It’s a safe bet that in all the possible scenarios the presidential campaigns considered, a killer hurricane a week before the election probably didn’t factor in. No matter. Hurricane Sandy has come, and mostly gone, and it’s left in its wake, along with $20 billion worth of damage, the vexing question of how the candidates should proceed. They need to do all they can to win votes, but can’t risk looking as though they’re politicizing a tragedy.
In this regard, Obama has the easier job, since, as commander in chief, he’s the one ultimately overseeing the government response and therefore can be seen responding to the crisis. So far, there haven’t been any Katrina-style screw ups. Obama spent last night calling governors in affected states, and this morning got the kind of political payoff that’s all he could hope for: Asked on “Good Morning America” to assess the president’s handing of the job, Republican New Jersey Governor Chris Christie said, “I have to say the administration, the President himself, and FEMA Administrator Craig
Fugate have been outstanding with us so far. We have a great partnership with them, and I want to thank the President personally for his personal attention to this.”
Romney’s job is tougher. Because he doesn’t actually have a job, besides that of candidate, he can’t easily go off and be seen doing something civic-minded and productive. But he also can’t barrel ahead
with the usual campaign-rally attacks on a president busy responding to a tragic storm. With that in mind, Romney’s scheduled rally today in Kettering, Ohio, was hurriedly recast as a “storm relief event” –
but still included the same celebrities (Richard Petty, Randy Owen) who were set to endorse him at the political rally. According to the Romney campaign, they’ll “collect donations” for storm victims.
That’s safer than a rally, but could still look a little crass to some voters, because politics will still be front and center. Need visual evidence of what I’m talking about? This picture from the event, tweeted by ABC’s Jonathan Karl, should do the trick — it shows two women, one with canned goods for the victims of the storm, the other proudly holding a t-shirt that says, “Obama: You’re Fired!”
