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Game Change

418 statements
82 feature instances
1 referencing feature instances

Game Change	type	TVTItem
Game Change	label	Game Change
Game Change	page	GameChange
Game Change	comment	Game Change is the 2010 book by John Heilemann and Mark Halperin that documents the 2008 race between Barack Obama and John McCain, and the events leading up to it.It covers all the major events of the campaign, with most of the focus on the contentious Democratic primaries, in particular the fight between Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton. In addition, it offers startling and perceptive insights into the behind-the-scenes drama during the election â€” Obamaâ€™s attempts to remain in the race; the Clintonsâ€™ increasing ire at the media for its soft coverage of Obama; the complete destruction of Edwardsâ€™ campaign and marriage before, during and after his affair with videographer Rielle Hunter; the last-minute switch-out of Joe Lieberman with Sarah Palin as the Republican vice presidential nominee; and the increasing chaos of the McCain campaign after the financial crisis, and through it all the constant interplay and threats of racism and sexism.A TV film based on the book, primarily focusing on Sarah Palin, aired on HBO in 2012. It starred Julianne Moore as Palin, Woody Harrelson as Steve Schmidt, and Ed Harris as John McCain.
Game Change	fetched	2024-04-05T21:45:59Z
Game Change	parsed	2024-04-05T21:45:59Z
Game Change	isPartOf	DBTropes
Game Change / int_12628662	type	The Call Knows Where You Live
Game Change / int_12628662	comment	The Call Knows Where You Live: Schmidt wanted to sit out the 2008 cycle, but McCain convinced him to re-join.
Game Change / int_12628662	featureApplicability	1.0
Game Change / int_12628662	featureConfidence	1.0
Game Change	hasFeature	Game Change / int_12628662
Game Change / int_1520ad7e	type	Jumping Off the Slippery Slope
Game Change / int_1520ad7e	comment	Jumping Off the Slippery Slope: Averted at first. McCain refuses to bring up Rev. Wright or Bill Ayres to attack Obama, and only very reluctantly does so late in the campaign, after reminding his team about when he suffered a personal smear back in 2000. There's also some foreshadowing to the Tea Party, which would rise in Obama's first term. Before the Vice Presidential debate, Steve Schmidt says the campaign staff's best bet is to focus on giving Palin "talking points" to memorize, and admits that trying to get her to actually understand any of the issues she'll be talking about was a waste of time. In that one statement, he's reconciled himself to the fact that his job is to go all-out in getting Palin into a post for which she is (in his view) spectacularly unqualified.
Game Change / int_1520ad7e	featureApplicability	-1.0
Game Change / int_1520ad7e	featureConfidence	1.0
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Game Change / int_154aa477	type	Big, Screwed-Up Family
Game Change / int_154aa477	comment	Big, Screwed-Up Family: Averted, the Palins are portrayed as perfectly normal, loving people thrust into a very unnerving situation.
Game Change / int_154aa477	featureApplicability	-1.0
Game Change / int_154aa477	featureConfidence	1.0
Game Change	hasFeature	Game Change / int_154aa477
Game Change / int_184e7708	type	Hands-Off Parenting
Game Change / int_184e7708	comment	Hands-Off Parenting: McCain has very little interaction with Palin and at the end he's no longer sure he can control her.
Game Change / int_184e7708	featureApplicability	1.0
Game Change / int_184e7708	featureConfidence	1.0
Game Change	hasFeature	Game Change / int_184e7708
Game Change / int_19769f50	type	Defeat Means Friendship
Game Change / int_19769f50	comment	Defeat Means Friendship: The Clintons managed to put aside their initial dislike of Obama and support him in the coming election. Hillary even made a surprise visit on the Democratic Convention floor asking the convention to declare together that Obama would be their candidate and president. It should be noted that subsequently, Obama even made Hillary his Secretary of State. As she explained it, she was surprised when she received his phone call offering the position, and warned him that due to the previous scandals surrounding her husband, the media would use her presence in his cabinet as further ammunition to criticize him. Obama responded that he was aware of what her ties to Bill Clinton would bring, but he was still offering the job, because he genuinely needed someone of her expertise in such an important position. She was genuinely touched, and they apparently had a good working relationship afterwards.
Game Change / int_19769f50	featureApplicability	1.0
Game Change / int_19769f50	featureConfidence	1.0
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Game Change / int_1ba17583	type	The Ghost
Game Change / int_1ba17583	comment	The Ghost: Barack Obama never appears in person in the movie, and is only shown sparingly in stock footage. Oddly enough, McCain's in-film depiction is superimposed on real-life news reports over his real-life face, but no such treatment is given to Obama. Justified in that the movie portrays McCain barely even interactive.
