Posted by
Matt Purple on Monday, June 09, 2008 12:02:14 PM
So much for hope and change and unity and love and peace.
According to the New York Times, Barack Obama's campaign is stepping up the heat on John McCain now that liberal fellow-traveler Hillary Clinton has been vanquished. Their first move? Obama '08 has hired Dan Carroll, who gained notoriety and a reputation for ruthlessness as chief opposition researcher for the DNC in 1992. Among the slime leveled by the Democratic Party that year was the absurd and thoroughly unsubstantiated claim that George H. W. Bush cheated on his wife with his secretary Jennifer Fitzgerald. Bush furiously denied the allegation and it ultimately faded into the memory sinkhole. Meanwhile, the DNC was working past 5 to obfuscate Bill Clinton's verifiable affairs, particularly with Gennifer Flowers.
The notion that a presidential campaign would hire an opposition researcher is neither shocking nor immoral. But that a political goody-two-shoes like Obama -- who has grabbed the nation's consciousness by relentlessly emoting about Uniting America and Running a Different Kind of Campaign -- would hire a scum peddler like Carroll gives you a headache from all the cognitive dissonance. I'm not feeling the hope and change, in other words. Even the Times demurely remarked that, "for all the talk on both sides about a new kind of politics, the general election campaign is likely to be bloody."
Somewhat ominously, the Obama campaign also let it be known that they planned to venture into red-state strongholds like North Carolina and Missouri. Such a "50 State Strategy" has been tried by Democrats before: DNC chair Howard Dean burned money on it in the 2006 election and Rahm Emanuel had to step in and save the party. This time around though, the Democrats are far better funded and can scream about the failing Iraq war and skyrocketing gas prices to potentially-sympathetic blue-collar Republicans. The GOP should take note: Obama intends to run a brutal campaign. The usual suspects and strategies are in play and the Democrats have wind in their sails. For all his vaunted moderation, McCain is at a disadvantage and will get no honeymoon from the left.