The New York Times is Wrong

Yesterday morning, the New York Times wrote an editorial widely decrying tactics used in the recently completed Pennsylvania primary. The article specifically focused on Hillary Clinton and her use of negative campaign tactics to undermine Senator Barack Obama in the waning days of that state's contest. The Times criticized the tone and content of the campaign, focusing particularly on the rhetoric and advertisements of Senator Clinton.

The Times is wrong because, but for that communication, the primary almost certainly would have been closer than it proved to be. Exit polls showed that while both candidates were seen as having leveled unfair attacks, the 46% who said that negative advertisements impacted their vote broke overwhelmingly for Senator Clinton.

Senator Clinton's margin had dropped to low, single-digits earlier last week when she was in danger of being overwhelmed by Senator Obama's 2.5-3 to 1 advantage in media advertising and campaign spending. Senator Clinton then successfully framed the race as a referendum on Senator Obama and his values, particularly with regards to his comments about Americans being bitter and clinging to guns and religion as a means of dealing with that bitterness. By doing so, she was able to win substantial victories, not only with working-class voters, but with working-class male voters, a key constituency that she needed to win. Her supporters were clearly energized, as she raised $3.5 million in the hours after winning the primary, marking her best overnight performance ever.

The lessons of Pennsylvania are clear for her going forward. She must continue on a negative or a comparative theme if she is to win the upcoming primaries. After running a negative campaign, candidates are frequently tempted to turn back to a positive track to avoid criticism from the media. Given the deficit that Senator Clinton faces in states won, the popular vote and pledged delegates, she does not have this luxury. She must continue to draw contrasts with Senator Obama, raise questions about the nature and extent of his associations with Reverend Wright and terrorist leader William Ayers, and raise more questions about his values in comparison with hers.

Having done 15 years of successful Democratic campaigns in Indiana, I can say with confidence that negative campaigning works effectively with Hoosier voters. Voters in the southern part of the state are very much akin to southern white voters, who have given an overwhelmingly large amount of support to Senator Clinton. They will be quite susceptible to her values-based argument about the flawed candidacy of Senator Obama. Voters in the northwestern part of the state, particularly white, working-class voters, will also be responsive to this appeal, along with Senator Clinton's appeal on economic issues relating to the almost-certain recession. Thus, experience and my own political history suggest that this is the only direction and approach Senator Clinton can take to maximize her chance of success.

There will be ample time once the nominee is decided upon, most likely in June, for the Democratic Party to come together. With only around 20% of each candidate's supporters defecting to John McCain, there is every indication that when the two candidates consolidate once the primary season is over, the Democratic support will coalesce around the nominee. It will further coalesce if we have an Obama-Clinton or Clinton-Obama ticket, which is increasingly likely. But for now, Senator Clinton has in large part adopted the advice offered in my Washington Post op-ed piece last week. If she is to make the most of her chance for success, she must continue with the same tactics.

Carly Cooperman contributed to this article.

Comments

[MWChris]

Hey Doug:

Hillary can continue to get down and dirty because she is desperate and has no shame. She is lucky that Obama has chosen not to TRULY go negative against her. Let's look at her character.

1) She talks freely about how she would have walked away if she had heard Rev. Wright say what he said at her church. Yet, 10 years ago, her husband humiliated her shamelessly and publicly and she did not walk away from him.

2) She told a baldfaced lie about her trip to Bosnia and, having got caught, she can't even admit that she told a baldfaced lie.

3) Forget what Bill said in SC. SHE continued to emphasize during her SC campaign that Obama is African American (I am the first woman and he is the first African American) in a blatant appeal to white voters.

4) What did she have to do her brother, Hugh Rodham's, scheme to sell pardons during the end of the Clinton Administration?

I could go on....

[LeoMarvin]

"She must continue on a negative or a comparative theme if she is to win the upcoming primaries. "

That's one way to look at it.

Or she could decide not to drive away a whole new generation of Democrats.

Either way.

Let us know what you decide, Hill....

[greejambri]

Doug Schoen -- Now HERE is a political advisor par excellance. He was advising Bill Clinton when the Democrats lost the House to the Republicans in '94. Yeah, Hillary, this is your go-to guy. Ha Ha Ha.