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Game Change / int_2171fd57	type	I'm a Man; I Can't Help It
Game Change / int_2171fd57	comment	For that matter, Edwards also knew in most of these shots that he was on camera - but he was so wrapped up in Hunter's praise that he didn't even think to stop flirting with her.
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Game Change / int_2171fd57	featureConfidence	1.0
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Game Change / int_23ff95fb	type	Brutal Honesty
Game Change / int_23ff95fb	comment	Brutal Honesty: Steve has to resort to this to get anything through Palin's head, due to her Never My Fault attitude. At first he is direct but kind, but he gets less understanding as the film goes on and she becomes harder to control. One notable example:
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Game Change / int_2764d432	type	Bitch in Sheep's Clothing
Game Change / int_2764d432	comment	Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: Elizabeth Edwards, despite her public sickly persona.
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Game Change / int_27a42ebc	type	Spiritual Successor
Game Change / int_27a42ebc	comment	Spiritual Successor: To HBO's other election movie, Recount, about the 2000 Florida ballot count and also directed by Jay Roach; and possibly a trilogy with Too Big to Fail, about the 2008 financial crisis. HBO optioned Game Change's follow up book Double Down about the 2012 election, but nothing ever came to fruition.
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Game Change	hasFeature	Game Change / int_27a42ebc
Game Change / int_2ae29c0d	type	The Dreaded
Game Change / int_2ae29c0d	comment	The Dreaded: Obama's charisma makes him this to the McCain political team. One of the first scenes is them watching footage of Obama's speech in Berlin, the sheer size of the crowd is made to look a little terrifying.
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Game Change / int_2cac89cf	type	The Ingenue
Game Change / int_2cac89cf	comment	The Ingenue: Palin (and Obama, although he's not the focus of the film).
Game Change / int_2cac89cf	featureApplicability	1.0
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Game Change	hasFeature	Game Change / int_2cac89cf
Game Change / int_2d7ef923	type	Mistaken for Cheating
Game Change / int_2d7ef923	comment	Mistaken for Cheating: A rumor circulates that McCain has had an affair with lobbyist Vicki Iseman. Both of them categorically deny so much as ever being alone together. note Though Schmidt confirmed years later that they did indeed.
Game Change / int_2d7ef923	featureApplicability	1.0
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Game Change / int_30d4f2a	type	Narcissist
Game Change / int_30d4f2a	comment	Narcissist: John Edwards is portrayed as one of these: He lets crowd reactions go straight to his head, and he lets Rielle Hunter's constant praise go straight to his... other head.
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Game Change / int_3149c4b0	type	It Will Never Catch On
Game Change / int_3149c4b0	comment	It Will Never Catch On: "[The day after the elections] no one will know who Sarah Palin is." Though she hasn't held elected office since, Sarah remained at least tangentially relevant in Right Wing American politics through 2022.
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Game Change / int_31df118	type	Attention Whore
Game Change / int_31df118	comment	Attention Whore: Palin is so concerned about her status in Alaska that she demands they do a poll despite the fact it costs $60,000 and the campaign has half the funds of Obama's. What's worse, she wasn't even running for re-election at the time, her term ended in 2010. After her successful performance at the Vice Presidential debate against Joe Biden, her attitude only gets worse. It should be noted that in reality, the poll itself makes more sense in context that isn't provided; given the state of Alaskan state politics and the rampant mutinees in the Republican base over McCain and/or Palin, it was essentially meant to see whether Palin's "base state" was secure. This was for the same reason it's wise for a general to make sure the enemy isn't running amok in their base while they're away: to keep a safe location and source of support, and avoid potential scandals popping up where they can least afford them.
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Game Change / int_35a858b3	type	Cluster F-Bomb
Game Change / int_35a858b3	comment	Cluster F-Bomb: McCain's way of speaking. Keep in mind that McCain was a Navy pilot, and the phrase "cursing like a drunken sailor" has become proverbial: Navy men tend to curse very casually. According to people that knew McCain, that's just the register of how he spoke. He did try to restrain it when in public.
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Game Change / int_35e56a75	type	Outdoorsy Gal
Game Change / int_35e56a75	comment	Outdoorsy Gal: Sarah uses her time in Sedona to take mind-clearing morning runs and rehearse her debate lines while sitting in a tree.
