"To Attack, or Not to Attack?"
HAYES, STEPHEN F.
To Attack, or Not to Attack? The cultural contradictions of McCainism. BY STEPHEN F. HAYES At a town hall in this conservative suburb of Milwaukee last Thursday, a middle-aged man took the...
...Although the questioner had raised Obama’s associations, he hadn’t directly mentioned Bill Ayers, the man McCain chose to discuss...
...Four years ago, George W. Bush’s critique of John Kerry was a simple, twopointed attack: He’s too liberal and he fl ip-fl ops...
...He avoids tough decisions...
...Are Obama’s “shady characters” relevant or not...
...The Obama campaign, by contrast, seems to have settled on one message, which it is driving nearly every day: John McCain is too erratic to be president...
...He called for a federal spending freeze and then proposed having the Treasury buy individual home mortgages at a potential cost of $300 billion...
...The crowd roared its approval...
...We have corruption here in Wisconsin and voting across the nation...
...Many of these things are true, of course, but in trying to communicate all of these messages at once the campaign risks communicating none of them...
...Everybody in this room is stunned that we’re in this position...
...And on it goes...
...In the space of about ten minutes, John McCain seemed to be saying “yes” and “no...
...Everyone here is tickled at what you’re doing for us,” he said...
...Top aides Karen Hughes and Karl Rove circulated among the press pointing out that Kerry had voted for the resolution authorizing a war in Iraq that he had come to oppose and telling reporters that Kerry “really is a liberal who is out of touch with mainstream America...
...He’s too inexperienced...
...We have the good Reverend Wright...
...We need to restore hope and trust and confi - dence in America and have Americans know that our best days are ahead of us...
...He said big government caused the current fi nancial mess and then called for more of it...
...He has bad judgment...
...We’re all products of our associations...
...But I also, my friends, want to address the greatest fi nancial challenge of our lifetime with a positive plan for action that Senator Obama and I have...
...That’s the future and strength and beauty of America...
...It is, in short, a campaign heavy on tactics and light on strategy...
...So it was an aggressive answer and the audience loved it...
...There was no agreement, and he debated anyway...
...We know that’s not true...
...I am begging you...
...He’s all rhetoric...
...Such contradictions have become a defi ning characteristic of the McCain campaign over the last month as his strategists try to fi nd something—anything— that will stop his slide in the polls...
...We need to know the full extent of the relationship because of whether Senator Obama is telling truth to the American people or not— that’s the question...
...We’re all wondering why Obama is where he’s at—how he got here...
...Take it to him...
...James T. Harris, a black conservative who hosts a local radio show, told McCain that he had taken an “ass-whoopin’ ” for supporting the Republican over Obama and implored McCain to fi ght harder...
...I am begging you, sir...
...Look, we don’t care about an old washed-up terrorist and his wife, who still, at least on September 11, 2001, said he still wanted to bomb more...
...He’s not bipartisan enough...
...The crowd seemed confused...
...We have [the Reverend Michael] Pfl eger...
...His record is too liberal...
...And though Sarah Palin had accused Obama of “palling around” with Ayers, and other McCain campaign officials had discussed him, McCain himself had not...
...McCain’s answer focused on just one person Obama has hung with...
...Obama’s too risky...
...The point is Senator Obama said he was just a guy in the neighborhood...
...If they are successful, voters will enter polling stations with this thought in their head: Barack Obama cannot be trusted because he’s done nothing and has consistently put his own political ambitions before his country’s needs...
...Is there not a way to get around this media and line up the people that he has hung with...
...We have all of these shady characters that have surrounded him,” Harris shouted...
...By the end of the week, however, conversations with several McCain advisers indicated that the campaign may have settled on its closing argument...
...That’s not the point here...
...He’s the wrong kind of change...
...Ask McCain advisers for a succinct description of his message, and you’ll get several different answers...
...He suspended his campaign and threatened to skip the fi rst presidential debate unless there was agreement on a bailout plan...
...He has no record...
...Stephen F. Hayes, a senior writer at THE WEEKLY STANDARD, is the author of Cheney: The Untold Story of America’s Most Powerful and Controversial Vice President (HarperCollins...
...The crowd, which had been energized before McCain’s arrival by a lengthy stemwinder from former Wisconsin governor Tommy Thompson, applauded wildly and stood ready to explode as McCain began to answer...
...Moments later, though, McCain seemed to have a change of heart...
...BY STEPHEN F. HAYES At a town hall in this conservative suburb of Milwaukee last Thursday, a middle-aged man took the microphone and claimed to speak for the 4,000 others gathered in a gymnasium to hear from John McCain and Sarah Palin...
...Three weeks out from the 2008 election and John McCain’s campaign has no discernible central theme, no succinct answer to the most basic question voters ask as they consider their choice: Why should I choose you over the other guy...
...Yes, I’ll do that,” McCain said quickly and dismissively...
...Even for voters not inclined to believe the charge, McCain’s last month has lent it credibility...
...Much as he tried to obscure it, on issue after issue, my opponent showed why he’s earned the ranking, the most liberal member of the United States Senate,” Bush said at a campaign event on October 9, 2004...
...Ayers is the Weather Underground terrorist who has had friendly relations with Barack Obama for more than a decade...
Vol. 14 • October 2008 • No. 6
