Negative campaigning—not that there’s anything wrong with that
A Presidential campaign is not a tea party, and it’s a bizarre and ultimately unrealistic affectation to think it won’t go negative sooner or later.
How can a candidate just say how wonderful he/she is without saying what’s wrong with his/her opponent? How is it possible to effectively present the reasons a person should vote for Person A above Person B without saying what’s wrong with Person B?
But there are many sanctimonious (and hypocritical) Pollyannas monitoring this campaign. This includes the NY Times, which recently gave Hillary a tongue-lashing for (gasp!) going negative on Saint Obama.
The Times places the blame for negative campaiging squarely in the Hillary camp: Obama is only going negative reactively, because he is “rising to Mrs. Clinton’s bait.”
In other words, Obama has the “she hit me first!” defense. And unfortunately, the Times can’t send them both to their rooms, although it might want to, and leave the field of negative campaigning to the Times itself—which will concentrate on the real enemy, John McCain.
But Obama hardly has clean hands. if you’ve read John Dickerson’s Slate article about the Obama campaign, it’s clear that Obama is simultaneously taking the high and the low road in this campaign, while claiming innocence—and no doubt laughing up his sleeve at the pack of us as he does so.
My strong suspicion is that no matter who ends up as the Democratic nominee, if he/she goes negative against John McCain this fall the Times and other liberal rags won’t utter so much as a peep of protest. I would wager the Times editors are angry now because they see the effect the feistiness of the campaign is having on the chances of a Democrat victory in 2008. The fear that what once seemed a sure thing—carefully nurtured by the Times during the eight hard years of Democratic exile from the Promised Land of the Presidency—might slowly be slipping away as a result of the bloodletting between the two Democratic candidates.
The myth that negative—“attack”—campaigning is the purview of the nefarious Republicans, and that the Democrats are just one big happy family pumping up each others’ self-esteem in time-honored liberal fashion, is just that: a myth. It’s always amusing to hear Democrats brand each other with the worst possible accusation, that of resembling Republicans—or even the worst of the worst, Karl Rove—when they diss each other. But there’s nothing especially kinder/gentler about Democrat-on-Democrat campaigns (see this, for example), or Democrats vs. Republicans in the general election (see this).
Negative ads are just fine with me if they are true. A candidate’s flaws need to be exposed, and candidates also need to show their ability to take fire, if only of the metaphorical variety. One of Obama’s especially unpleasant traits is his whiny imperiousness (not an oxymoron). He has a tendency to complain if anyone criticizes him, and then to claim that he himself is too high and mighty to descend to such rhetoric—even as he does just that.
It’s always amusing to hear Democrats brand each other with the worst possible accusation, that of resembling Republicans–or even the worst of the worst, Karl Rove–when they diss each other.
This always amazes me. Especially when it’s framed like
“We all know that Obama attending a racist church is something the Republican Attack Machine is going to gin up before the campaign”
(I made that up. but I heard things very simliar to it said by the Dems many time)
Here’s a good example by NPR:
http://www.npr.org/blogs/visibleman/2008/04/weathering_the_latest_obama_co.html
Anybody with half a brain knows this is a battle for control of the Democratic party. The Kennedys, Daleys, etc would like to take it back from the Clintons. I’m surprise anyone bothers to read the MSM these days.
As as for the Bill Ayers flap, I’m sorry but there is a huge difference between pardoning someone for a crime and befriending them. If it was the only mistake in judgement from Obama, it could be passed off. You can’t ignore it after seeing what his pastor is like.
But Obama was smooth in answering the Rev Wright question, where he seems to have lost that same rhetorical nuance since. Tired from many weeks of campaigning? Or did he already have the speech at least mentally written before Wright was “outed”? I’d say the latter.
Certainly, as Vince P. had mentioned, something for the Republicans to “gin-up”, as if there was nothing legitimate to be concerned for.
Obama is to politics what the Ab Roller is to physical fitness.
Huh?
Whats the difference? We have three choices for President to replace El Presidente Jorge Bush. Our three choices are a Marxists, a Socialist and a Democrat. All three have bought into AGW and all three are open borders.
It’s fascinated me how Obama is touted as a unifier, above the partisan fray, yet he can’t even unite his own party! Also that he’s the official candidate of ‘Hope’, but seems to be telling us about how bad everything is all the time (and of course, how he’ll save us from ourselves).
He smiles little, which also unnerves me.
He strikes me as profoundly negative, not so much in his campaign tactics, but in his outlook on the world.
SteveH Says:
Obama is to politics what the Ab Roller is to physical fitness.
harry McHitlerburtonstein the Extremist Says:
Huh?
The Ab roller is supposed to magically give you great abs while it ‘assists’ you in doing crunches. Thing is, you can do crunches without it and they’d be just as, if not more effective than with the Ab roller.
A big snow job, basically. Marketing.
S.S.D…candidate. 🙁
Ah! Thank you!
Bush is interesting in that he tends to go out of his way to avoid destroying a person’s character via ads or other uses of his power, even when that person is called Valerie Plame and has set out destroying everybody’s character in order to make money via book deals.