One thing I didn’t understand about the 2000 election – among a million other things – was how Al Gore’s campaign never managed to say the one thing that should have persuaded the most voters, namely: “what part of eight years of peace and prosperity didn’t you like?” Arguably, he wanted to stay away from invoking the unsavory elements of Bill Clinton’s reign, but this was potentially a fatal miscalculation. Ahhh, anyways, hindsight is 20/20.
Moving on. Why isn’t the picture to the right in every single general election centered ad run by the Democratic party? George W. Bush has the highest disapproval rating in the history of the Gallup poll. And he and John McCain agree on a lot of the issues. After all, McCain is running on a platform that supports a war opposed by a supermajority of Americans, a war started by Bush. The ads write themselves: “George Bush got us into this war, and John McCain will keep us there.”
McCain currently describes himself as a maverick, potentially distancing him from Bush, but it’s our fault if we let him keep that label. It seems almost too obvious to point this out, but the Democrats need to do a better job equating John McCain with George W. Bush. If the nomination battle isn’t over yet, perhaps, at least, the Democrats could start a coordinated spin effort.
Discussion
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