McCain Ignoring Wright: Stupid, Self-Interest, or Noble

[Lunar]

I say noble.  I think it was his personal desire not to want to have his campaign tainted by the "racist" charge -- which is self-interest insofar as he wants his image saved.  But in political terms, it's pretty damn noble to be not willing to sacrifice your image to win a presidential campaign.

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[MK]

I rather lose a election then lose my honor.

Very Noble.

[Lunar]

I rather lose a election then lose my honor.

Very Noble.

Both campaigns clearly lost their honor.  McCain ran his "Obama wants to teach toddlers about sex before they can read" ad and Obama ran "McCain wants to cut your Social Security in half" ads.

But the issue of Wright is different -- McCain would effectively pioneering how to address a national black candidate.  The media is all on you much moreso than statewide races that the media largely ignores (even the spiciest statewide-campaign ads don't break into the national conscious as much as generic presidential ones).

I suppose political honor is barely harmed by running old tricks - accusing your opponent of wanting to cut military expenditures (McCain's campaign claimed this because one Rep. Franks (D) supports a 25% cut , Obama must as well) or wanting to slash Medicare benefits, because that has been done before and is now acceptable.  intensely racial ads leave a sick feeling in the stomach of many.

[MK]

I rather lose a election then lose my honor.

Very Noble.

Both campaigns clearly lost their honor.  McCain ran his "Obama wants to teach toddlers about sex before they can read" ad and Obama ran "McCain wants to cut your Social Security in half" ads.

But the issue of Wright is different -- McCain would effectively pioneering how to address a national black candidate.  The media is all on you much moreso than statewide races that the media largely ignores (even the spiciest statewide-campaign ads don't break into the national conscious as much as generic presidential ones).

I suppose political honor is barely harmed by running old tricks - accusing your opponent of wanting to cut military expenditures (McCain's campaign claimed this because one Rep. Franks (D) supports a 25% cut , Obama must as well) or wanting to slash Medicare benefits, because that has been done before and is now acceptable.  intensely racial ads leave a sick feeling in the stomach of many.

The campaigns are over give it a break.

McCain is a very Honorable man.

[Franzl]

noble

McCain has always been a good man, and I stand by that.

[Robespierre's Jaw]

Noble.

Come to think of it, I'm surprised that Wright wasn't a dominant "issue" in the campaign. Judging from the "hype" it received, and amount of press coverage Wright received after March, and earlier of course, it seemed as if he was going to be a figure in the race. Thankfully he wasn't. I would hate to imagine the outcome of an election would be decided on Obama's links to a "terrorist", or any candidate linked to such folk.

[Smid]

I rather lose a election then lose my honor.

Very Noble.

Both campaigns clearly lost their honor.  McCain ran his "Obama wants to teach toddlers about sex before they can read" ad and Obama ran "McCain wants to cut your Social Security in half" ads.

But the issue of Wright is different -- McCain would effectively pioneering how to address a national black candidate.  The media is all on you much moreso than statewide races that the media largely ignores (even the spiciest statewide-campaign ads don't break into the national conscious as much as generic presidential ones).

I suppose political honor is barely harmed by running old tricks - accusing your opponent of wanting to cut military expenditures (McCain's campaign claimed this because one Rep. Franks (D) supports a 25% cut , Obama must as well) or wanting to slash Medicare benefits, because that has been done before and is now acceptable.  intensely racial ads leave a sick feeling in the stomach of many.

I think this is about what is a negative campaign and what is not a negative campaign.

Polling over here (public polling, although I couldn't provide a reference at the moment) shows that voters are overwhelmingly opposed to negative campaigning, however you notice that when one side or the other runs negative ads they are more successful and often experience a lift in the polls which often carries through on election day. This clearly suggests that the public are either lying to the pollsters about negative campaigning, they're hypocritical when it comes to advertising standards, or their definition of negative campaigning is different to what is being suggested. Actually, you might find this link interesting: I found it by googling "fears negative campaign" (looking for news articles along the lines of "Candidate fears this campaign may be the most negative yet") http://www.livescience.com/culture/081016-water-cooler-2.html

Actually, that article explains why negative advertising works, and kind of steals my thunder, but what I was going to say is that the public can often differentiate between issues-based negative advertising and mere character assassination.

It's one thing to come out and attack a candidate saying "if they're elected, this is what they're going to do" and something else entirely to target the candidate by saying "this is the church this guy attended and this is the type of sermon he was listening to"

I think that the difference between those two types of negative campaigns can also explain some of the difference between what people tell pollsters (that they don't like negative campaigns - meaning blunt character assassination) and how they vote (having been influenced by negative issues-based adverts).

What I'm trying to say is that while both candidates may have engaged in a mildly negative issues campaign, I think it was noble of McCain to not engage in personal mudslinging regarding Wright.

I'm sorry if that's a bit wordy or whatever, I'm noticing of late that post-midnight I become very verbose and not as clear as I am at other times of the day.

[Beet]

Both 1 & 3, but 3 I guess. Interestingly enough, in The Audacity of Hope, Obama mentions how Blair Hull never ran any negative ads against him and suggests it was a mistake on Hull's part ("I was lucky"). He also suggests that the media was biased in favor of him because of his exotic background and his halting speaking style, which "appealed to the literary class." Pretty telling. It's very risky to go hard negative on a candidate that the media likes, because if it doesn't work you come off looking almost as bad as the other guy would have if it had worked. The lesson from 2008 seems to be that if you're going to do it, you should go all the way.

