It is the oldest rule in sports.
You get an elbow under the basket, so you throw one back after the rebound. They put a pitch under your slugger's chin, so you throw a brushback pitch the next inning. The receiver gives you a shove on the pass play, so you grab him when he tries to catch the ball.
It is always the guy that retaliates that gets punished for it.
Look, I understand the motivation behind clipping Cindy McCain at her knees after that awful performance by her and her husband yesterday. Her sudden (and, without a doubt, heartfelt) need to testify on love of country was so transparent it bordered on self-parody.
So, yes, I get where Mr. Populist is coming from. There is a certain code of honor in political battles--don't enter into the arena (which Cindy McCain did by making herself the headline yesterday with her direct shots at Michelle Obama) unless you are willing to withstand scrutiny yourself. McCain cannot expect his wife to be the angry surrogate without taking some heat.
But Obama and his people shouldn't do it anyway. Nor should we.
Not because it is not justified. It is.
Not because "We are Not Republicans" to quote the excellent diary by cedelson. This is a fight. You don't disarm unilaterally.
Dems should refrain from the retaliation because it retards our progress towards the attainable goal of a Democratic presidency.
It is not bad manners. It is just bad politics.
Here is why:
Voters, as evidenced by their rejection of the Republican Party in 2006, and their continued rejection (if polling is to be believed), are no longer easily persuaded by the "I love America more than you do" or "I love God more than you do" narratives.
Obama represents a new kind of politics. Rather than playing tit-for-tat on this, he ought to RIP Cindy McCain for questioning his wife's patriotism, and point out explicitly that this is the kind of tired, divisive, attack dog politics that have not advanced this country forward ONE INCH since Gingrich rode to town fourteen years ago.
I think if the GOP questions Michelle Obama's love of country, and Barack comes back defending his wife by saying this is the same tired, old swift boat attack politics Republicans employ because they CAN'T talk about the issues, he wins the argument.
While I thought it a bit harsh, Mr. P's description of Cindy McCain is not inaccurate. She looks like the very model of the "Country Club" Republican. She reeks of inherited wealth and an incredible disconnect with "regular Americans." Retaliating by going after her makes her into the kind of sympathetic figure she could never become on her own.
So far, this has been an extraordinarily different presidential campaign. Even on the attack, Obama has employed a campaign style that has been atypical. It has been the key to his success. If this campaign degenerates into a series of back-and-forth attack narratives, Obama becomes just another political candidate. If there is one thing that the record turnouts on the Democratic side are telling us, America does not want "just another" political candidate.
Besides being ugly and transparent, Cindy McCain's swipe at Michelle Obama yesterday created winces for many of us because it was just SO F*@^ING TYPICAL.
Really, when the news reports of the Michelle Obama story hit Monday, was there anyone NOT expecting a McCain attack on it within 48 hours??!!??
And this, believe it or not, works in Obama's FAVOR.
It reinforces the idea that Republicans in general, and McCain in particular, cannot extricate themselves from yesterday. Yesterday's failed policies, AND yesterday's failed campaign tactics. It also makes it possible for Obama to argue that they are resorting to the same old attacks because they are INCAPABLE of offering an agenda for change.
The desire for a new politics has driven the 2008 campaign thus far. I went from a supporter of John Edwards to an Obama voter because I thought his campaign rationale was the most likely to carry the day against John McCain.
Indeed, Obama creates matchup problems for McCain on any number of levels, not just on the rationale for their campaigns.
He has the lead. He has the high ground. He should not cede it, as tempting as it might be to do so. He ought to use it to vehemently decry the use of the politics of yesterday, as employed on his own wife. And then he ought to move on to the important task of reclaiming this country from the tired old hacks who cheered and whistled when Cindy McCain opened her mouth yesterday.
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