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Game Change / int_3bc88a7f	type	Foregone Conclusion
Game Change / int_3bc88a7f	comment	Foregone Conclusion: Everyone knows who won in the end.
Game Change / int_3bc88a7f	featureApplicability	1.0
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Game Change / int_40bb59d0	type	Blatant Lies
Game Change / int_40bb59d0	comment	Blatant Lies: Palin claiming to reporters that she was cleared in the "TrooperGate" investigation, when in fact she was censured for it. Schmidt calls her out on this. In real life, this was a bit more contentious and subject to controversy behind the scenes; she was indeed censured by one report, but this report was under suspicion for being a politically motivated hatchet job since many of those who did it were political allies of Obama (or at least enemies of Palin). A later report- by an attempt at a bipartisan/nonpolitical investigation- exonerated her.
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Game Change / int_46290b93	type	Manic Pixie Dream Girl
Game Change / int_46290b93	comment	Manic Pixie Dream Girl: An extremely disturbing Real Life example with Rielle Hunter to John Edwards: She was fascinated with New Age philosophy, astrology and reincarnation, and would announce to people she had just met that she was a witch. She also pumped Edwards up, claiming he could be as great a leader as Martin Luther King or Mahatma Gandhi. Other Edwards campaign team members who were interviewed describe how she insinuated herself into the entire campaign, becoming Edwards's constant companion - when she had just been hired to run a documentary film crew about the campaign. To this day, that video has never been publicly released, despite the fact that it was the one job that Rielle was officially supposed to be doing. The reason why is that the other campaign team members state that when they watched the rough cut, Hunter and Edwards were clearly flirting throughout it. Pause a moment and ask yourself: 1 - How blatantly obvious must their flirting have been that even a TV audience that didn't know them personally would pick up on it? 2 - This is the video Hunter herself submitted to them: she had become so removed from reality that she gave them a final cut of a video in which she was obviously flirting with Edwards, with zero thought to the consequences. For that matter, Edwards also knew in most of these shots that he was on camera - but he was so wrapped up in Hunter's praise that he didn't even think to stop flirting with her.
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Game Change / int_4b39c18	type	Taking the Heat
Game Change / int_4b39c18	comment	Taking the Heat: Edwards' Sycophantic Servant Andrew Young claims he was the one who had an affair with Hunter resulting in her pregnancy. Nobody buys it.
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Game Change / int_4f4602da	type	They Changed It, Now It Sucks!
Game Change / int_4f4602da	comment	They Changed It, Now It Sucks!: invoked Once it became inevitable that Obama would be the Democratic nominee over Hillary, many of her followers declared they would go with McCain, who increased their support once he chose Sarah Palin.
Game Change / int_4f4602da	featureApplicability	1.0
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Game Change / int_53224e46	type	Bookends
Game Change / int_53224e46	comment	Bookends: Steve Schmidt's interview with Anderson Cooper on 60 Minutes.
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Game Change	hasFeature	Game Change / int_53224e46
Game Change / int_5989e3b6	type	Enemy Mine
Game Change / int_5989e3b6	comment	Enemy Mine: McCain ended up employing people from Bush's campaigns, despite the fact that they ran extremely nasty smears against him during the 2000 primaries, including claiming his adopted daughter from Bangladesh was really his illegitimate child.
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Game Change / int_60b4a128	type	The Last DJ
Game Change / int_60b4a128	comment	The Last DJ: John McCain gets portrayed as one, being old fashioned in a sense that he no longer has a chance to compete against the charismatic Obama.
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Game Change / int_62b65869	type	And I'm the Queen of Sheba
Game Change / int_62b65869	comment	And I'm the Queen of Sheba:
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Game Change / int_680f950	type	Gilligan Cut
Game Change / int_680f950	comment	Gilligan Cut: McCain tells his crew they're going to be adults in this election — cut to them laughing like schoolboys at this YouTube video mocking John Edwards, another early contender in 2008. Even more funny when you consider that all three men watching the video (one of which was a member of Edwards' own party) served with Edwards in the Senate. When Palin's advisers warn her they'll have to prepare for when the press starts sniffing around about Palin's past and personal life:
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Game Change / int_76a5eaf8	type	Spotlight-Stealing Squad
Game Change / int_76a5eaf8	comment	Spotlight-Stealing Squad: Sarah Palin, both in-universe and meta-wise. The book was on the 2008 campaign in general, the movie focuses on Sarah Palin's role in the Republican Campaign. In the movie, Palin is portrayed as an Attention Whore who goes so far as to prepare her own concession speech and has to be told by Schmidt that A) failed vice-presidential candidates don't give concession speeches and B) she is not going steal the attention away from the election of the first African-American president of the United States.
