Which One Is the Real McCain?

31 July 2008 |permalink | email article

IS he a happy warrior or an angry warrior as the dog days of August begin?

Angry seems to be winning as McCain continues an aggressive ad campaign to define Obama as arrogant, out of touch and unprepared for president.

The new round of nasty negative spots has pushed John Weaver, once one of McCain’s closest friends and advisers who resigned from his presidential campaign last year, over the political edge.

Weaver’s take on how McCain is losing it:

“For McCain to win in such troubled times, he needs to begin telling the American people how he intends to lead us. That McCain exists. He can inspire the country to greatness. There is a legitimate mockery of a political campaign now, and it isn’t at Obama’s. For McCain’s sake, this tomfoolery needs to stop.”

What did it for Weaver was a new TV celebrity ad linking Obama with Paris Hilton and Britney Spears as “childish.”

The intensity if McCain’s negative attacks and misleading assertions has surprised many longtime McCain supporters who believe, like Weaver, that he should be promoting his own positive agenda.

Late yesterday Obama fired back with an ad citing editorials critical of McCain’s attacks. He also reminded reporters “he doesn’t have anything positive to say about himself. You need to ask John McCain what he’s for and not just what he’s against.”

McCain’s campaign is now directed by members of Bush’s 2004 re-election campaign, notably Steve Schmidt, the war room czar and attack dog who savaged John Kerry as effete and elite and is attempting to recreate the same scenario in terms of Obama.

Some Republicans fear a backlash, as the New York Times notes today. “McCain does not like to follow a script. People who know him said it may be a challenge to apply the Bush model.”

The good news is that Schmidt gives Obama his opening to link McCain irretrievably to a third Bush term. 

Quote of the Day

*** I think people thought it was a sensible thing that was long overdue. I think the industry was very appreciative. It’s for those reasons that the oil industry has always tried to be a substantial contributor.” – Robin West chairman of PFC Energy, on McCain’s high profile split in June with environmentalist by reversing his opposition to a federal ban on offshore drilling.

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