Last week, Sen. Barack Obama enjoyed a nine percentage point advantage over Sen. John McCain in presidential polls. This week, the two are in a statistical tie. So what changed? John McCain’s strategy. The Arizona senator began leveling increasingly harsh and negative attacks on his rival last week. In television advertisements and on the campaign trail, McCain repeatedly characterized the senator from Illinois as inexperienced, naive and overconfident. He accused Obama of playing the race card and compared him to Paris Hilton and Britney Spears, implying that, while he has garnered a great deal of media and popular attention, the 46 year old is not ready to lead.While acknowledging there are three months before the election in November, and the possibility these attacks could have negative consequences down the road, it is still time to panic and ready ourselves for another four years of Republican rule. Negative attacks always work and, so far, Obama’s campaign has tried to take the high-road by calling McCain cynical, while not firing back similarly nasty rhetoric of its own. Remember when John Kerry tried to take the high road when confronting the attacks made by the Swift Boat Veterans? They ate him alive. People might say they don’t like negative campaigning, but they respond to it, and feeding people’s fears has always been a superb way of gaining power and influence.
Negative Campaigning Boosts Mccain
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