Several readers have pointed out this last line from the NYT’s analysis piece on Palin:
“In a way, McCain has set a trap on the experience argument,” said Scott Reed, who managed Bob Dole’s presidential campaign in 1996, “because if they start picking on her on experience, it’s going to backfire with women.”
The merit of this argument aside, I think that this points to a general strategy that the McCain camp will adopt for the next few weeks. Palin will become a foil through which to attack Obama: if she’s inexperienced then so is he, if she has corruption problems then so does he, if he attacks her then he’s attacking women. And of course, every fault of his will be made to look worse than hers, because he wants to be President (it’s still a big step from the 2-slot to number 1). It will take some line blurring and fudging, but I expect the McCain camp to try to re-couch its personal attacks on Obama as self-righteous defenses of Palin.
Meanwhile, reader SC dissents from earlier:
I don’t agree that the Democrats should focus on Palin’s inexperience – at least not directly. (For one thing, it keeps Obama’s “inexperience” in the discussion as well.) I would instead focus first on McCain’s judgement and priorities – the argument practically writes itself: “Barack Obama selected one of the most qualified people available for the job of vice-president; John McCain picked one of the least qualified. Who really puts country ahead of politics?”
The argument is a straight-forward one. Presumably, the McCain camp is working to make sure the distinction gets lost in the soundbytes.
