GOP Primary Megathread!

[HisMajestyBOB]

Hey Tim!
http://www.redbubble.com/people/basvanoerle
Get your Cosmonewt T-shirt here!

[Admiral Yi]

It depends which you mean the 'apology tour of the world' or the teleprompter.   They're both wrong, I think it's relatively easy to demonstrate otherwise and I don't think they fit with what most non-Republicans see in Obama.

It's kind of like the whole dangerous radical friend of Bill Ayres thing.  While that line of attack excited the base I don't think it was at all connected with the sort of impression most people have of Obama.  So they hear a line about him being mates with the Weather Underground, they look at Obama and don't recognise it.  Then the attacker ends up looking worse.

I don't see how you would easily demonstrate the 'apology world tour' is wrong.  That one is a question of tone and perception.

I also don't see how an attack on an aspect of Obama's life that some voters aren't particularly familiar with will necessarily backfire.  When the Jeremiah Wright videos first surfaced people didn't say, "I've never heard of this guy before, the folks that are playing these videos are obviously dickheads."

[Sheilbh]

I don't see how you would easily demonstrate the 'apology world tour' is wrong.  That one is a question of tone and perception.

A Republican candidate brings it up in a debate or in an ad and Obama can forcefully rebut it and then mention bin Laden, Awlaki, Gadaffi and, indeed, much of al-Qaeda.  It'll make the Republican look foolish.  He should work on a better more nuanced attack on foreign policy.

I also don't see how an attack on an aspect of Obama's life that some voters aren't particularly familiar with will necessarily backfire.  When the Jeremiah Wright videos first surfaced people didn't say, "I've never heard of this guy before, the folks that are playing these videos are obviously dickheads."

It's a matter of tone and style.  'An apology tour for America' is a big attack.  Similarly the Palin lines towards the end of the campaign were rhetorically very aggressive.

Wright's a different situation - that's why I didn't use that as an example.  That was a very real issue that Obama addressed and I think the attacks based on that were generally well done and legitimate.

With Bill Ayres it didn't work.  The whole line that he was a radical 'palling around with terrorists' or the Gingrich obsession with Obama as an 'Alinskyite Marxist' doesn't work for the reasons I've given.  Similarly I think that if the Clinton campaign had gone for Glenn Beck style lines about Obama 'hating white people' on the basis of Wright that attack would have petered out.  The story would have been more about their attack than Wright or Obama - this is what happened with Palin.

[Admiral Yi]

A Republican candidate brings it up in a debate or in an ad and Obama can forcefully rebut it and then mention bin Laden, Awlaki, Gadaffi and, indeed, much of al-Qaeda.  It'll make the Republican look foolish.  He should work on a better more nuanced attack on foreign policy.

Obama has cards he can play back.  That's not the same thing as saying the attack is patently wrong and instantly makes the messenger look foolish.

It's a matter of tone and style.  'An apology tour for America' is a big attack.  Similarly the Palin lines towards the end of the campaign were rhetorically very aggressive.

Wright's a different situation - that's why I didn't use that as an example.  That was a very real issue that Obama addressed and I think the attacks based on that were generally well done and legitimate.

With Bill Ayres it didn't work.  The whole line that he was a radical 'palling around with terrorists' or the Gingrich obsession with Obama as an 'Alinskyite Marxist' doesn't work for the reasons I've given.  Similarly I think that if the Clinton campaign had gone for Glenn Beck style lines about Obama 'hating white people' on the basis of Wright that attack would have petered out.  The story would have been more about their attack than Wright or Obama - this is what happened with Palin.

First you said they were wrong, then you said that it didn't fit people's perceptions, now your're raising another issue of the manner in which they're done.

The main reason Wright had traction and Ayers didn't was because there was no Ayers footage to air.

[grumbler]

The main reason Wright had traction and Ayers didn't was because there was no Ayers footage to air.

Precisely.  And there's no "world apology tour" and "speaking other people's lines on a teleprompter" footage, either.

I'm no great fan of Obama, and I'm undecided as to whom I will vote for in November, but I think Romney is definitely off on the wrong foot.  He's going to have to stop speaking nonsense if he wants me to take him seriously as a candidate.

[Sheilbh]

Obama has cards he can play back.  That's not the same thing as saying the attack is patently wrong and instantly makes the messenger look foolish.

Then we disagree.  I think that attack will make Romney look ridiculous in the eyes of non-Republicans. 

First you said they were wrong, then you said that it didn't fit people's perceptions, now your're raising another issue of the manner in which they're done.

They're wrong, they don't fit with people's perceptions - the reason for that is because they're so rhetorically over the top that they backfire on the attacker.  I said all of that in my first post on this.

The difference with Wright, in my view, was that it was right, it shook people's perception of Obama.  It was stronger because the Clinton campaign handled it well.

