or us

""McCain is running for Bush's third term.""

Barack would argue the point... Given that we have 57 states and Arkansas touches Kentucky and Ilinious does not...

Barack also proclaims that McCain is running for Bushs' FOURTH Term, not third.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q4KVHusNZ_8

Fight the lies!

I think McCain should go with """He's young and inexperienced and he's got a funny name"""

What could possibly be better? Brought to us by Barack himself.

Someone suggested McCain should play the race card and claim the Democrats are going to point out how white he is and if you don't vote for the white guy, then your obviously anti-white and a huge racist.

No, the Democrats will play the ageist card, they'll point out how old he is and if you don't vote for the old guy, then your obviously anti-old and a huge ageist.

You didn't vote for McCain?
Why, do you hate you grandparents? Are you a age bigot? When you see Grandma coming to kiss your face, do you try to step out of the way? Do you avoid helping old women across the street?

Well, your jjust an ageist that hates old people, simple as that.

Posted by: Anonymous | July 6, 2008 4:15 PM

Case in point, there is no coherent narrative in your criticism. It has to be coherent, consistent, and it has to "fit" (ie, be believable).

The only theme that actually would fit Obama is the, "He's a cult leader." It's believable: he is popular, people do like him, his supporters are enthusiastic, and he does draw large crowds. It also attacks Obama's strengths and turns McCain's weakness (no one really likes him, and he doesn't have an enthusiastic following of grassroots supporters) into a virtue.

Another possible one: Obama isn't angry enough to attack America's problems with the strength needed. This is true (Obama has spent his entire campaign engineering things so that he never comes across as an "angry black man"), and Obama can't credibly fight this attack without tanking his own campaign. It also turns McCain's irrationality into a virtue.

I don't think these will ultimately work ("Vote for me! I'm not popular and not well liked!"), but they're the only two narratives that can be pressed against Obama that will actually stick.

"in the past month, the McCain campaign has tried deriding Obama's candidacy as 'just words,' attacked him for inexperience, insisted he was untrustworthy, and as of this week, are trotting out 'flip-flopper.'"

Actually, three of those charges sound a lot the same, and as a group they consort well with the remaining charge, that O is inexperienced. He's a fast-talking kid who makes a great first impression and doesn't care about anything beyond getting treated as a star. Or so the argument could run.

I really don't think it was the consistency. I think it was two things: the clarity that their attack had (everyone understood it, could be conveyed quickly and had an air of truthiness), and the fact that nobody on our side hit back worth a damn. Or hit something else. Or hit at all. Our problem in 2004 wasn't that we kept switching attacks, it's that the only meaningful attacks were staged by people preaching to the choir on the internet.

Obama needs to do what Kerry didn't: punch back with the same force and clarity. Liberals talk too damned much, and Obama is no exception. We'll see if he can do what he needs to do, but I doubt it.

I don't think that Republican line of attack on Kerry can be reduced to "flip flopper." There were really three distinct if not unrelated lines of attack.

One, the flip flop stuff.

Two, the Swift Boat, purple band-aid, denigrating Kerry's military service stuff.

Three, the Zell Miller, Kerry will surrender to Osama, Democrats are total pussies stuff.

Each of these was equally devastating I think. A similar three-pronged attack against McCain would work well also.

One, McCain = Bush's third term.

Two, McCain = you will lose your job.

Three, the Wesley Clark argument, that McCain's military service in no way qualifies the guy to be C in C. Oh and did you know he made a propaganda video for the North Vietnamese?

Fnor:

Yes, yes, exactly right. The narrative doesn't even have to be excessively coherent; in fact, I'd say the Repugs have nailed it that such counterpunching has to speak to McCaint's character, it has to attack his perceived or claimed strengths, and it can be in fact only tangentially 'true.' The slippery contamination of reasonably accurate info with wildly distorted accusations carrying the penumbra of authenticity has been one of the Repugs greatest accomplishments politically. Would love to see it shoved back down their throats.

