Looks like the GOP in North Carolina ran an ad attacking Barack Obama, and by association the Democratic gubernatorial candidate for North Carolina, based on his association with Reverend Wright. I’m not going to agree with some in the media that the ad was in poor taste. I think the Wright issue is legitimate, as well as other folks Obama has close associations with. I don’t agree that this has anything to do with race, and I don’t get why other people want to wave that flag.
But nor am I going to join Rush Limbaugh in condemning McCain for distancing himself from the ad. From the McCain campaign’s point of view, it makes no sense to attack Barack Obama right now. If McCain or the GOP attacks him, you’re lending credibility to the notion of him being the nominee, and we don’t want that to start becoming a settled issue. With Hillary wailing away on Obama, and Obama outspending her six times over to not only lose, but to lose big, let the infighting continue. McCain and the GOP stand to gain nothing by attacking Barack Obama now, especially not on Rev. Wright. Let Hillary get dirty with him.
Let’s also not forget that the Republican have a lot of problems with the race issue, in terms of having certain people in the party who enjoy opening their mouths and inserting their feet. Not that the Democrats deserve a pass on this, by any means, but it matters little whether the the Wright ad was racist or not. There’s a public perception of the GOP as not being as good on racial issues as Democrats, and the media is only happy to foster that. The media meme was that the ad was racist, so McCain had everything to gain and nothing to lose by distancing himself from it. It allowed McCain too take the high road, while leaving Hillary to continue weakening Obama, and herself in the process. Either way this turns out, McCain gains. I would have imagined that people who follow politics as closely as Rush Limbaugh would realize that, but I have to wonder if they are too clouded by a seething hatred of McCain by this point to realize it.
I think Republicans are scared that they won’t win in November, and they want to see their candidate attack at every opportunity. Not saying that’s smart, but I think that’s what they’re thinking.
Yeah, it’s understandable. In this specific case I think there was also state political issues involved that caused them to be less than concerned about using Wright as a political wedge. But McCain’s response was the smart political move.