Former Clinton strategist Mark Penn approves of John McCain’s Paris Hilton “celebrity” ad and negative ads in general, writing on Politico.com that “Clever negative advertising works. That is reality.”
He adds, “Done fairly, (negative ads) serve a legitimate role” by exposing an opponent’s weaknesses.
He’s right, of course, on one level — negative ads often do “work.” But at what cost?
Note that in the primary, Penn recommended an all-out negative strategy that would have attacked Barack Obama for not being “fundamentally American in his thinking and in his values.”
How would that have helped the party?
Clinton didn’t take the advice — to her credit. Penn’s piece is revealing about the warped mindset of winning at all costs that drives modern campaigns.
16 Comments
It’s way early in the campaign for McBush to go negative. And the key is: although it’s nicked Obama a bit, the strategy is not expanding McC*nt’s numbers.
The Rovians have clamped down on their cancer-scarred senile candidate. No more cell phones. No more “straight talk” with reporters. No more unscripted town hall meetings for the coot. They even went so far as proclaim, “The candidate does not speak for the campaign.”
Who cares?
Let’s get to voting – about 80 days to ‘git ‘er done’ and over with.
Hmmmm … If the candidate doesnt speak for the campaign, just who is it that the Republicans are running for POTUS???
“He’s right, of course, on one level — negative ads often do “work.” But at what cost?”
At what cost? What does that mean?
The cost of “it works”?
I think it is pollyannish, if that’s a word, to expect totally positive campaigning.
Candidates are comparing themselves against the other, past, present and future. You can’t do that without being critical. Of course, it can degenerate into mudslinging, but the presidential campaign hasn’t even come close yet.
outlander
Pollyanish, havent heard that word in a decade or more. Good one.
As long as you keep it factual there’s nothing wrong with painting your opponent in a negative light. You folks in the media need to get a grip, campaigns have always had the negative. What we see today is baby sheet compared to the stuff that went on “back in the day”.
This is politics. Winning IS the goal; if you don’t win, all the policy brilliance in the world don’t matter one whit.
By any historical standards, BTW, politics today is right polite and nice. Wanna really see nasty? Go back 100 years or so.
Negative ads work because they play to the LCD, unfortunate, but true.
See above posts for affirmation.
When Obama stands behind a podium and says “I am what you have been waiting for” then the Hilton/Spear ad is right on. He sees himself as a celeb and the public should be reminded of that. Truth hurts doesn’t it dems.
McCain has to go with what he’s got, and negative is all there is. What would an ad promoting his positives look like? We haven’t heard anywhere, or from anybody, anything about a McCain positive.
Politics has been negative and nasty forever but when Rove entered the scene negative took on a new nastiness — Swiftboaters, McCain’s black love child — that many voters finally recognized. And many voters really want more civility along with more substance. Add the dismal bushco to this recognition of Rovian politics, and negative doesn’t play as well.
We shall see! Soon!
Nasty wins, but their is a point where nasty/dirty campaigning a can backfire
Randy, you are a hypocrite, and a very uninformed hypocrite at that.
Why not do some RESEARCH on Obama?
Why not do some “investigative reporting” on Obama?
Why not do your job?
The MSM will NOT expose the inexperience or the radical leftist views of Obama.
McCain is doing YOUR job for you, since you refuse to do YOUR job!
One of Obama’s heroes is Saul Alinsky.
McCain is simply using Alinsky’s rules, much like Patton read Rommell’s book:
“Rules for Radicals”
“Always remember the first rule of power tactics: Power is not only what you have but what the enemy thinks you have.
Second: Never go outside the experience of your people. When an action is outside the experience of the people, the result is confusion, fear, and retreat.
Wherever possible go outside of the experience of the enemy. Here you want to cause confusion, fear, and retreat.
The fourth rule is: Make the enemy live up to their own book of rules. You can kill them with this, for they can no more obey their own rules than the Christian church can live up to Christianity.
The fourth rule carries within it the fifth rule: Ridicule is man’s most potent weapon. It is almost impossible to counterattack ridicule. Also it infuriates the opposition, who then react to your advantage.
Sixth rule: A good tactic is one that your people enjoy. If your people are not having a ball doing it, there is something very wrong with the tactic.
A tactic that drags on too long becomes a drag. Man can sustain militant interest in any issue for only a limited time, after which it becomes a ritualistic commitment.
Keep the pressure on, with different tactics and actions, and utilize all events of the period for your purpose.
The threat is usually more terrifying than the thing itself.
The major premise for tactics is the development of operations that will maintain a constant pressure upon the opposition.
If you push a negative hard and deep enough it will break through into its counterside; this is based on the principle that every positive has its negative.
The price of a successful attack is a constructive alternative. You cannot risk being trapped by the enemy in his suddenly agreeing with your demand and saying “You’re right – we don’t know what to do about this issue. Now you tell us.”
Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it.”
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BTW Alinsky is a hero of most Liberals. Hillary and Bill Clinton, Michelle and Barrack Hussein Obama, have ALL studied the Marxist, Alinksy, at leanth.
How about some “investigative reporting” you LAZY Eagle “journalists”?
How about telling your readers that the hero of the Left PREACHES DIVISION???
Negativity is a feature of “modern” campaigns? Randy, haven’t you read anything at all about the history of American politics? The stuff they do now is absolutely tame compared with what used to happen. Sure, with TV and the Internet, people hear things more quickly now, but the level of discourse was certainly meaner and dirtier in the 19th century than anything we see now.
Lindalinks, McCain has a long list of positive accomplishments. I think you must do most of your reading at moveon.org, which is why you’re not seeing anything about them.
One thing about McCain is that he has a real history of working across the aisle in the Senate in a bipartisan way to get things done. He has stuck his neck out on things like McCain-Feingold, McCain-Kennedy and the Gang of 14. These have all enraged the Republican base, but he did them anyway because he believed they were the right thing to do. He does not owe his nomination to the right wing base either. They went ballistic trying to stop him during the primaries precisely because they knew he wasn’t one of theirs.
By contrast, can anyone cite any instance in which Obama has worked across the aisle on a controversial bipartisan initiative or offended the party’s left by taking a bold stand they disagreed with on important legislation?
He owes his nomination to the hard work and big bucks of the far left, and is reliably the leftmost member of the Senate. There is not an issue on which he bucks the left’s position. By contrast, McCain is by far the most independent member, and least reliable vote, of the Republican caucus.