How will McCain campaign against Obama?

[Danny White]

Obviously, running a campaign against Obama is trickier than running against Hillary. Hillary has a well-worn liberal track record, and high negatives that are not going to disappear anytime soon. Obama is much more likable, is a much smoother communicator, and doesn't have the long track record that Hillary has.

At the same time, Obama has been running to the left of Hillary and has embraced a platform that, when you look at it closely, is far more liberal than Hillary's.

Based on his campaign promises alone, Obama may very well be the most liberal Democratic nominee in recent memory.

How can/will McCain use this to his advantage?

Here are a couple of articles I came across today from the Republican blog "Redstate" that start to lay out a campaign strategy for McCain:

[Danny White]

http://redstate.com/stories/election...l_ not_cut_it

Advice for McCain vs. Obama: Pork and Earmarks Will Not Cut It
Start Thinking Strategically
By Dan McLaughlin

OK, with McCain stuffing the Huck-insurgency back in the bottle again yesterday, it's time to start thinking general election strategy. Now, we know the basics of what John McCain needs to do to beat Hillary Clinton, which is mostly based on (1) reminding voters that she is Hillary Clinton and (2) letting voters get prolonged exposure to watching and listening to Hillary Clinton.

[View Full Quote]But Barack Obama, if he manages to keep his back free of Clinton shivs long enough to secure the nomination, will be a more challenging nut to crack; he has far lower built-in negatives and is surrounded by a protective heat shield of worshipful press coverage. He's unlike the unlikeable and fundamentally disingenuous candidates the Democrats ran in 2000 and 2004, and much more similar to the candidates they ran in 1972 and 1984. That last analogy suggests why Obama, strong as he is on the surface, should not be confused with an unbeatable candidate.

Anyway, I'll start with one specific issue that I think needs not to be overplayed in a campaign against Obama: pork-barrel spending and earmarks. Yes, it's a hot issue and a worthy one. Yes, it contributed to the air of fiscal irresponsibility and corruption that fed the GOP's defeat in 2006, and from which McCain needs to distance himself. Yes, it's important to McCain's good-government, spending-hawk brand, is an issue he attacks with genuine enthusiasm and helps serve as a firewall against the charge that McCain's superior experience is a liability because he doesn't represent Abstract Nouns like a man who just got to Washington in 2005 and hasn't even located the big spigot where the taxpayer money flows from yet.

But for all of that, if Sen. Obama is the nominee, I hope Sen. McCain is clued in early to the fact that this issue is not going to be a useful distinction against Obama, for three reasons.

Read On...

1. People like Obama and think he embodies Change from Business as Usual. Trying to change that perception is going to be harder work than it's worth. You beat a guy like Obama by burrowing into his fundamental naivete, extremism and inexperience, by showing how his combination of extreme liberalism and lack of experience leads him to be very wrong on the very biggest of the big things, and to take extremist positions on cultural-signifier issues. Small-bore goo-goo issues won't do that.

2. One of Obama's very few actual accomplishments in DC was co-sponsoring the "porkbusters" bill on earmark disclosures with Tom Coburn. Granted, Coburn did all the heavy lifting, but Obama will get (deservedly) some credit for putting himself out there on the issue and reaching across the aisle.

3. McCain's been in DC so long, and Obama so little time, that it will be much easier to find examples of projects McCain himself has brought home than Obama. That's not to say that Obama has no weaknesses in this area; one can certainly point to letters Obama wrote as a state Senator in support of a $14 million taxpayer-funded housing project that yielded more than $850,000 in fees for now-indicted Obama fundraiser Tony Rezko. But while McCain has fought the good fight against some of Congress' most ridiculous wastes of money, he has never himself been entirely immune to bringing home what Arizona voters wanted.

McCain will talk about pork and earmarks in his stump speech; as I noted above, it's part of his appeal. But those of us who remember his 2000 primary campaign and other races like Rick Lazio's 2000 Senate race (which was run by the same people) know that "process" issues can grease a candidate's good press but they don't win elections; the big things do, the things that go to people's basic hopes, fears, needs and values. Let's hope Sen. McCain keeps that in mind in focusing his priorities. The remarks Ben notes from last night are, thematically, a good start.

[Danny White]

http://www.redstate.com/stories/elec...lenge_to_obama

McCain's Challenge to Obama
McCain rolls out his response rhetoric in Virginia
By Ben Domenech

If you want a preview of what strategy John McCain will apply against Barack Obama as a nominee, look no further than the remarks he delivered last night in Alexandria. You can watch video of it here.

We do not yet know for certain who will have the honor of being the Democratic Party’s nominee for president. But we know where either of their candidates will lead this country, and we dare not let them.

They will promise a new approach to governing, but offer only the policies of a political orthodoxy that insists the solution to government’s failures is to simply make it bigger.

[View Full Quote] They will appeal to our dreams of a better future for ourselves, our families and our country, but they would take from us more of the wealth we have earned to build those dreams and assure us that government is better able than we are to make decisions about our future for us.

They will promise to break with the failed politics of the past, but will campaign in ways that seek to minimize their exposure to questions from the press and challenges from voters who ask more from their candidates than an empty promise of “Trust me, I know better.”

...

Hope, my friends, is a powerful thing. I can attest to that better than many, for I have seen men’s hopes tested in hard and cruel ways that few will ever experience. And I stood astonished at the resilience of their hope in the darkest of hours because it did not reside in an exaggerated belief in their individual strength, but in the support of their comrades, and their faith in their country.

