It seems to me that many of the tactics that McCain is using so far are familiar. They have been tried before and, thank goodness, they failed. Although many would have been used anyway, I can't help feeling that the grueling primary season has helped McCain sharpen his message. Some common themes between the Clinton strategy used during the primary season and McCain so far include:
These are just some of the similarities. My question is: Was the prolonged (and some would say unecessarily long) nominating process good for Obama as the Democratic establishment would have us believe or did it just provide insights for McCain as to how best to attack Obama?
It's just a question but I feel it's worth asking?
What's your opinion?
From Yahoo!News:
The poll responses also show Obama has more work to do to quell fears among voters like Kirstie Hartle of Rome, N.Y., a registered Democrat who has never supported a Republican presidential candidate. With Clinton out of the race, Hartle said, "I'm Republican all the way now."
She said she doesn't like Obama's name and thinks he has a questionable background. She also said she thought Obama was deceitful when he broke from his church after it hurt his campaign, and she doesn't trust him to handle the Iraq war.
"It sounds to me like a Middle Eastern type of name and whether or not he's born here in the United States, he doesn't seem like, to me, somebody who is trustworthy," Hartle said in a telephone interview. "You can't trust anybody these days, so who's to say he's not a terrorist and we just don't realize it yet?"
How does one respond to this type of thinking?
"We ... know how the noblest sentiments can be subverted in the name of power, expedience, greed, or intolerance."- The Audacity of Hope, P. 8, Paperback editionIf Barack Obama adds Hillary Clinton to the ticket, it clearly would be political expedient and result in a few extra votes in November, but it would also be a betrayal of the very ideals upon which the whole campaign has been based.The Clintons tried to make the nomination process about race and gender, while Barack has inspired millions of people with the idea that we could do so much better, we can dream so much bigger, and indeed we do so much more in realizing the American ideal than any generation that came before us.The experts may say that Barack cannot win without Hillary on the ticket, but to those people, and to Barack's supporters, and to Barack himself, I say ... YES, WE CAN!
