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On The Importance Of Going Negative On Obama

Submitted by Sean Oxendine on Fri, 08/15/2008 - 20:33

The conventional wisdom is that going negative on an opposing candidate is a risky decision for a candidate to make.  The convetional wisdom is that it is doubly risky for a politician like John McCain, who owes much to his reputation as a maverick politician who rises above the normal give-and-take of politics.

I think most readers here instinctively don't buy the  conventional wisdom (and I think some are just happy to see someone finally rip into Obama).  But I've been noticing a trend that validates this intuition.

Over at Race42008.com, they regularly collect polls.  It is one of my first stops every time I take a blog break at work.  I've gone back through and collected McCain's percentages over the month of August from Rasmussen Reports, as well as Obama's unfavorables.

State McCain % Obama unfavorable
ME 36 36
NC 46 48
MN 42 42
CO 47 45
KS 52 52
VA 44 47
NV 45 51
IA 41 43
OR 37 39
WA 40 42
MO 48 46
MI 40 45
MA 36 39
WI 43 47
NY 32 39
NJ 40 38
AL 55 57
CT 36 38
AZ 52 55
AK 44 45

 

It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out the pattern here.  McCain gets people who don't like Obama, and not much more, and not much less than that.

The key to winning this election is to make people like Obama less.  People who don't like McCain vote for Obama.  People who like McCain and Obama vote for Obama.  McCain needs to make more people that either like McCain and don't like Obama, or don't like McCain and don't like Obama.

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Comments

Going Negative Works

Submitted by Jeff Roberts on Sat, 08/16/2008 - 01:32.

McCain is not going to win this election because the voters appreciate him pulling his punches against Obama.

McCain got back in this race, and started pulling even in the polls when he started going on the attack against Obama, and that is key to winning this election.  McCain's job is to expose Obama as the inexperienced, far-left empty-suit he really is.  Make Obama a risky proposition to the American voters. 

Liberals are still whining about the "racist" Willie Horton ad that Bush Sr. used against Dukakis, but it was fair and truthful, and it put Bush in the White House.  I really doubt Bush regrets using that ad to expose Dukakis.

Obama is a very vulnerable candidate for negative attacks, McCain is much less so.  Obama's policies are far to the left of any leader America has ever had, and he also has the thinnest resume.  As long as McCain doesn't hit below the belt, (he hasn't, and he won't)  McCain should hammer on Obama every day and not let up until the election.

Every election cycle, Americans say they don't like negative ads, and every election, they work.

 

 

the campaign should be based on vision, issues and exper.

Submitted by mnmod on Sat, 08/16/2008 - 09:48.

With nearly thirty years in Washington, Mccain should on his record of leadership experience and solid support of conservative policies (which everyone knows are the best.)

when you have nothing else, you go negative

Submitted by superdestroyer on Sat, 08/16/2008 - 12:25.

I guess when a party has a candidate who cannot deliver a speech, who has a limited grasp of the issues, who has zero leadership skills, and who depends of an incompetent staff, then that party has to go negative.

It is not like one can depend upon the Republicans to ever implement any of the campaign promises.  It is not like one can expect the Republicans to live by the rules that want to set for others.  It is not like one can expect the Republicans to do their homework and really understand the issues.  It is not like one can expect the Republicans to be able to prepare a speech withouth cutting and pasting off of the internet.

Until the Republicans find a full set of candidates who are not incompent, stupid, and lazy, the dead spral of the Republicans will continue and we all will be left with a negative only campaign.

When the leader of the Republican party is too stupid to realize the massive budget deficits are bad and that open borders makes limited government impossible, then I guess mocking someone for their middle name is all that is left.

 

 

 

you've set up a macro for this post, right

Submitted by Ironman on Sat, 08/16/2008 - 13:55.

since you've posted the same thing virtually verbatim at least twenty times here

I vary the response

Submitted by superdestroyer on Sat, 08/16/2008 - 14:08.

