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CLINTON WON THE BATTLE, OBAMA IS WINNING THE WAR. Improbably, the Clinton-Obama fight is still going strong and, also improbably, Obama now seems to have the upper hand. How do I know? In the first 24 hours after the debate it was Obama who was arguing Clinton was distorting his position, now it's Clinton's surrogates who are arguing Obama is distorting her statement. As Marc Ambinder pointed out, It's never a good thing in politics to say "what I meant to say was." That's the position Obama was in shortly after the debate:
[Clinton is] somehow maintaining [that] my statement could be construed as not having asked what the meeting was about. I didn't say these guys were going to come over for a cup of coffee some afternoon. From what I heard the point was well, I wouldn't do that because it might allow leaders like Hugo Chavez to score propaganda points. I think that is absolutely wrong.
Yet, in a deeply impressive bit of street-fighting the Obama campaign has managed to turn what originally was a Clinton attack on him into a counterattack on Clinton. On Thursday and Friday both campaigns were going at it. Obama called Clinton "Bush-Cheney lite" and Cliton's campaign called Obama "Naive." There were a bunch of "both sides think they can win this" articles and blog posts written. Today however, I'm ready to call this for Obama. Polling shows more people agree with him than Clinton (though this is probably a pretty hard question to poll fairly since it depends so much on wording) and Clinton's campaign is now on the defensive. Clinton supporter and first-tier surrogate Tom Vilsack is now saying that Clinton actually agrees with Obama:
"Rather than just simply acknowledging the mistake that was made during the course of the debate, the Senator has attempted to distort Senator Clinton's record in an effort to mask this confusing statement of his," said Vilsack. "It's not the Iowa way." Vilsack also scolded Obama for comparing Clinton's foreign policy philosophy to that of the Bush administration; "These comments are so wrong, one could say that they are certainly audacious, but honestly they are not particularly hopeful," said Vilsack.
You know you're losing when you start complaining that the other side is being unfair in not "admitting the mistake." The Obama campaign is packed with incredibly sharp people (as of course is Clinton's) and any candidate who thinks Obama's rhetoric means he won't be willing to give as good as he gets is going to be quite rudely surprised.
As the ever-prescient E. J. Dionne noted last Friday, this debate helps Obama in two ways. First, he gets to go one-on-one with the frontrunner which is a good for him and bad for her. Second, it allows him to make the debate aobut her vote for the Iraq war. Clinton's strength, experience, has gone head to head against Obama's, his better record of judgement and his commitment to change, and, based on the evidence above, I think Dionne's analysis is right and Obama will come out this fight strengthened.
--Sam Boyd
COMMENTS (8)
"It's not the Iowa way."
It's the Chicago way, the "you pull a knife, we pull a gun" way. Welcome to the big leagues Gov. Vilsack. You got and your candidate got pantsed on the merits.
It's a media construction that Obama's "new kind of politics" means he is Mr. Nice Guy. What's new is fighting to do the people's business in the sunshine, FIGHTING to make the playing field of politics the same as the playing field of the governed.
Obama has never been preaching a "can't we all get along" puree of insider wisdom. He's talking to all people because the powers of goverment derive from the consent of the governed.
Posted by: joejoejoe | July 30, 2007 9:19 AM
I'm not sure what Barack O'Reagan's diplomacy position will be tomorrow. Perhaps he doesn't, either.
As of today, however, having studied O'Reagan's many, many, statements over the past week, I think I have my head wrapped around his current view of Presidential diplomacy.
O'Reagan thinks that preconditions are OK on the condition that conditional conditions are previously agreed upon. Further, under the Conditional Propaganda Clause, there are conditional exceptions to this rule, but only under certain conditions.
Are we clear now?
Posted by: JoeCHI | July 30, 2007 9:36 AM
Clinton dserves a smackdown for calling Obama "naive" and by distorting the clear intention of what he said in the debate.
For his part, Obama better resist the temptation to bring up her war vote every time a spat erupts betweeen them, lest he go to that well too often. He should hit that issue hard only after the field has been winnowed down to a clear Obama v. Hillary race.
Oh, and Joe CHI, is Clinton's extremely narrow definition of "meeting" make how she intends to deal with our foes that much clearer? At least Obama is clearly on the record supporting a meeting. Clinton, on the other hand, still thinks the high-handed approach is best. Except when George Bush uses it, I guess.
Posted by: brewmn | July 30, 2007 11:20 AM
Obama has proven to me that he has what it takes not to back down when he's been hit unfairly. That goes along way in allaying any worries I've had about him, and towards mitigating some of Clinton's strengths.
And for the love of god, why would Hillary be so stupid as to make an attack like this? It may make her look strong, but it feeds directly into her opponents; and even some of her supporter's, worries about her right wing tendencies.
Posted by: soullite | July 30, 2007 11:49 AM
JoeChi, so making up lame Republicanesque nicknames for a candidate you hate is going to make us like your beloved neocon Hillary?
I doubt it, bub. Go sell your shit to people who might actually buy it.
Posted by: Anonymous | July 30, 2007 12:03 PM
It was Obama's campaign as well as Obama himself who invoked both the policies and the politics of Reagan.
If you have an issue with it, you should communicate them to O'Reagan's campaign directly. ;)
Posted by: JoeCHI | July 30, 2007 12:56 PM
Ooooh, O'Reagan huh? How witty.
Posted by: Col Bat Guano | July 30, 2007 1:33 PM
Obama proved himself adept at taking a potential disaster and turning it to his advantage. The headline of the debate could have easily been "Obama promises to meet with Chavez and Ahmadinijad during his first year in office." Instead he managed to make the argument with Clinton the big story. Did he count on the press liking the fight between them better than the "scandalous" headline? Though I agree with Clinton on substance (IMHO she answered the exact question they were asked better than Obama did), I do admire his comeback skills last week.
Posted by: Dawn | July 30, 2007 5:16 PM