Will Obama Go Negative
Will Obama Go Negative?
For the last several weeks I’ve had what I considered a pretty clear idea of how I thought things would play in Pennsylvania, and up until now I’ve been pretty close. I was always of the opinion that Obama would close the gap to single digits in the weeks prior to the primary, maybe even take a slight lead. I thought that come Wednesday or Thursday of this week Hillary would start with a 3 a.m. ad, or the like, and some 527 would start running a Jeremiah Wright ad and Hillary would win going away by double digits, similar to the Ohio situation.
But last week I saw the SUSA poll showing Hillary up by 18 pts. I thought that must be an outlier, until today when I saw the ARG poll giving Hillary a 20 Point lead. Then I thought, Maybe she doesn’t need to go negative. She could just run ads accentuating whatever it is that small town white people tell pollsters they prefer about her over Obama. Then just allow the media to remind the voters of the elitist comments Obama made in a bath house in San Francisco while receiving a pedicure from Tony Lane. That should be good for 15 points.
Obama can’t just sit back and take that. Especially after he out spent Hillary 3 to 1 in the state. If he loses Pennsylvania by 20 points, the narrative changes. He is no longer inevitable. Hillary’s argument about winning the right voters and the right states starts to gain significant credibility. It leaves him terribly situated for Indiana and opens the possibility of Hillary winning North Carolina. There are 5 undeclared Indiana Congressmen in Indiana, How many of then are going to endorse Obama if Hillary wins the State by 15%?
Obama will go negative to forestall this possibility. I don’t know what the content of the negativity will be (maybe, “If you don’t know that you don’t sip out of a shot glass, you’ll destroy our relations with our new eastern European allies, and therefore destroy NATO.”), but I bet that no later than Thursday night Obama goes Negative (comparative if you prefer) in a big way.
For the last several weeks I’ve had what I considered a pretty clear idea of how I thought things would play in Pennsylvania, and up until now I’ve been pretty close. I was always of the opinion that Obama would close the gap to single digits in the weeks prior to the primary, maybe even take a slight lead. I thought that come Wednesday or Thursday of this week Hillary would start with a 3 a.m. ad, or the like, and some 527 would start running a Jeremiah Wright ad and Hillary would win going away by double digits, similar to the Ohio situation.
But last week I saw the SUSA poll showing Hillary up by 18 pts. I thought that must be an outlier, until today when I saw the ARG poll giving Hillary a 20 Point lead. Then I thought, Maybe she doesn’t need to go negative. She could just run ads accentuating whatever it is that small town white people tell pollsters they prefer about her over Obama. Then just allow the media to remind the voters of the elitist comments Obama made in a bath house in San Francisco while receiving a pedicure from Tony Lane. That should be good for 15 points.
Obama can’t just sit back and take that. Especially after he out spent Hillary 3 to 1 in the state. If he loses Pennsylvania by 20 points, the narrative changes. He is no longer inevitable. Hillary’s argument about winning the right voters and the right states starts to gain significant credibility. It leaves him terribly situated for Indiana and opens the possibility of Hillary winning North Carolina. There are 5 undeclared Indiana Congressmen in Indiana, How many of then are going to endorse Obama if Hillary wins the State by 15%?
Obama will go negative to forestall this possibility. I don’t know what the content of the negativity will be (maybe, “If you don’t know that you don’t sip out of a shot glass, you’ll destroy our relations with our new eastern European allies, and therefore destroy NATO.”), but I bet that no later than Thursday night Obama goes Negative (comparative if you prefer) in a big way.