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Game Change / int_7a12aabf	type	New Media Are Evil
Game Change / int_7a12aabf	comment	New Media Are Evil: Thanks to YouTube and the 24 hour news networks none of the candidates get any relief from criticism and mockery (even from Fox News!). Ironically Palin was picked partially because she looked good on YouTube.
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Game Change / int_7cc8d769	type	Sore Loser
Game Change / int_7cc8d769	comment	Sore Loser: Hillary doesn't even acknowledge when Obama clinches the number of delegate votes needed for the Democratic nomination, instead giving a speech that suggests she still has a chance to win.
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Game Change / int_7ea8f5ce	type	Knight in Shining Armor
Game Change / int_7ea8f5ce	comment	Knight in Shining Armor: McCain wanted to be this (or at least present himself as this) when he suspended his campaign and rushed back to Washington, D.C. to ensure that Congress passed legislation to prevent the impending financial crisis. Instead, he was flustered to find that the bipartisan committee had all but finished the Troubled Assets Relief Program (TARP) bill, and demanded that they start over (at a time when the entire federal government was racing against the clock to prevent financial Armageddon), then sat through the meetings like a clueless bystander, while Obama (who had also returned to Washington) virtually presided over them. One of McCain's long-time friends summed up, "If you're going to come riding into Washington on a white horse to slay a dragon, you better have the dragon tied up and tranquilized and ready to die. You don't come in and not slay the dragon and walk out with a whimper." Even George W. Bush, who was at least willing to hear his former rival out, seemed angry and embarrassed that McCain wasted everyone's time, and was also impressed at Obama's insight on the matter.
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Game Change / int_7fbb2a3	type	Nice Job Breaking It, Hero!
Game Change / int_7fbb2a3	comment	Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: One of the moments of high drama during the campaign occurred when McCain demanded that the debate with Obama be postponed, so McCain could return to Washington and help shepherd through legislation to address the financial crisis. It was intended to be a grand gesture of setting aside partisan politics for the good of the country as a whole, but it misfired badly: The very act of suspending his campaign to return to Washington only increased public nervousness, undermined confidence in the already-shaky market, and accelerated the collapse that the federal government was trying so desperately to prevent; When he arrived in Washington, McCain was aggravated to learn that the bipartisan committee had all but finished hammering out the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP), and demanded that the Republican representatives scrap the bill and start over - either because he needed to claim some credit for getting the legislation done, or because he took it for granted that any "progress" made by other representatives without his input was meaningless, or both; Insofar as he did sit in on the continuing TARP negotiations, most of the attendees were struck by how unprepared McCain was, and how little he had to contribute in the way of practical suggestions - especially compared to Obama, who was also a sitting Senator and had also returned to Washington after the debate was canceled; Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson's Chief of Staff, Jim Wilkinson, had already donated $500 to McCain's campaign, but after the TARP debacle, he asked for his money back, and cast his vote for Obama; In McCain's absence, Palin was thrust onto center stage, further highlighting how ignorant she was of national issues; in the film, when Schmidt tries to prepare her for questions about how the government is responding to the crisis, he has to start from scratch and explain to her (among other things) what the Federal Reserve does.
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Game Change / int_7fbe9a30	type	Freak Out
Game Change / int_7fbe9a30	comment	Freak Out: After the infamous Katie Couric interview Palin kind of goes into a downward spiral and people start worrying about her mental health (or questioning if she was mentally healthy to begin with). It doesn't help that Palin blames her campaign manager for not prepping her despite the fact it's her own fault she didn't "study".
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Game Change / int_8042e814	type	Actually Pretty Funny
Game Change / int_8042e814	comment	Actually Pretty Funny: Right after Steve tells one of his colleagues to stop making fun of Dick Cheney, who he thinks is "misunderstood", he has to stop himself from laughing at the next joke. ("How does he eat wearing Darth Vader's mask?")
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Game Change / int_83a903f6	type	Stepford Smiler
Game Change / int_83a903f6	comment	Between John and Elizabeth Edwards, despite their best efforts to pretend otherwise.
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Game Change / int_89631688	type	The Chosen One
Game Change / int_89631688	comment	The Chosen One: Obama to the Clintons and McCains, who were so irritated by the media's soft handling of him they felt it was borderline Villain with Good Publicity.