Of course, no one has challenged me it on things like the failure of Republicans to actually be conservative or actually deliver what they promise during the election 

 

Well, sadly, it's tough to challenge such a claim

Submitted by lagomorph on Sat, 08/16/2008 - 15:38.

This is why I became interested in politics.  Many politicians are completely incompetent.  Only a very, very few are what history will look back kindly on as either "brilliant" or "lucky" (or both).  We all considered Reagan and Pope John Paul to have ended the Cold War and brought down Communism, but here we are watching Russia reclaim its Evil Empire again under a totalitarian capitalist society in which Gazprom and energy domination have replaced totalitarian Marxism. 

Most of the people we work with, and who are placed in leadership roles in the military, the government bureaucracy, large corporations, small businesses and heads of families are all incompetent in some form or other.  They can excel in certain areas and completely fail in others.  This is what some people call "being human".   Somehow we all sort of muddle along in spite of these handicaps.  Maybe we won't always be so lucky.  Maybe some incompetent, self-righteous human will end up getting the nuclear football codes, and badda boom, badda bing!  That's Darwinism at work in all our lives, folks.

Politicians reflect the world-at-large, yet we expect them to be somehow far superior to the rest of us.  Then, when they turn out to be just like the rest of us, we hate them even though we elect them into positions of power.  I think the entire phenomenon is simply fascinating and very Freudian.  The whole Bush Derangement Syndrome looks to me as though it's a hybrid of the same type of mass mental disorder that we observed during the Salem Witch Trials combined with an Oedipal "I want to kill Daddy" complex fueled by the media, the Internet, the arts and academia. 

One of the most amusing things about modern society is watching libertine liberalism evolve into the "establishment" while conservatives have gone underground and turned into the radical opposition.  Who knew?  Well to be fair, I guess George Orwell did. 

"The most expensive commodity in this country is ignorance" ~ Rush Limbaugh.  In modern society and politics (and throughout our entire history), we've got plenty to go around on all sides.  Once you go through the 5 stages of grief on the subject, you will eventually get around to acceptance. Resistance really is futile.

do need to get excited about elections

Submitted by superdestroyer on Sat, 08/16/2008 - 18:30.

If politicians are not going to be held responsible for their promises and if neither party is capable of delivering what they promise, they  why get excited about elections

Maybe the first thing that everyone involved in politics should do is stop making excuses for the incompetence of any elected leaders.  The Republicans threw away all credibility with the repeated excuse making for the incompetence of the Bush Administration.  maybe in the future, there will be a few leaders who will either succed, apologize, or resign instead of the constant excuse making.

Also, I believe that Karl Rove is the one who claims that policy and performance does not really matter and that everything in politics is marketing. Of course, President Bush followed the advice of Karl Rove and will leave office with a 20% approval rating and a disaster of an administration

 

Worse than a Republican breaking a campaign promise....

Submitted by Ironman on Sat, 08/16/2008 - 17:09.

is usually when a Democrat keeps one

Oh Ironman, you and P.J. O'Rourke

Submitted by lagomorph on Sat, 08/16/2008 - 17:56.

Your quote so reminds me of this one of P.J.'s:

The Democrats are the party that says government will make you smarter, taller, richer, and remove the crabgrass on your lawn. The Republicans are the party that says government doesn't work and then they get elected and prove it.

 

Ah yes, you need to keep us Irish guys away....

Submitted by Ironman on Sat, 08/16/2008 - 18:00.

from liquor and keyboards

But don't we do our best writing after a few Glenfidditches?

Submitted by lagomorph on Sun, 08/17/2008 - 16:22.

Or for those of us like me-self who are as sober as judges, may I at least please have 3-4 shots of espresso?  Which reminds me, I kept referring to Michael Phelps all weekend as Michael O'Phelps.  My husband, who is Italian, called me on this and every time I responded, as he should well know by now, that in my world everyone is Irish and Michael O'Phelps will never, ever walk alone.  Heh.