Senators John McCain and Barack Obama shared a few laughs — yes, really — at the Alfred E. Smith Memorial Foundation Dinner in New York City on Thursday night. They sat with Cardinal Edward M. Egan, head of the Archdiocese of New York. (Photo: Damon Winter/The New York Times)Senator John McCain, the Republican nominee for president, announced that he had dismissed his entire team of senior advisers. “All of their positions will now be held by a man named Joe the Plumber,’’ he cracked.
His rival, Senator Barack Obama, then made a confession about his past associations. “John McCain is onto something,’’ he said. “There was a point in my life when I started palling around with a pretty ugly crowd, I’ve got to be honest. These guys were serious deadbeats, they were lowlifes, they were unrepentant no-good punks. That’s right: I’ve been a member of the United States Senate.’’
With a pair of rivals taking time away from the fray to swap jokes, it could only be the Alfred E. Smith Memorial Foundation Dinner in New York City, the white-tie charity roast that has long served as a light-hearted rest stop on the road to the White House. It brought Mr. McCain and Mr. Obama together Thursday night to dine together and trade some light-hearted jokes — some self-deprecating, some not so much — just one night after their third and final debate was so rough that many commentators could finally dust off all those boxing metaphors that they had been saving up this year.
They poked fun at themselves — and each other — in consecutive monologues that had their audience of New York royalty at the Waldorf-Astoria in stitches.
Mr. McCain answered critics who said that the plumber he made famous as a hardworking everyman in Wednesday night’s debate would not earn enough money to face any tax increase under Mr. Obama’s fiscal plan.
“What they don’t know — what they don’t know — is that Joe the Plumber recently signed a very lucrative contract with a wealthy couple to handle all the work on all seven of their houses,’’ Mr. McCain said, in an allusion to a flap he caused last summer when he was unable to remember how many homes he and his wife own.
And Mr. McCain scanned the crowd and said: “Even in this room full of proud Manhattan Democrats, I can’t shake that feeling that some people here are pulling for me,’’ quickly adding, “I’m delighted to see you here tonight, Hillary,’’ as he nodded to Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, who lost to Mr. Obama in the primary.
Mr. McCain gleefully toyed with the notion that former President Bill Clinton has been a less-than-enthusiastic campaigner for Mr. Obama. “He’s also been hammering away at me with epithets like ‘American hero’ and ‘great man,’ ” he said. “My friends, this is nothing but a brazen attempt to suppress turnout among anti-Clinton conservatives.’’
And he referred to the awkward moment in the second debate when he disdainfully referred to Mr. Obama as “that one.” “He doesn’t mind at all,’’ Mr. McCain said. “In fact, he even has a pet name for me: George Bush.’’
Mr. Obama, for his part, told the audience that his first name was actually Swahili for “that one.’’ And he had a startling revelation: “My middle name is actually Steve,” he said. “Barack Steve Obama.”
“There is no other crowd in America that I’d rather be palling around with right now,’’ he said right off the bat, alluding to Gov. Sarah Palin’s attack that he had been “palling around with terrorists.”
And he paid tribute to former governor Alfred E. Smith, the first Roman-Catholic to win the presidential nomination of a major party. “It is often said that I share the politics of Alfred E Smith and the ears of Alfred E. Neuman.’’
Mr. Obama, noting his age, said he did not have the pleasure of knowing Al Smith, but added: “From everything Senator McCain has told me, he was a great man.”
Then, he gave a shout out to Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg. “The mayor recently announced some news that he would be rewriting the rules and have a third term, which prompted Bill Clinton to say: You can do that?”
He poked fun at his reputation for arrogance, asking, “Can somebody tell me what happened to the Greek columns that I requested?’’
And, looking toward his rival, he said, “I think it is a tribute to American democracy that with two weeks left and a hard fought election, the two of us could come together, and sit down at the same dinner table without preconditions.’’
For all the tweaks, the two men did take time to praise one another in a tableau that would have seemed extraordinary 24 hours earlier, when Mr. McCain seemed to be throwing everything he had at Mr. Obama, sometimes angrily, painting him as a tax raiser who had had the poor judgment to hang around with a former terrorist.
Mr. McCain called Mr. Obama “an impressive fellow in many ways.’’
“Political opponents can have a little trouble seeing the best in each other,’’ he said. “I have seen this man at his best. I admire his great skill, energy and determination. It’s not for nothing that he has inspired so many folks in his own party and beyond. Senator Obama talks about making history and he’s made quite a bit of it already.’’
“There was a time when the mere invitation of an African-American citizen to dine at the White House was taken as an outrage and an insult in many quarters,’’ he said. “Today, it’s a world away from the cruel and frightful bigotry of that time. And good riddance.’’
“I can’t wish my opponent luck, but I do wish him well,’’ he said.
And Mr. Obama returned the compliment. “There are very few of us who have served this country with the same dedication and honor and distinction as Senator McCain, and I’m glad to be sharing a stage with him tonight.’’
The event, which is affiliated with the Archdiocese of New York, raised $4 million for underprivileged children.
Comments are no longer being accepted.