power of Imagination characters are humble and self-effacing quite naturally.\u00a0 They seek greatness from others and draw their inspiration and power from the bottom up (rather than display it from the top down like John McCain does).<\/p>\n

Obama’s grass roots campaign and masses of small individual donations also displays this Character Type’s bottom up view of things.\u00a0 The danger is they are always collecting allies and consensus and avoid stepping out decisively or with passion on their own, ahead of the crowd, to really lead.\u00a0 They can be a bit dull and do seem quite ordinary.\u00a0 Their leap of faith is to move away from the unity of the crowd and make hard decisions that could be divisive.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

#ThinkpieceThursday – The Presidential election is an opportunity to see two Character Types play their roles on the world stage.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":11959,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"nf_dc_page":"","_uag_custom_page_level_css":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[44,47,134,55,56,128],"tags":[623,624,515,25,26,131,626,627,629,628,132,27,28,30,31,517,32,33,292,34,518,135,100,152,136,625,519,520,521,35,36,37,38,39,40,41,42],"class_list":["post-1538","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-nine-character-types-development-script-screenwriting-movie-film-tv-video-online-scripted-drama","category-random-thoughts-pop-culture-political-movie-television-blog","category-politics","category-power-of-idealism","category-power-of-imagination","category-thinkpiece-thursday","tag-623","tag-2008-presidential-election","tag-barack-obama","tag-character","tag-characters","tag-current-affairs","tag-democrat","tag-democrat-party","tag-democratic-party","tag-democrats","tag-election","tag-emotional-toolbox","tag-etb","tag-film","tag-films","tag-john-mccain","tag-laurie-hutzler","tag-movies","tag-news","tag-nine-character-types","tag-obama","tag-politics","tag-power-of-idealism","tag-power-of-imagination","tag-president","tag-presidential-election","tag-republican","tag-republican-party","tag-republicans","tag-screenplay","tag-screenplays","tag-screenwriting","tag-script","tag-scripts","tag-scriptwriting","tag-tv","tag-writing"],"acf":[],"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":["https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/30710870_10211699141895539_4496568718662303744_n.jpg",960,720,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/30710870_10211699141895539_4496568718662303744_n-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/30710870_10211699141895539_4496568718662303744_n-300x225.jpg",300,225,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/30710870_10211699141895539_4496568718662303744_n-768x576.jpg",768,576,true],"large":["https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/30710870_10211699141895539_4496568718662303744_n.jpg",960,720,false],"ttshowcase_normal":["https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/30710870_10211699141895539_4496568718662303744_n.jpg",125,94,false],"ttshowcase_small":["https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/30710870_10211699141895539_4496568718662303744_n.jpg",75,56,false],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/30710870_10211699141895539_4496568718662303744_n.jpg",960,720,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/30710870_10211699141895539_4496568718662303744_n.jpg",960,720,false],"Image Size 500x500":["https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/30710870_10211699141895539_4496568718662303744_n.jpg",500,375,false],"woocommerce_thumbnail":["https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/30710870_10211699141895539_4496568718662303744_n-300x400.jpg",300,400,true],"woocommerce_single":["https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/30710870_10211699141895539_4496568718662303744_n-600x450.jpg",600,450,true],"woocommerce_gallery_thumbnail":["https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/30710870_10211699141895539_4496568718662303744_n-100x100.jpg",100,100,true]},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"Laurie Hutzler","author_link":"https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/author\/admin\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"#ThinkpieceThursday - The Presidential election is an opportunity to see two Character Types play their roles on the world stage.","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1538"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1538"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1538\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11959"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1538"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1538"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/etbscreenwriting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1538"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}