The O Team: A Response

Democratic Party allied third parties have announced negative ad campaigns, which distort McCain's statements and positions, in the hundreds of millions of dollars. They are already running them.  Senator Obama himself and Democrats generally have taken out of context and distorted Senator McCain's statements on a post war military presence in Iraq and his views on the economy.  Our townhalls are now routinely salted with Obama supporters who are there to raise embarrassing questions for the Senator (we don't screen people at our events).  An Obama supporter asked him in Iowa if he called his wife a very vulgar name.

When the North Carolina party prepared to run an ad raising the Reverend Wright issue, Senator McCain again denounced it in the strongest possible terms, and was sharply criticized by conservative radio and pundits for doing so.  And when the North Carolina party refused to withdraw it, the Obama campaign, Howard Dean and others charged that he was either being disingenuous or ineffective.  I understand why they might employ that tactic, but isn't it the job of reporters to ponder its implications to see if it is fair?

Senator McCain is not going to referee ads run by groups outside our control.  The other side has no intention of reciprocating and has shown every inclination to tolerate and even encourage such attacks against us.  Of course, he will denounce any use of race or calumnies against his opponent by anyone.  But he won't play traffic cop anymore.  The other side uses the same tactics, with no opposition from the Obama campaign that I have seen.  Also, were he to do so and be unable to discourage independent expenditures run by people who have no relationship with him or our campaign, (and, in some cases, had previously run attacks against him) the Obama campaign will denounce him as a phony or weak.  If Evan and Richard's piece represents a general attitude among their colleagues, the press will agree.

Evan and Richard noted, ominously, that our campaign includes Steve Schmidt and Charlie Black, characterizing them basically as noted Republican attack specialists.  The Obama senior staffers were described as idealists and decent sorts, and jujitsu experts who could use Republican Party smears and deceitful tactics against their authors.  I'm sure both David Plouffle and David Axelrod are fine, upstanding citizens.  But the former ran a campaign for Senator Torricelli and the latter worked on the campaigns of Mayor Daley.  I don't remember those campaigns being notable for their delicate courtesy and softball tactics toward their opponents.

Without a trace of skepticism, your reporters embraced the primary communications strategy the Obama campaign intends to follow: any criticism of their candidate is a below the belt, Republican attack machine distortion that should discredit the authors.  And any attempt by our campaign to counter that suggestion will be dismissed as a rant.  The other day, Senator Obama noted that Representative DeFazio's accusation that Senator McCain was up to his neck in the Keating Five scandal was a legitimate line of attack, despite the fact the Senator was largely exonerated by the Senate Ethics Committee, whose special counsel declared he had been kept in the investigation only because of his party affiliation.  Were we to raise the Rezko matter, their campaign would accuse us of distracting voters with a low blow by making more of a "flimsy relationship" than the facts warranted. Evan and Richard, I feel certain, would agree.

The McCain campaign will keep to the high standards of political debate Senator McCain demands of us.  The Senator will not tolerate unfair attacks by anyone on our campaign.  We won't, however, abide by rules imposed on us by our opponents, and which pertain only to our campaign and not theirs, even if they manage to get reporters to call the deal fair.