It's not very often that I'll compliment John McCain, but his campaign's strategy over this now-infamous North Carolina GOP ad hitting Obama is one shrewd move.
Some pundits have caught on, but only half-way.
It's true that the damage has been done by the ad just being out there and run on networks which cover it (before it even airs on the paid airwaves, mind you), so McCain can afford to come out against the ad, as he has done so a few times.
But, there's a longer term game here, no matter who the nominee is for the Democrats.
If the nominee is Obama, then the ad from the North Carolina GOP did earlier damage to him and will be well-forwarded around the internet by the time the general election comes around. That helps McCain, of course.
But, McCain and his team obviously are hoping that it does enough damage in North Carolina to begin to knock Obama out of the race, so Hillary Clinton is the nominee. It's already been floated that McCain has called off the dogs when it comes to Hillary Clinton, because that's who he wants to face.
If he gets what he wants, this ad episode really helps him. Right now, McCain is viewed much more positively by voters than Hillary Clinton. She would go into a general election pretty well disliked, most intensely by those Obama supporters who became first-time Democratic voters just to vote for him, and may feel she ripped it away.
The first time Hillary Clinton launches an attack ad on McCain, guess what he's going to do? He will stand up and recall this episode - saying that he deplores this kind of slash-and-burn politics, and even stood up for Barack Obama when he was getting unfairly attacked, while Hillary Clinton stayed silent. He will lay his claim to the "new kind of politics" mantle that Obama supporters find so attractive, while solidifying the positive feelings the majority of voters have of him.
In doing so, he'll hope to peel away some disillusioned Obama supporters and independents who tend to hate attack politics. But, more importantly, he'll cause enough of them to not dislike him so much that they come out, hold their noses for Clinton just to stop him. They'll just stay at home, or so is the plan.
The irony, of course, is it is the most classic of 'old politics' - let someone else go on the attack, so you can look like the nice guy trying to stop it. But, he's playing it perfectly, and as a consultant, I have to give them a little golf clap.
When performed by the same person, it is commonly known as schizophrenia.
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I live in Cary, NC-and reading editorials in the Raleigh N&O-it's having a backlash against the GOP here..
More GOP voters are registering Inde or even switching-to vote against local GOP members running for seats in upcoming elections because of dirty ads like this..
NC voters are all-to-aware of Jesse Helms style race-baiting ads--and are turning against it..
NC is quite a bit more cosmopolitan/progressive with growth of its' bigger cities now- than it's give credit for.
The Doles and McHenrys' are gonna be gone soon.
Even popular mayors like McCrory of Charlotte-who stick to Bush/GOP politics-are seeing some declining numbers in approval ratings.
I say good riddance to it too.
I really don't think this is about McCain (which doesn't mean that his campaign won't get some mileage out of it ).
In the North Carolina governor's race Beverly Perdue and Richard Moore are the Democrats who've been pounding each other over the airwaves for a couple of months now. On the Republican side there are four or five guys who are relatively unheard of outside of their individual areas of the state.
This ad is about making Moore and Perdue look bad, and it smells like all the other ads over the years from the Jesse Helms machine.
I just wish I could figure out why the NC GOP is going after both of them now, before the primary, instead of saving their money for the general election campaign against only one of them that starts right after the primary.
I know they're up to something nefarious, I'm just not yet sure what.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8QW5RivftMA
to expose the ncgop.
When you compare the 3 candidates, one of the qualities that sets them apart is integrity. When Obama didn't denounce his pastor, that was as stunning as it was uplifting. When he spoke about the fact that people can be left so poor by it's government that they keep religion, guns or anything they find important close to them--he may have chose his words poorly, but was he was accurate. All Christians look to God in times of tribulation. It's a sad commentary that McCain is given applause for deceiving our people and Obama is crucified for having integrity and being honest. Our country/media just doesn't believe that such an honest person as Obama could exist in politics. But they do and every generation or so, we see such a person rise up and we should decide as one nation that enough is enough and applaud the few brave who chart new courses for America.
Like many Democrats, I (who see the Clinton Administration, for all its good stewardship of the economy and balancing the budget, for which he deserves ENORMOUS credit, as throwing progressive issues and interests, including moi, under a bus as president) am all the more appalled at HRC for her obvious willingness to seriously jeopardize the chances of the Democrats in Nov for HER own agenda. It isn't even as if there were some list of PUBLIC demands that she wants to extract as concessions from Obama, and her campaign is basically a negative 'kitchen sink' approach which I believe is so that she could run in '12 against a Repug incumbent, and win.
It was straight out of the republican’s playbook they have been playing that old saw since Ronald Reagan. It is an old Lee Atwater tactic.
Too bad you're just realizing that this is what the republicans do and the folks in the media play the public like fools by airing the commercials for free so they get even more air time.
McCain is going to be doing this oh so out raged crap until November so that he can give the appearance that he has risen above politics as usual.
Anyone with a brain knows that if Gore won , or was allowed to take his place as the winner, which he was in 2000, there's no way Gas prices would now be over $1.80. He'd have pushed automakers to give us better mileage, and would have demanded alternative energy sources that would now be now coming down the pike. Thanks a lot, idiots who voted for Bush.
Your post kicks *ss. Thanks.
It really, really, helps to look at the big picture. Hopefully, Barrack will be considering employing some definite, hard learned strategic big-picture moves in this campaign that are there for the taking.
You make a very good point about Hillary... She's shown her hand (and Bill's) way too much these last few months, and a great majority of voters like myself are very let down and not impressed. Her not taking on populist stances when she was the one person who could have, of ALL the candidates, while all those of us here on the left were looking to support her shows that she is flakey and will do whatever it takes. Maybe she was thinking she'd change after she assumed the White House... A woman has the right to change her mind, but principles are too strongly needed for the position she hopes for.