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Game Change / int_8cb1a369	type	Took a Level in Jerkass
Game Change / int_8cb1a369	comment	Took a Level in Jerkass: After Palin's debate with Biden her confidence soars and she starts making unplanned statements to reporters, contradicting McCain's policies about stem cell research despite saying she wouldn't, and most importantly, even wants to make her own concession speech on election night. As Schmidt sternly explains to her, no Vice Presidential candidate has ever given their own concession speech in all of American history, and her request is shockingly arrogant. She counters that traditions change. True, the first black man was just elected president - but Schmidt explains that the concession speech is a solemn occasion to cement American democracy (the US isn't prone to starting civil wars when one side loses an election because the losing side always respects the election results). Palin can't seem to understand that even if there is no official reason she can't give her own concession speech, that purely from a public relations perspective the press would tear her apart for being self-centered if she gave one. Her behavior is so aggravating that even her own campaign manager couldn't vote for her.
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Game Change / int_973d220f	type	Never My Fault
Game Change / int_973d220f	comment	Never My Fault: Palin, particularly after the disastrous Couric interview, when she gets into a heated argument on the phone with Wallace about it. In all fairness, Palin is a local politician and it was the campaign's fault for selecting her as McCain's running mate, so she could have made the humble defense that there's only so much preparation she could do for questions about national issues in a matter of weeks. Instead, her actual response is, "Nicolle, it wasn't my fault! I wasn't properly prepped (by you)!" Wallace desperately retorts that she wasn't "properly prepped" because she didn't listen to Wallace and her other advisers, instead ignoring them when they attempted to prep her. Palin then pulls a 180 turn (forgetting that she just accused Wallace of not prepping her at all), and declares that it's Wallace's fault for overwhelming her with too much information.
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Game Change / int_9d12bbc1	type	Foreshadowing
Game Change / int_9d12bbc1	comment	Foreshadowing: After Steve searches for potential female vice president candidates and watches a clip where Palin is interviewed by Charlie Rose and gives a well-worded response to a question, we see her telling the exact same thing word for word to a constituent, hinting at her being better at memorizing lines than actually knowing the substance behind them.
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Game Change / int_9e0c3153	type	Punctuated! For! Emphasis!
Game Change / int_9e0c3153	comment	Punctuated! For! Emphasis!: Steve's shutdown of Palin toward the end of the movie is full of this.
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Game Change / int_9f9ef70f	type	The Unchosen One
Game Change / int_9f9ef70f	comment	The Unchosen One: Sarah Palin; McCain's original pick for VP was Joe Lieberman.
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Game Change / int_a0db7803	type	It's Personal
Game Change / int_a0db7803	comment	It's Personal: McCain is very reluctant to use Rev. Jeremiah Wright against Obama because it reminds him of when George W. Bush smeared him by accusing him of having a black daughter out of wedlock (the girl in question was actually an adoptee from Bangladesh).
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Game Change / int_a1b141f4	type	My God, What Have I Done?
Game Change / int_a1b141f4	comment	My God, What Have I Done?: Steve says it almost word-for-word ("what have we done?") watching Palin's disastrous interview with Katie Couric; When it's clear that they're going to lose, Steve can barely get the words out as he apologizes to McCain for suggesting Palin as his running mate. McCain, for his part, is very understanding. McCain has one when he realizes he's whipped up racism and xenophobia in his base by going negative on Obama.
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Game Change / int_a44cd048	type	Meet the New Boss
Game Change / int_a44cd048	comment	Meet the New Boss: A common accusation thrown at McCain was that he would be Bush Lite.
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Game Change / int_a76de48b	type	Troubled Production
Game Change / int_a76de48b	comment	Troubled Production: invoked The campaign gets shades of this in a very bad way once Palin comes aboard.
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Game Change / int_a861560f	type	The Friend Nobody Likes
Game Change / int_a861560f	comment	The Friend Nobody Likes: Mitt Romney is this among the Republican candidates, who regard him as a flip-flopping opportunist with no real convictions.
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Game Change / int_ad1db87c	type	Oh, Crap!
Game Change / int_ad1db87c	comment	Oh, Crap!: Many of these occur among the campaign workers during their various dealings with Palin. Schmidt has one when he tries to quiz Palin with a simple policy question about maintaining America's alliance with Britain; she gives a rote answer about the U.S.'s good relationship with the Queen, and looks baffled when he points out that the Prime Minister, not the Queen, is the head of the British government. McCain has one when an angry supporter yells "Kill him! (Obama)" during a rally.