The main reason Wright had traction and Ayers didn't was because there was no Ayers footage to air.

There's a whole bloody documentary about Ayers and the Weather Underground.  Unlike with Wright there's footage of actual victims too.  There's a lot of footage of Ayers.

It didn't get traction, as I say, because it wasn't really true and the attack was over the top and too aggressive.  The connection was more tenuous and Obama by that point had already won lots of votes, he looked like a suburban dad not a terrorist - the same goes for Gingrich's obsession with Alinsky.

[Admiral Yi]

OK on the first point.  Let's see how it plays.  Although I doubt we'll see a survey on how the public feels about Obama's Cairo speech and the Russia reset button.

Ayers didn't work because it didn't match the perception of Obama as a suburban dad (city townhouse dad actually) yet Wright worked because it shook perceptions.  Contradiction!

I think to really hit you need footage of Ayers and Obama together.  Are you aware of any?

[Sheilbh]

Ayers didn't work because it didn't match the perception of Obama as a suburban dad (city townhouse dad actually) yet Wright worked because it shook perceptions.  Contradiction!

Not a contradiction.  Something has to be credible for the attack to work.  The attack about Ayers didn't because it wasn't really true, he didn't look like a terrorist and it was over the top.  So this backfired particularly on Palin.

The Clinton line on Wright was far more controlled and nuanced.  It was true and shook perceptions of him, people wondered whether they knew him.  Had they followed the Palin approach and gone for a Glenn Beck style incendiary remark about 'Obama hates white people', then they would have been the story.  I don't think it was strong enough to shake the perception that Obama isn't a racist.

The bigger the accusation or insinuation you make the less likely it is to seem credible, to gel with people's perceptions.  Do it right and it can work.

I think to really hit you need footage of Ayers and Obama together.  Are you aware of any?

No.  But I don't think the most important Wright footage was of him and Obama together.

[Admiral Yi]

To be clear Shelf, are we talking about "the apology thing" and "the Bill Ayers thing" in general terms, or in reference to some specific attack ads or talking points that have been launched?

[Razgovory]

Looks like a candidate for water boarding.

[Sheilbh]

To be clear Shelf, are we talking about "the apology thing" and "the Bill Ayers thing" in general terms, or in reference to some specific attack ads or talking points that have been launched?

Specific talking points as used by the Romney and McCain campaigns (though the Ayers thing was largely Palin going rogue I think).

[Admiral Yi]

The McCain attack ads on Ayers were yanked *not* because the public said these ads are clearly wrong and we think McCain is an idiot for airing them (which is fortunate for the public since it was information from the public record) but rather because McCain was unhappy with the hatred towards Obama that the ads were generating in the Republican base.

Can you give me some more information on Romney's "apology" attack?  I haven't heard of it until now.

[Sheilbh]

The McCain attack ads on Ayers were yanked *not* because the public said these ads are clearly wrong and we think McCain is an idiot for airing them (which is fortunate for the public since it was information from the public record) but rather because McCain was unhappy with the hatred towards Obama that the ads were generating in the Republican base.

I wasn't referring to an ad - I didn't know there'd been an ad campaign.  I was talking about Palin's repeated attacks at her events on Ayers-Obama.  As I say I think this was after she'd gone rogue.

Can you give me some more information on Romney's "apology" attack?  I haven't heard of it until now.

The basic is something along the lines of this 'The president went about this all wrong. He went around the world and apologized for America.'  He riffs on that in different ways in his stump speech, sometimes saying Obama travelled around the world 'to apologise for America'.  His book is called 'No Apology' and the entire foreign policy section is about alleged 'apology tours'.  The triumphant end of every Romney speech on foreign policy is when he says 'I will not apologize for America!'

As I say I think it's a mistake.  I don't think it's the way most voters see Obama, it's easily rebutted and it's a bit silly - like the teleprompter thing.  Romney should work on another line for foreign policy attacks.

[Admiral Yi]

I was expecting something truly zany the way you were carrying on Shelf.  That's not a new line, it was first used early in Obama's presidency when he was, you know, travelling around the world apologizing for America.

It can't be rebuted (and wasn't back then) because there's nothing that's factually incorrect.  It can be countered, in the ways you described.  But the fact that Obama has smited several of our enemies doesn't refute the claim that he apologized.

[Sheilbh]

I was expecting something truly zany the way you were carrying on Shelf. 

Not zany.  I think it's just a line that won't work and could cause more damage to Romney.

That's not a new line, it was first used early in Obama's presidency when he was, you know, travelling around the world apologizing for America.

It can't be rebuted (and wasn't back then) because there's nothing that's factually incorrect. 

It was wrong early in his Presidency and it's wrong now.  What are your examples of this apology tour?