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July 30, 2008
Exclusive: Obama’s Campaign Strategy: Whining
John McCain is finally hitting Barack Obama where it hurts: Obama’s milquetoast support for American troops. Last week, the McCain campaign released a commercial entitled “Troop Funding.” “Barack Obama has never held a single Senate hearing on Afghanistan,” states an announcer. “He hasn't been to Iraq in years. He voted against funding our troops. Positions that helped him win his nomination. Now Obama is changing to help himself become president. John McCain has always supported our troops and the surge that's working. McCain. Country first.”
The Obama campaign, predictably, is upset about such commercials. Mostly, they’re upset that McCain has decided that surrender first isn’t only bad foreign policy - it’s bad campaign tactics. They prefer the John McCain who allowed Barack Obama to spout baloney at will for months. They don’t much like the McCain who battles his opponents on the issues.
“While Barack Obama wants to change American foreign policy to wind down the war in Iraq and address the grave threat posed by a resurgent al Qaeda and Taliban in Afghanistan, John McCain offers this patently misleading negative ad,” said Obama spokesman Bill Burton. “Given his calls for a civil campaign, it's disappointing that Senator McCain has slipped so easily into the same, tired campaign tactics that have become so familiar to the American people.”
Apparently, attacking Obama on the issues is now a “disappointing … tired campaign tactic.” McCain isn’t supposed to mention Obama’s failure to fund the troops, his repeated statements making light of military heroism, his pledge to cut military expenditures and scale back new weapons programs. He’s not supposed to mention Obama’s association with his radical preacher, his terrorist professor friends, his militant Palestinian advocates, or even his anti-patriotic wife. He’s not supposed to talk about Obama’s lack of experience and dramatic naivete.
It’s not as though the Obama campaign wants to silence McCain completely, however. They like when McCain speaks about how much he respects his fellow senator. They like when McCain sides with Obama on issues ranging from drilling in the ANWR to cap and trade restrictions with regard to emissions. Essentially, they like when McCain acts like a moonstruck schoolgirl. They like it less when he acts like a legitimate political opponent.
And so they condemn McCain as unfair. They complain that his attacks are scurrilous. They vilify McCain as wishy-washy on tenor and tone.
It’s the first time in American history that whining has actually been considered a full-scale campaign strategy. Bill Clinton used whining relatively sparingly during the 1992 presidential campaign – he complained that Republicans were unfairly attacking his wife (a tactic copied by Obama during the current election campaign). John Kerry used whining more frequently during his 2004 presidential campaign – he complained that Republicans were attacking his patriotism (a tactic similarly adopted by Obama). But both Clinton and Kerry actually campaigned on issues: Clinton campaigned on the economy, Kerry on the war in Iraq.
Obama, by contrast, campaigns solely on the power of his personality. He does not mention Iraq nearly as often as he used to, since his stance on the surge was clearly wrong. He does not mention the economy all that much, either, since his solution – taxing everyone more strenuously – isn’t particularly popular. He doesn’t campaign on the environment, campaign finance reform, or social issues, since his policies are less popular than McCain’s.
What, then, does he have left? His identity. Obama campaigns on the fact that he is young and has African ancestry. Anything else about his record or policies is, in his view, illegitimate campaign fodder. When McCain brings up these issues, therefore, Obama whines.
He does it magnificently. He is the finest whiner in American political history. He portrays complaints about his vicious pastor as insidious attacks on his race. He calls questions about his politically vocal wife violations of his honor. And attacks on his positions? Those, he says, are “disappointing.”
The most disappointing thing about this campaign, however, isn’t McCain’s attacks. It’s Obama’s strategy, which shuts down all legitimate political debate. Politics isn’t a tea party. Voters should be insulted by anyone who tries to make a presidential campaign into a game of patty-cake.
Family Security Matters Contributing Editor Ben Shapiro is a graduate of UCLA and Harvard Law School. He is also the author of the recently published "Project President: Bad Hair and Botox on the Road to the White House." Feedback: editorialdirector@familysecuritymatters.org.
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