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Game Change / int_aebae11c	type	Viewers Are Morons
Game Change / int_aebae11c	comment	Viewers Are Morons: In-Universe. In fairness to Palin, one newscaster says most Americans probably can't name a Supreme Court decision, explain why North and South Korea are separate countries, or understand the difference between Saddam Hussein and al-Qaeda. He then adds that the problem is most Americans aren't running for Vice President of the United States.
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Game Change / int_b17f6a27	type	I Did What I Had to Do
Game Change / int_b17f6a27	comment	I Did What I Had to Do: Steve Schmidt thinks long and hard about the pros and cons of selecting Sarah Palin as McCain's running mate, but ultimately decides, "I'd rather lose by ten points going for the win than lose by one point and look back and say, 'goddamn, we should have gone for the win!'" He comes to profoundly regret it later. On Election Night, Nicolle Wallace breaks down in tears and confesses to Steve Schmidt that she couldn't bring herself to vote for McCain, her own party's candidate, because the idea of Palin succeeding him as President was too scary to contemplate. Schmidt hugs her and says he understands completely.
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Game Change / int_b4a6ae4c	type	Everyone Has Standards
Game Change / int_b4a6ae4c	comment	Everyone Has Standards: Said by one of the campaign managers: "Dick Cheney said picking her was rash, and when Dick Cheney has the moral high ground..."
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Game Change / int_b707726f	type	Hypocritical Humor
Game Change / int_b707726f	comment	Hypocritical Humor: Steve tells McCain to stop watching Countdown With Keith Olbermann and Fox News, because "it's all just bullshit." Then Steve quickly turns off his TV, which is tuned to Fox News, which is just as biased as what McCain was watching, just towards the other party.
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Game Change / int_b9fa17b7	type	Pretender Diss
Game Change / int_b9fa17b7	comment	Pretender Diss: At one point, Palin compares herself to Hillary Rodham Clinton — who, whatever her faults, is indisputablynote well-respected Senator, called one of the finest modern Secretaries of State in American history, and the first woman to be the presidential nominee of a major political party in 2016 one of the most politically accomplished women in American history. Nicolle Wallace is extremely unimpressed, and makes that quite clear. Inverted when Rick Davis tries to pull one of these on Obama, saying all he has is "star power", which is why they need a "star" like Palin to counteract his influence. Steve Schmidt cheerlessly reminds him that Obama actually has substance to go with his style (he was a Constitutional law professor), while Palin... doesn't. note Under other circumstances, Palin's status as Governor of Alaska might have been leveraged as more relevant experience than Obama's status as a freshman U.S. Senator, but Palin's media appearances only hung twin lampshades on Obama's surprising grasp of domestic and foreign policy issues, and her own tenuous understanding of anything outside her home state.
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Game Change / int_bc74ef27	type	Berserk Button
Game Change / int_bc74ef27	comment	Berserk Button: Bill Clinton is a patient, wizardly figure in Hillary's campaign; a master of the rules of politics like no other. But during the primaries, he is repeatedly hammered by former friends and a media, which he is convinced is in the tank for Obama, for supposedly playing the race card. The final straw is when a reporter in South Carolina suggests that he is using similar tactics to Lee Atwater, George H.W. Bush's infamous 1988 campaign manager, who created the infamous Willie Horton ad. Bill loses it at this point, forgoing his own rules and berating the reporter for a solid five minutes, leading to the famous "shame on you" incident.
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Game Change / int_bec0417c	type	Happily Married
Game Change / int_bec0417c	comment	Happily Married: Sarah and Todd's only scene together shows him providing moral support that she counts on.
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Game Change / int_c313d43a	type	True Companions
Game Change / int_c313d43a	comment	True Companions: All the campaigns started out with one. Only Obama's survived.
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Game Change / int_c335b9ec	type	Irony
Game Change / int_c335b9ec	comment	Irony: McCain criticizes Obama for his lack of experience and "star power." His team later disregards other looked at options such as Meg Whitman (lots of business experience), Kay Bailey Hutchison from Texas (15 years in the Senate at the time), and Susan Collins from Maine (11 years in the Senate, though admittedly not very charismatic) in favor of Palin despite her (relative) lack of political experience (4 years on the city council, then 6 years as mayor of a mildly populated city, and then a year and a half as the governor of one of the most sparsely populated states in the country) because she's charismatic and gun-toting. And milfy.