[druidlady42]

Quoting Schoen:

"I can say with confidence that negative campaigning works effectively with Hoosier voters. Voters in the southern part of the state are very much akin to southern white voters, who have given an overwhelmingly large amount of support to Senator Clinton. They will be quite susceptible to her values-based argument about the flawed candidacy of Senator Obama. Voters in the northwestern part of the state, particularly white, working-class voters, will also be responsive to this appeal"

Isn't this comment the EPITOME of everything Obama was UNjustifiably castigated for saying in San Francisco? Only, his comments--in NO way condescending or "bigoted"-- advised his campaign workers how to best address the ingrained attitudes affecting the response of some groups of voters in PA.

LOOK OUT, you "Hoosier voters", you "southern white voters", you "white, working-class voters: you will be "QUITE SUSCEPTIBLE to Hillary's "values-based" arguments (you know them: guns, gays, religion, abortion, illegal "aliens", flag pins, etc.)! Never mind the wrecked economy, our trashed Constitution, the war she voted for, the nuclear war against Iran she's not opposed to---vote your "VALUES", folks!

------And you and Hillary have the unadulterated GALL to call Obama "ELITIST"?

[Kache]

The difference is, Shoen fleshed out Obama's point without leaving a convenient sound bite. He actually shows contempt for them and can get away with it because it's hard to find a two or three word sound bite in his insults. That's why he and buddy Penn are getting $10 million from Hillary to post here, they're real professional Rove-league players. This is what Hillary means by "experience". Knowing how to spit on people and not get caught.

[wmfor]

Oh no, there is a big difference.

Obama indicated that they had been duped by politicians, and that he was genuinely interested in improving their lives. BAD

Schoen is saying, if they are so easily duped, let's use it to our advantage. GOOD.

As our coach used to say before the game, "Remember, it matters not if you win or lose, but how you play the game. Now get in there and get down and dirty and win this one or I'll kick your asses!" Of course we said a prayer first.

[HamletsMill]

druidlady42,

Absolutely spot on post! I think I love you.

[Give Peace A Chance]

Clinton surrogates need a reality check. Hillary didn't win TX. She didn't win PA by big double digit margin. It is impossible for her to overtake Obama's delegate lead. She is finished.

It is time for Hillary surrogates to start being good democrats and that means supporting our nominee Barack Obama.

[Bobrobert]

ROFLMAO Obama 08 - can't wait. Keep up the spin - reassure everyone all is alright. It is - Obama is on his way to being Mr. President. Gotta love all this hype about what if - the only what if is... what if Hillary begs Obama to make her VP. :-) My guess is he would simply reply - "No!!! Thanks for the offer though!!!" Hee hee hee... :-)

[findingthetruth]

With Hillary "possibly"using an advisor like Doug Schoen, will destroy her and the Democratic Party for sure. Ooops! But then again---he sounds precisely like "expertise", Mark Penn.

[thegaygardener]

"Senator Clinton's margin had dropped to low, single-digits earlier last week"
Yep! And she managed to pull it ALL THE WAY UP to a bit over 9% WOW!!!
This after she had a 20 point lead for most of the period.
The New York Times was correct to call her out on her negative campaigning &! They should have also signaled out her race-baiting husband because it was definitely the racist vote that delivered PA to HRC
You also say:
"There will be ample time once the nominee is decided upon, most likely in June, for the Democratic Party to come together"
You are delusional. Time has run out. This party is NOT coming together.
The longer she stays in & folks like you keep creating these myths that she is viable, the more fractured the party becomes & the rightful nominee, who played by the rules & won the delegates, BARACK OBAMA becomes damaged by the particular Clinton brand of poison, the better JOHN MCCAIN looks to the country. It's already happening! Look at McCain's numbers! She's helping him win! Over half the country HATES her now & she is well on her way to making it unanimous.

[druidlady42]

The New York Times isn't wrong;---YOU ARE!!!

Mr. Schoen, I find your comments beyond disgusting and inconceiveably stupid if you have even one drop of love for this country and what it USED to represent! Have YOU,---have WE as a nation sunk so low as to judge who should be our next President by who can sling the most MUD, who can PANDER more hypocritically, who can most effectively DESTROY the character of his/her opponent?
If this is what America has become, if this is what a candidate must do to become President,--then rightfully, America deserves to be damned!

