The money quote in this excellent article is this:
As the Clinton-Obama marathon proved conclusively, a photo finish is essential to the dramatic and Nielsen imperatives of 24/7 television coverage.
That should tell us all that we need to remember about the primary race, and what we need to remember about the general election. But while it may be annoying, obvious, irresponsible and confusing, that is not all bad. If the election campaign breaks the way I sense that it may, the greatest risk may be complacency. Never underestimate the complacency of the American people, the GOP certainly doesn't. They have signaled loudly and clearly that they are planning to go negative early, often and hard. What does that mean? It means they will be working (through surrogate groups) to paint Barack Obama as a socialist, Marxist, elitist, Communist, Muslim, radical black, corrupt, homosexual, liar, a sleeper Muslim "Meccan Candidate", someone who is too weak to lead, an ivory-tower academic, not a regular guy, someone whose wife runs his life, a black man, a black nationalist, disloyal, someone who took the oath of office on the Koran, a traitor, someone who never enlisted in the army, someone the soldiers will not trust or follow, someone who has no sympathy for the working class, someone who will ruin our economy with his liberal ideas, someone not fit to shine John McCain's shoes and someone who is unfit to serve in the Senate, let alone as President.
We may think we already have heard these themes, but what we heard were just the "try outs" for each negative theme. Now three or four of those will be selected and the airwaves will be carpet-bombed with those slurs. And worse. And they will have a negative impact, particularly on those who are wavering at this point. But with as strong a showing as this, since Obama seemed to pick up support during the primaries the more attention voters paid to him, the odds of people being able to shake off negative advertising and avoid complacency strike me as pretty good.
Arthur
As the Clinton-Obama marathon proved conclusively, a photo finish is essential to the dramatic and Nielsen imperatives of 24/7 television coverage.
That should tell us all that we need to remember about the primary race, and what we need to remember about the general election. But while it may be annoying, obvious, irresponsible and confusing, that is not all bad. If the election campaign breaks the way I sense that it may, the greatest risk may be complacency. Never underestimate the complacency of the American people, the GOP certainly doesn't. They have signaled loudly and clearly that they are planning to go negative early, often and hard. What does that mean? It means they will be working (through surrogate groups) to paint Barack Obama as a socialist, Marxist, elitist, Communist, Muslim, radical black, corrupt, homosexual, liar, a sleeper Muslim "Meccan Candidate", someone who is too weak to lead, an ivory-tower academic, not a regular guy, someone whose wife runs his life, a black man, a black nationalist, disloyal, someone who took the oath of office on the Koran, a traitor, someone who never enlisted in the army, someone the soldiers will not trust or follow, someone who has no sympathy for the working class, someone who will ruin our economy with his liberal ideas, someone not fit to shine John McCain's shoes and someone who is unfit to serve in the Senate, let alone as President.
We may think we already have heard these themes, but what we heard were just the "try outs" for each negative theme. Now three or four of those will be selected and the airwaves will be carpet-bombed with those slurs. And worse. And they will have a negative impact, particularly on those who are wavering at this point. But with as strong a showing as this, since Obama seemed to pick up support during the primaries the more attention voters paid to him, the odds of people being able to shake off negative advertising and avoid complacency strike me as pretty good.
Arthur
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