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Game Change / int_c3c18143	type	Hope Spot
Game Change / int_c3c18143	comment	Hope Spot: The Vice Presidential debate is depicted as this for the McCain camp. Upon seeing Palin handle the debate calmly and with renewed energy, with almost no gaffes, Steve and the others think they can still win. However, immediately after is when they begin bringing up Rev. Wright and Bill Ayres out of desperation, causing the campaign to nose dive into batshit crazy with Palin at the center. For all the craziness that Palin is putting them through, Schmidt and Wallace both shine when McCain takes back the microphone from a racist supporter and firmly tells her that Obama is not "an Arab, a terrorist", but instead a "decent family man" who happens to be on the opposing side. Even with Palin attached, they can feel that they're working to elect the right man as President, and they can do it on character and accomplishments rather than mud-slinging.
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Game Change / int_c819533b	type	Rage Breaking Point
Game Change / int_c819533b	comment	Rage Breaking Point: Hillary puts up with a lot of nonsense during the primaries, but the worst is when MSNBC's David Shuster remarks that her daughter, who has been reportedly calling some unconfirmed delegates, seems to be being "pimped out" on her mother's behalf. This makes Hillary's inner Mama Bear come out in full force.
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Game Change / int_c83751cb	type	Description Cut
Game Change / int_c83751cb	comment	Description Cut: When McCain is favoring Lieberman early on, Schmidt warns they'll have to keep it top-secret or the right-wing of the Republican Party will sink the pick - cut to a montage of news reporters lambasting the choice.
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Game Change / int_ccbf0095	type	Critical Backlash
Game Change / int_ccbf0095	comment	Critical Backlash: invoked Despite the McCains' efforts to keep it secret, word got out that Joe Lieberman was set to be McCain's running mate, setting off anguished cries of the end of conservatism as conservatives knew it.
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Game Change / int_d0b60f23	type	GoshDangItToHeck
Game Change / int_d0b60f23	comment	Gosh Dang It to Heck!: Palin's way of speaking, conversely from McCain's Cluster F-Bomb manner of speaking.
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Game Change / int_d34cbda2	type	Implausible Deniability
Game Change / int_d34cbda2	comment	Implausible Deniability: When Steve comments that Todd Palin was a member of the Alaskan Independence Party for seven years, Sarah responds that he checked the wrong box, because people can hold the completely wrong party registration for multiple years. There are actually cases in which this happened, even if it is incredibly unlikely: Todd might honestly have checked the wrong box and not noticed he'd registered with the Independence Party for years. Such mistakes have been known to happen. What Palin lies about is that she tells Steve that Todd checked the wrong box "and rectified the error immediately". Todd checking the wrong box isn't "implausible" - what Steve is angry about is that it is a blatant lie to claim that he fixed it "immediately" when the indisputable, recorded fact is that he at the least didn't notice it until seven years later - and that even if the accusation is trivial, making an implausible lie to deny it altogether is drastically worse.
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Game Change / int_d397657d	type	Hoist by His Own Petard
Game Change / int_d397657d	comment	Hoist by His Own Petard: Both Steve Schmidt and John McCain arguably. Schmidt was more interested into turning Palin into a "celebrity" to combat Obama's popularity that he completely neglected the fact that she was completely ignorant to politics. McCain completely turned a blind eye to her spotlight seeking.
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Game Change / int_d50a5478	type	Unlimited Wardrobe
Game Change / int_d50a5478	comment	Unlimited Wardrobe: Palin is criticized for the lavish shopping spree the GOP sent her on when she was to be elevated into the national spotlight.
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Game Change / int_d820f28	type	Reaction Shot
Game Change / int_d820f28	comment	Reaction Shot: The staff members are regularly displaying an appalled face right after some ignorant, outlandish or inappropriate stuff comes out of Palin's mouth.
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Game Change / int_d965507b	type	Tragic Mistake
Game Change / int_d965507b	comment	Tragic Mistake: The framing of the scene where McCain makes the decision to pick Palin. It's never stated or implied that he would have won without her. But the stakes are laid out plainly for him. When the question is put to John:
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Game Change / int_d9cf40fa	type	Screw This, I'm Outta Here
Game Change / int_d9cf40fa	comment	Screw This, I'm Outta Here: After Palin's Freak Out over the phone to Nicolle Wallace, blaming her for the disastrous Katie Couric interview, Wallace calmly dials Steve Schmidt and tells him that she's happy to take the blame and be fired from the campaign, if it means never having to deal with Palin again.