[memphis]

The Wright story never had any traction. It was old news. McCain thought the socialist/terrorist labels would be more effective.

[WillK]

The campaigns are over give it a break.

McCain is a very Honorable man.

Yes the campaigns are over, so you can let it go now. 

McCain is a very ambitious man. 

[MK]

The Wright story never had any traction. It was old news. McCain thought the socialist/terrorist labels would be more effective.

McCain did the right thing in the end.

[Sam Spade]

Stupid.  But I doubt it would have made that much difference during this particular election cycle.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

Self-interest. The story had been done to death already. McCain had to at least pretend his attacks dealt with the issues.

[Stranger in a strange land]

noble

McCain has always been a good man, and I stand by that.

add to that, I don't think an onslaught of Wright ads would have been all that effective: the media covered Wright AND NOTHING ELSE for six weeks in March and April.

also, McCain is clearly not a racist, and would have undoubtedly felt guilt and shame if he ran a bunch of "OMG HE'S BLACK!!!!!" ads and then some redneck shot his opponent. The decision not to play with fire was thus a noble one.

[minionofmidas]

I've no opinion on McCain's reasons, but the call was a good one - because

The story had been done to death already. McCain had to at least pretend his attacks dealt with the issues.

[panda_priest]

Obama already threw Wright under the bus, it would have looked desperate.

[Lunar]

Self-interest. The story had been done to death already.

I'm not sure if you're right about the "been done to death" already logic since you never hear of that rational whenever ex-McCain people talk about the issue.  So I don't think that that was the self-interest.  "Wanted to pretend to talk about the issues" doesn't work since the McCain campaign ran lots of vague ads with no point whatsoever.  The only self-interest Ican see would be to avoid the "omg you're so racist" backlash from the media.

Although as I say in my other thread () I am skeptic if that topic post ad would have generated much public backlash from non-Obamaniacs

[paul718]

I don't think bringing up Wright would've made much of a difference.  When the economy tanked, the electorate cared more about competence than character.  The Obama campaign effectively sold the idea that Obama was economically competent and McCain was not.

This is a reason why, I think, Barack Obama could never have become President outside of the present circumstances.   

[Lunar]

He ideally would have brought it up before the economy tanked and been able to use that as a leverage "judgment" issue.

[paul718]

He ideally would have brought it up before the economy tanked and been able to use that as a leverage "judgment" issue.

Good point.  I just don't think it would've worked.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

Self-interest. The story had been done to death already.

I'm not sure if you're right about the "been done to death" already logic since you never hear of that rational whenever ex-McCain people talk about the issue.  So I don't think that that was the self-interest.  "Wanted to pretend to talk about the issues" doesn't work since the McCain campaign ran lots of vague ads with no point whatsoever.  The only self-interest Ican see would be to avoid the "omg you're so racist" backlash from the media.

Sure McCain was full of vague attacks, but at least they were fresh ones. Wright was beyond old by the time the real campaign came around. Imagine how ridiculous it would look after the stock market crisis if Obama is talking about it and the economy and McCain was just blabbing on about Wright. Sure McCain basically did this with Ayers, but same thing, at least Ayers was new. Everyone already knew about Wright. The Ayers attacks weren't exactly a success, but on paper it was something at least worth testing.

Another reason McCain might've ignored it: Attacking over Wright had already been tested when Hillary did it. And it didn't work then.

[Lunar]

Self-interest. The story had been done to death already.

I'm not sure if you're right about the "been done to death" already logic since you never hear of that rational whenever ex-McCain people talk about the issue.  So I don't think that that was the self-interest.  "Wanted to pretend to talk about the issues" doesn't work since the McCain campaign ran lots of vague ads with no point whatsoever.  The only self-interest Ican see would be to avoid the "omg you're so racist" backlash from the media.

Sure McCain was full of vague attacks, but at least they were fresh ones.

A character attack as cited in the topic post would have been pretty damn fresh.  No one ran ads on Wright until the waning moments of the campaign and did McCain ever run ads mentioning his POW heroism or comparing it so wittily to Obama's church status?*

*Note, Reverend Wright doesn't bother me the slightest.  But he makes swing [read: ignorant, apolitical] voters uncomfortable.  Besides, even if the economy would overpower that, what else could McCain do besides switch the subject?

blah yes whatevsky......Everyone already knew about Wright The Ayers attacks weren't exactly a success, but on paper it was something at least worth testing.

Everyone already knew about Wright but it wasn't fresh in their minds.

Another reason McCain might've ignored it: Attacking over Wright had already been tested when Hillary did it. And it didn't work then.

Hillary stuck her toe in the waters, slyly mentioning it some stump speech, no?  That is like comparing a centipede to a dinosaur if you try and compare that to the topic post's ad suggestion!

[○∙◄☻¥tπ[╪AV┼cVê└]

None of these poll options apply. McCain did it out of self-interest, like BRTD says.

[Lunar]

None of these poll options apply. McCain did it out of self-interest,

So the poll option that cited "self-interest" doesn't apply?

[Nym90]

Self interest and noble. It was the right thing to do politically and morally.