They switched jarringly between claims of incompetence ideology, obstinance, corruption, inexperience, and inattention.

All of which turned out to be true in varying degrees. Never before has having more faults been such a strategic asset.

Kerry's major problem was that he flip-flopped on his own war service.

He claimed both that he was proud of his service and at the same time his service was illegal and he participated in war crimes.

It was like a Nazi guard at Auschwitz claiming he was proud to serve.

McCain is running for Bush's third term.

Ummmm...NO. McCain\-Kennedy, McCain-Feingold. Promoting a surge in Iraq when it was unpopular, etc......hardly!

I believe it's pretty well understood on both sides that ethanol from corn was a terrible idea.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/03/arts/03camp.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin

Ethanol is one area in which Mr. Obama strongly disagrees with his
Republican opponent, Senator John McCain of Arizona. While both
presidential candidates emphasize the need for the United States to
achieve “energy security” while also slowing down the carbon emissions
that are believed to contribute to global warming, they offer sharply
different visions of the role that ethanol, which can be made from a
variety of organic materials, should play in those efforts.

Mr. McCain advocates eliminating the multibillion-dollar annual government
subsidies that domestic ethanol has long enjoyed. As a free trade
advocate, he also opposes the 54-cent-a-gallon tariff that the United
States slaps on imports of ethanol made from sugar cane, which packs more
of an energy punch than corn-based ethanol and is cheaper to produce.

“We made a series of mistakes by not adopting a sustainable energy policy,
one of which is the subsidies for corn ethanol, which I warned in Iowa
were going to destroy the market” and contribute to inflation, Mr. McCain
said this month in an interview with a Brazilian newspaper, O Estado de
São Paulo. “Besides, it is wrong,” he added, to tax Brazilian-made sugar
cane ethanol, “which is much more efficient than corn ethanol.”

Mr. Obama, in contrast, favors the subsidies, some of which end up in the
hands of the same oil companies he says should be subjected to a windfall
profits tax. In the name of helping the United States build “energy
independence,” he also supports the tariff, which some economists say may
well be illegal under the World Trade Organization’s rules but which his
advisers say is not.

I think Ezra has the causality backwards.

The reason that Kerry tried out so many different messages, and the reason that McCain is trying so many different messages, is that they're losing. They're trying to find out what "works", but very few things are going to work because the country is most likely going to vote for the other guy.

It's easy to have message discipline when you're winning - it looks like the message is working!

It's definitely fun watching the Republicans flail around this time, but I think much of the different can be chalked up to structural factors. National elections are, in almost every case, reducible to structural factors.

It's just possible that all the criticisms of Obama are goign to gel into one cohesive criticism: he can't handle the job. First they lay the groundwork by spinning the facts to say he's a hypocrite, flip-flopper, weak, with poor judgement, etc etc - then they wrap it all up in a single attack. We are buying into the early stages of this now, and I think we should be careful. I'm iffy on Obama myself, but when I examine the charges of hypocrisy and flip-flopping, I don't think they're founded.

The problem with the flip-flopper charge is that is doesn't allow McCain to contrast himself with Obama in any meaningful way. In 2004, Republicans cast Kerry as a flip-flopper due to hsi own statements, but also to intentionally contrast Kerry's "waffling" with Bush's steadfast commitment. In this way, one of Bush's greatest vices (his unwillingness to adapt to changing circumstances or accept criticism) was recast as a virtue.

First, it is unlikely that McCain has this opportunity, as he, by his own admission, has changed positions on a number of issues. He even trumpets this fact when it comes to global warming and immigration reform. Also, I think given the state of the economy and the desire to leave Iraq, most people would prefer a strategy adapted to circumstance rather than "steely resolve." The fact that Obama's alleged change in position regarding withdrawal has had little traction with the American people despite the media harping shows this to be true. In fact, it may even help him.