My hope for our country resides in my faith in the American character, the character which proudly defends the right to think and do for ourselves, but perceives self-interest in accord with a kinship of ideals, which, when called upon, Americans will defend with their very lives.

To encourage a country with only rhetoric rather than sound and proven ideas that trust in the strength and courage of free people is not a promise of hope. It is a platitude.

It's an interesting line of attack, and blunter than I expected it to be: the subtext is that McCain has seen Hope win through in the trenches, not the halls of Harvard Law. And its effect is one of reaching out to moderate Democrats and conservative Republicans who care about getting things done, effectiveness in leadership, while cornering Obama as a naif whose thinly disguised, hype-filled message of a New New Deal reaches out only to liberal Democrats. We'll see what comes of it.

[Doomsday101]

All I can say to my fellow conservative if you don't think McCain is conservative enough how conservative do you think Obama is?

[Sasquatch]

If Obama wins the democratic nomination, nothing short of a miracle will bring McCain the presidency as he is too closely associated with the current administration which the election will be a referendum on, and I don't think the religious right is going to be praying very fervently on his behalf.

His only hope is a Clinton comeback.

McCain's moment may very well have passed, his presidential aspirations swiftboated forever by Carl Rove in 2000.

[Doomsday101]

Originally Posted by Sasquatch

If Obama wins the democratic nomination, nothing short of a miracle will bring McCain the presidency as he is too closely associated with the current administration which the election will be a referendum on, and I don't think the religious right is going to be praying very fervently on his behalf.

His only hope is a Clinton comeback.

McCain's moment may very well have passed, his presidential aspirations swiftboated forever by Carl Rove in 2000.

Or conservatives will get out and vote in the general election to prevent Ted Kennedy Jr from winning the presidency. Obama is liberal enough for republicans to get out vote

[Sasquatch]

Originally Posted by Doomsday101

Or conservatives will get out and vote in the general election to prevent Ted Kennedy Jr from winning the presidency. Obama is liberal enough for republicans to get out vote

I don't get that sense. Moderate republicans seem quite willing to give him a chance to prove that his rhetoric has substance. And the extremists who are not keen on McCain don't appear to loathe Obama enough to go all out to defeat him. Of course, we can't tell for certain at this point, but those are my current impressions.

[ConcordCowboy]

It's the Republican's worst nightmare.

They don't like McCain...no Hillary to energize their base against her...and a guy who HAS energized people in Obama.

And the best is the Religious nuts don't have anyone to carry their cross.

Good times for all.

[Doomsday101]

Originally Posted by Sasquatch

I don't get that sense. Moderate republicans seem quite willing to give him a chance to prove that his rhetoric has substance. And the extremists who are not keen on McCain don't appear to loathe Obama enough to go all out to defeat him. Of course, we can't tell for certain at this point, but those are my current impressions.

I agree. I just feel things start to change once we get into the General Elections. I think McCain will get the support from top conservatives to help rally the Republicans. Right now Obama has been able to avoid the specifics of his call for hope and change I think we are about to see Hillary call him down for those specifics as she is fighting for her political life and I think that will play well for the republicans it is hard to fight change and hope until you know what a person is actually putting on the table.

[Mavs Man]

Originally Posted by ConcordCowboy

It's the Republican's worst nightmare.

They don't like McCain...no Hillary to energize their base against her...and a guy who HAS energized people in Obama.

And the best is the Religious nuts don't have anyone to carry their cross.

That is the most likely scenario if Obama wins the Democratic nomination.

McCain is the opposite of a firey orator - he trips over his own words, reads directly from notes (not glances, reads), and pronounces Washington "Warshington".

Yeah, with an 'r'.

Things could get nuke-ya-lur in War-shington.

[ConcordCowboy]

Originally Posted by Mavs Man

That is the most likely scenario if Obama wins the Democratic nomination.

McCain is the opposite of a firey orator - he trips over his own words, reads directly from notes (not glances, reads), and pronounces Washington "Warshington".

Yeah, with an 'r'.

Things could get nuke-ya-lur in War-shington.

If that meant anything Bush would never have gotten within a thousand miles of the White House.

Ever hear Bush pronounce Nuclear?

[Mavs Man]

Originally Posted by ConcordCowboy

If that meant anything Bush would never have gotten within a thousand miles of the White House.

Ever hear Bush pronounce Nuclear?

Sorry for the confusion - that's who I was referencing with the nuke-ya-lur part.

[burmafrd]

McCain has a secret weapon- he can pull out all the nice things the newspapers, Democrats and all the rest said about him when he was opposing bush, and being a rebel in the Republican party. then when they start to attack him he can whip out those quotes and ask them what has changed.

[burmafrd]

One thing the Real Campaign will highlight is how liberal Obama is; he will not be able to hide from that then. THAT will energize the conservatives and McCain also needs to remind them what happened the last time they sat out an election - 1992.

[Sasquatch]

Originally Posted by burmafrd

One thing the Real Campaign will highlight is how liberal Obama is; he will not be able to hide from that then. THAT will energize the conservatives and McCain also needs to remind them what happened the last time they sat out an election - 1992.

It may energize the republican base but Obama's advantage is that unlike Clinton he won't shy away from the term since he is not a product of the culture wars of that came out of the Vietnam Era. That will not only energize his own base but attract progressives and independents who might otherwise not support Clinton. And, frankly, I think many moderate conservatives would be more than willing to support a liberal who offered the possibility of transcending the debilitating politics of rapid partisanship.