We get the government we deserve, and this country is now seeing the results of the kind of politics you so ignorantly endorse, the kind that's produced two terms of the worst Presidency in our history, two endless and tragic wars, and a power-hungry former NY Senator who is willing to do anything to WIN at all costs,---- including destroying a brilliant, young, charismatic and intelligent man who wants to CHANGE the "old politics" of personal destruction and division; dash the hopes of the young and upcoming generation of voters; and destroy the Democratic Party in the process! Yep! That's smart politics, according to you and Hillary!

[HamletsMill]

druidlady42,

Again, absolutely spot on comment! See my above post on your comment above after this one. You go girl!

[naijaman]

This guy is a Clintonista, so why on earth should we care what he thinks?

[BJMS]

"there is every indication that when the two candidates consolidate once the primary season is over, the Democratic support will coalesce around the nominee."

Oh really?? I am a lifelong Democrat who voted for Bill Clinton twice. I defended the Clintons during EVERY SINGLE (self-induced) scandal throughout the 90's. I now regret that deeply. I can assure you, there is NO WAY IN HELL that I will now vote for Hillary if she somehow gets this nomination.

I will NOT reward the kind of politics you espouse and Hillary gleefully practices. I will NOT vote for a Democrat who threatens to "OBLITERATE" Iran. You - Doug Schoen - and Hillary and your ilk make me sick to my stomach. You are the best evidence of WHY we NEED Barack Obama as our next President!!!

[truelie]

You are the reason politics is so dirty. Where's your dignity? The kind of people like you only bring about pettiness and disgrace to our country. Shame on you!

[BubbaC33]

Would the pettiness include telling a lie about statements made by a candidate discussing accurately a proposed health care plan? Would it be the disgrace that comes from calling someone a racist for remarks that are in no way racially motivated? Would the pettiness and disgrace include labeling the last ten years as the GOP era of great ideas, which includes the W presidency?
Each of these examples are Obama. Each of these examples illustrate the methods Obama uses. It was Obama who went negative first. It was Obama who injected race into the campaign. It was Obama who lied about Ms. Clinton in order to cover the lies he was telling about his own health care plan. Before you go after Ms, Clinton perhaps it would be a good idea for you to look at the Obama campaign.

[Bluesue]

You have misinterpreted each of these - let me put it this way, you are susceptible to spin.

[Uberbah]

I don't think you're projecting hard enough. Could you try a little harder please?

[DoninJoisey]

Here is my response - it's beautiful because it it is HRC herself.
Watch and see the obvious:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=exsmFDYyK4U

The total absence of integrity in Clinton is appalling!

[lobear00]

Hillary's lack of integrity is the ""DNA of all Neocon Republicans.

[justobserve]

While the questions are asked of Obama's links to his pastor and the others, we should also ask Clinton of her role in the communist-leaning law firm in SF, Whitewater, travelgate, intimidations of Bill's ex-sex partners, the campaign fund fraudulent in the 90s, her lies and cover-ups leading to the impeachment of her husband and the disbarred of his license, the trails of hundred millions in income after they left the WH, her associations with her chief strategist in the Columbian free trade talks, the upcoming court case of Peter Paul vs Clintons, ... We need several books to list all the questions needed to be asked of the Clintons.

[mickeyrat]

sorry, but facts are facts. People respond a lot better to comparisons than they do to Obama's oratory. The fact is that Obama has explaining to do about Wright and Ayers, and no whining about "guilt by association" is going to change that. People are judged by the "company they keep".

Look, I don't care what Wright says about the issues., But when you say "God Damn America", as though we've made no, zip, zilch attempts to rectify the past, and when Obama sits t here nodding and smiling at such comments, he's got explaining to do to me.

Maybe you people want a President who thinks that looking at all the bad America has done and ignoring any good should be our national perspective. I don't. And most Americans don't either.

If Obama doesn't have the judgement to separate himself from this man, then he's got nothing to offer America.

This one issue will sink Obama. I can just see the commercial coming out the week before the election, Obama on the left, Wright on the right, and the latters voice thundering out, "God Damn America".

Get used to saying President McCain. NOTHING Hillary has done will outrage Americans as much as those words and Obama's happy acceptance of them.

[Benton]

Then why is Hillary losing?

[mickeyrat]

it's basically a tossup. Neither will go into the convention with 2025. Delegates are only bound for the first ballot. After that they can vote as they wish. By August, most delegates will see that Obama simply isn't electable. It's the choice of putting someone out there who can handle what the Republicans throw at her, and someone who will be destroyed by a single commercial a week before the election.