Turning point

Karl Rove interprets Obama's Tuesday night speech as a major turning point in Campaign 2008.  According to Rove, Barack Obama has left himself wide open to valid criticism from campaign adversaries.

Perhaps in response to criticisms that have been building in recent days, Mr. Obama pivoted Tuesday from his usual incantations. He dropped the pretense of being a candidate of inspiring but undescribed "post-partisan" change. Until now, Mr. Obama has been making appeals to the center, saying, for example, that we are not red or blue states, but the United States. But in his Houston speech, he used the opportunity of 45 (long) minutes on national TV to advocate a distinctly non-centrist, even proudly left-wing, agenda. By doing so, he opened himself to new and damaging contrasts and lines of criticism.

Mr. McCain can now question Mr. Obama's promise to change Washington by working across party lines. Mr. Obama hasn't worked across party lines since coming to town. Was he a member of the "Gang of 14" that tried to find common ground between the parties on judicial nominations? Was Mr. Obama part of the bipartisan leadership that tackled other thorny issues like energy, immigration or terrorist surveillance legislation? No. Mr. Obama has been one of the most dependably partisan votes in the Senate.

Mrs. Clinton can do much more to draw attention to Mr. Obama's lack of achievements. She can agree with Mr. Obama's statement Tuesday night that change is difficult to achieve on health care, energy, poverty, schools and immigration -- and then question his failure to provide any leadership on these or other major issues since his arrival in the Senate. His failure to act, advocate or lead on what he now claims are his priorities may be her last chance to make a winning argument.

With regard to campaign strategy Rove and McCain are of the same mind, and I think it's safe to say McCain will follow the Rove prescription.  If she's smart Hillary Clinton will too, but even she does it may be too little, too late to salvage her shot at the presidency.  Rove is almost always on the money and Republicans will do well to follow his advice.

They didn't in the summer of 2006 when he came to Manchester, New Hampshire to urge Republicans to campaign on the Iraq war. 

As for the 2006 Republican defeat, in part it can be chalked up to the fortunes of war but in greater part to the failure of Republican candidates to follow Rove's campaign formula.  In the summer of 2006 Rove came to Manchester with a message for New Hampshire Republicans.

In a speech to New Hampshire Republican officials here Monday night, the White House deputy chief of staff attacked Democrats who have criticized the U.S. war effort in Iraq, such as Sen. John F. Kerry (Mass.) and Rep. John P. Murtha (Pa.), who he said advocate "cutting and running."

"They may be with you for the first shots," Rove said of such opponents. "But they're not going . . . to be with you for the tough battles."

He said that Republicans should not to avoid the topic of Iraq in the upcoming campaign, but instead they should make it the center piece of their campaigns.

He defended the administration's decision to invade Iraq by laying out Saddam Hussein's "vital interest" in acquiring advanced weapons technology.

"We were absolutely right" to remove him, Rove said of the former leader. He added, "We have no excuses to make for it."

The example of Joe Lieberman, the Democratic hawk from Connecticut, proved him right.  Running as an Independent after losing to anti war Democrat Ned Lamont in the primary, he campaigned hard on the importance of winning the war in Iraq and defeated Lamont in the general election.  On the other hand, Republican candidates who hoped to distance themselves from the President on Iraq were so successful that they distanced themselves right out of Washington.

Then, as now, McCain was a strong proponent of the rightness in taking down Saddam Hussein.  He has been loudly critical of the Iraq war at times, but his criticisms have been aimed at the strategy, not the goal.  The strategy has changed and because of it, prospects in Iraq have improved dramatically.  But the goal and McCain have both remain the unchanged.  It should be no surprise that McCain is on course to be the last man standing in the Republican race, and if the example of Joe Lieberman is any indicator, McCain will be the last man standing in November.

Republicans are being given a "do over" in the 2008 campaign.  They have another chance to take Rove's advice from the summer of 2006.  All they have to do is hitch themselves to McCain's star.

Comments

[john wieder TX-22]

Hi, I am a real Libertarian cause I got a card. Yes the
democratic candidate you speak of, and I do not like to give him an inch and mention his name, is further to the left, than the x presidents wife, who is also a candiddate. Yes, Mc Cain compared to him, is an ultra conservative like me. thanks MGB