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Game Change / int_db39ccfd	type	Battle Couple
Game Change / int_db39ccfd	comment	Battle Couple: Bill and Hillary.
Game Change / int_db39ccfd	featureApplicability	1.0
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Game Change	hasFeature	Game Change / int_db39ccfd
Game Change / int_dc774000	type	Start X to Stop X
Game Change / int_dc774000	comment	Start X to Stop X: As stated in The Dreaded, Obama was such a charismatic speaker that the McCain Campaign decided that the only way they would stand a chance is if they could get someone equally charismatic as McCain's running mate. The problem though, as Schmidt would later put it:
Game Change / int_dc774000	featureApplicability	1.0
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Game Change / int_dca70c44	type	Reasonable Authority Figure
Game Change / int_dca70c44	comment	Reasonable Authority Figure: McCain; he doesn't want to use Rev. "God Damn America!" Wright against Obama and he's really disturbed when people start saying Obama is a Muslim Socialist or call for his death.
Game Change / int_dca70c44	featureApplicability	1.0
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Game Change / int_deecc9eb	type	Awful Wedded Life
Game Change / int_deecc9eb	comment	Awful Wedded Life: Between John and Elizabeth Edwards, despite their best efforts to pretend otherwise. Between Rudy Giuliani and his third wife, Judith. John and Cindy McCain's wedded life isn't awful all the time, but they can get into some pretty epic fights.
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Game Change / int_e13156e1	type	Mama Bear
Game Change / int_e13156e1	comment	Mama Bear: Palin gets especially upset when her family is bashed by the media, and she did not want to say she and Todd were "proud to be grandparents" after their teen daughter's pregnancy is revealed (she's not too thrilled about seeing baby-daddy Levi either: "I see you cut off your mullet").
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Game Change / int_e42fbc	type	The Gift
Game Change / int_e42fbc	comment	The Gift: Even her harshest critics can't disagree that Palin has a special talent for connecting with voters on rope lines and in her solo speeches.
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Game Change / int_e4b69188	type	Very Loosely Based on a True Story
Game Change / int_e4b69188	comment	Very Loosely Based on a True Story: A common accusation. While a lot of the events and politicking are accurate, a lot of them are at best...dubious. A basic rule of thumb is the more a given fact focuses on Palin, the less likely it is to be reliable.
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Game Change / int_ed05cfee	type	NaÃ¯ve Newcomer
Game Change / int_ed05cfee	comment	NaÃ¯ve Newcomer: Palin (and Obama, although he's not the focus of the film).
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Game Change / int_ed2bbf8a	type	You Are in Command Now
Game Change / int_ed2bbf8a	comment	You Are in Command Now: As McCain leaves to give his concession speech, he tells Palin that she is now one of the leading members of the Republican Party and to not let people like Rush Limbaugh rip it apart.
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Game Change / int_eec329f5	type	Lesser of Two Evils
Game Change / int_eec329f5	comment	Lesser of Two Evils: During the last months of the campaign, one of Obama's pollsters, David Binder, visited a group of undecided voters in Cleveland, Ohio. One woman stated that she and the rest of the group believed most of the conspiracy theories about Obama: that he was not born in the United States, that he was actually a Muslim, and being a Muslim made him secretly sympathetic to terrorists. In some bewilderment, Binder asked if that was the case how could they be "undecided"? The woman explained that they were still weighing whether electing a foreign, Islamic, terrorist sympathizer might be less dangerous than putting Sarah Palin in line to become the next President, if something happened to McCain.
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Game Change / int_f98356f	type	Right-Wing Militia Fanatic
Game Change / int_f98356f	comment	McCain has one when an angry supporter yells "Kill him! (Obama)" during a rally.
Game Change / int_f98356f	featureApplicability	1.0
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Game Change / int_f9f2c33	type	Running Gag
Game Change / int_f9f2c33	comment	Running Gag: Senator "Obiden". This really happened and it was yet another of Palin's frustrating "quirks": she kept combining the names of Obama and his running mate Biden...even after being warned about it for weeks, she physically could not break this verbal habit. The cameras caught her asking Joe Biden right before the Vice Presidential debate, "Can I call you Joe?" - which was actually because behind the scenes, she was worried that she'd make the Biden-Obiden gaffe again on camera, despite being fully aware of it.
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Game Change / int_fbd285b7	type	Comically Missing the Point
Game Change / int_fbd285b7	comment	Comically Missing the Point:
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The following is a list of statements referring to the current page from other pages.

Game Change

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Turn of the Millennium / int_6709780f

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