I loved Hillary's response yesterday to McCain's ads and their attempt to use her words (not to mention one of her supposed former supporters) to divide Democrats.
“Let me state what I think about their tactics and these ads,” she said in an appearance at a downtown hotel. “I’m Hillary Rodham Clinton and I do not approve of that message.
McCain's tactics remind me of 2004, when the Republicans had so little confidence in W, despite all his advantages (incumbency, fundraising, "war-presidentness"), that they actually started funding Nader's candidacy to siphon off votes from Kerry.
Now McCain, who apparently has nothing original left to say, is ripping off Hillary's 3am spot (thanks, Mark Penn!) to push what seems to be the only thing his campaign has left now that House-gate has undermined the whole "elitist" line of attack--his claim to have the "experience" Obama lacks to be President.
The McCain people have left this pitch sitting up in the strike zone and Hillary can knock it out of the park, something I think she is ready and willing to do. All she needs to do is say something like, "I respect John McCain and this twenty-six years of experience in Washington. But more than experience, what America needs after eight long years of the Bush-Cheney administration is good judgment. In the Senate and on the campaign trail, I have seen over and over again, that Barack Obama has the good judgment to learn from experience and to make the right decisions for America and its future. And while I like Sen. McCain and admire the courage he displayed as a POW forty years ago, I can tell you from first-hand experience, that in his seventy-two years, he has not developed the kind of judgment we need in the White House. He was one of this administration's top cheerleaders for the war in Iraq. He called Cheney and Rumsfeld the best foreign policy team we've ever had. He has voted with President Bush more than 90% of the time. And now he thinks the economy is fundamentally strong and wants to continue the Bush-Cheney policies that have brought us the biggest banking crisis since the Great Depression, record gas prices, record foreclosures, and record amounts of anxiety for America's middle class."
The experience / judgment distinction is not a new one, of course. And if McCain picks Romney as his VP, then the Obama people can start running an ad of their own. But Hillary has an unparalleled opportunity to take McCain's "experience" argument and undermine it on a national stage just as clearly and effectively as McCain's Politico interview sabotaged the "elitist" argument. If she does this, all he'll have left is POW, POW, POW.
A few other "experience" related points she might make:
- No one has ever questioned Dick Cheney or Donald Rumsfeld's foreign policy experience. Look where that got us.
- If McCain is so experienced, why does Joe Lieberman have to keep explaining the difference between Sunni & Shia to him?
- Bill Clinton was also criticized for lacking foreign policy experience. He did a heckuva lot better than W & his team.
- JFK certainly had less "experience" than McCain, Cheney, Rumsfeld etc boast when he was President. Yet he made the right call during the Cuban Missile Crisis. If any of those three had been around, large parts of this country would still be glowing at night ("no more than 10 to 20 million killed, tops... depending on the breaks.")