Ah, forgot about that William Jennings Bryan quote. Classic old dude talk.

http://strategy08.wordpress.com

Beautiful words cannot make our lives better ... Don't hope for a better life -- vote for one.

I like that you're told "words don't mean anything" right before you're hit with a slogan.

correction: Should we be surprised McCain is adopting the losing strategy of HRC? No. Hillary lost and McCain will too.

The McCain team seems to have calculated that the differences in the primary and general election electorates are substantial enough that the same attacks that failed last time will work this time. But this is nonetheless a big gamble for the McCain camp. Obama has already faced down these same attacks -- and won.

Cue Fogu2 & al to tell us that 1) Obama never really won and 2) these attacks are definitely going to work this time around and aren't we going to be sorry that we did not listen to them in March and April when they tried to warn us of as much.

Hillary certainly helps with her soft ass attacks on McCain.

"They say some of my supporters are considering voting for McCain. Folks, that's four more years of George W. Bush. Those who voted for me should no doubt cast another vote for Senator Obama in November (WINK WINK)."

If she'd go half as hard at McCain as she did Obama and make it clear that he's her enemy, maybe his mimicking of her campaign wouldn't be as effective. Instead it seems like she enjoys not being in the crosshairs of Republican attacks for once and wants to bask in her temporary role as the untouchable blue collar madam for as long as she can.

Notice how almost all of those attacks came AFTER she had any chance of winning...

Can we say Charlie Black = Mark Penn? I can see the connection going by the strategy employed by both campaigns.

Charlie Black and Mark Penn are great buddy

Let's not do cause and effect in the wrong order.

These attacks on Obama are where he is vulnerable. Experience, leadership, words not action, his early ads were a celebration of his celelbrity, of himself by his supporters.

He is vulneravble there. and IT WAS EXPECTED BY ANYONE WHO COULD THINK AHEAD THAT THIS IS WHERE THE REPUBLICANS WOULD ATTACK HIM IF HE BECAME THE NOMINEE.. So he's the nominee, so he's being attacked on his vulnerablilities...

The Republican attacks are happening on theri own not becasue of Hillary Clinton. Whether she was silent or even praising of him ...the republicans would still be attacking these things.

So Hillary attacked him on his weaknesses. He attacked her weaknesses. Do you expect a campign in the primary that would never mention an oppnent's weakness? I hope not...do we really want such wimpy nominees?

What a silly piece of reasoning is contained in the following paragraph of yours:

The McCain team seems to have calculated that the differences in the primary and general election electorates are substantial enough that the same attacks that failed last time will work this time. But this is nonetheless a big gamble for the McCain camp. Obama has already faced down these same attacks -- and won.

First, Clinton's attacks on Obama were pretty effective. They may not have won her the nomination, but they made this a historically close primary race, with her outpolling him in many major battleground state primaries. His delegate victory was due almost entirely to his out organizing her on the ground in caucus states dominated by voters who were tailor made for him and not for her.

Moreover, the voters in the democratic primaries and caucuses were choosing between two democrats and are voters who are mostly rock solid democrats or almost certain to vote democratic in the general election.

That her attacks did not fully succeed in the primaries is exactly zero measure of how effective they will be in the general election.

Of course I'm sure you do understand the huge difference between a primary/caucus system and the general election. But just to make sure I'll note two things. First off, the general election is a plebiscite and not a caucus. Which means all comers have an equal chance of partaking. You don't have to commit hours. You get to vote in secret. And no electioneering is allowed near the polls.

Second, it's a contest not between committed democrats to decide which of two democrats they prefer but a contest between a democrat and a republican -- who start off with very different base votes. Each of them is guaranteed 40+ % of the vote already. The voters not already committed are pretty much up for grabs. The general election is partly about mobilizing your guaranteed 40+ %, but it's also partly about swaying those who haven't paid much attention and don't have much ideology and aren't very political to begin with.

That Hillary's attacks didn't sway enough voters to give her the nomination during the primaries means, I repeat, almost nothing about the effectiveness of similar attacks in McCain's hands when they are aimed not at committed democrats but at swaying the marginal voters who decide elections and the mobilizing his core voters to turn out.

FInally, I should say that the attacks that Hillary and now McCain are mounting against Obama are the attacks that ANY opponent would mount against him. If you were a political consultant and you didn't advise your candidate to do just what Hillary did and McCain is doing, you'd be guilty of malpractice.

Theclintons should demand royalties. They could pay down their debt that way.

Her lackluster support of Obama is indication that she is still bruised...in addition to her wanting toget her debt paid and her facetime at the convention...It was ALWAYS predicted that McCain/repubs would use these! She was warned but ego/ambition got inthe way!!

So she was helping McCain after she discovered she could not win...very classy, indeed!

HORSEPUCKY cubed.

If you simple and gentle folk cannot tell the difference between the Points made by Clinton and those by McSAME, then God help this country.

I would never never never vote GOP, but you all make me feel sad to vote for someone you would support. I continue to talk to Dems who supported Clinton and are seriously going to vote McCain. I do not get it at all. They are troubled by Obama and his recent flipflopping back and forth. Yes, I know McCain is a pin wheel and a pin head, but these are smart people who are not bigots. They are just not convinced.