Blowback (n); an unintended adverse reaction or effect from an action or cause, especially political [Webster's New Millennium™ Dictionary of English]
Blowback normally refers to consequences that are unintended, but in the case of the Clinton campaign, one has to wonder whether the consequences of their tactics are very much intended.
Already, the repercussions from the release of that now infamous photo (which the Clinton campaign still sort of denies destributing to the Drudge Report) are being felt around the country, with the Tennessee Republican Party seeking to scare voters in that state into thinking Obama is some sort of Muslim plant.
And Hillary's needling of Obama last night on the issue of Louis Farrakhan, who praised Obama at the annual Savior's Day event in Chicago over the weekend, is bearing fruit: questions are now being raised on the radical right about the ties, not of the candidate himself, but of his pastor, Jeremiah Wright, to the controversial Nation of Islam leader.
You had to know this was coming. Luckily for Barack, it's coming now, early in the campaign, when he can get a handle on it, and be all the more prepared for the full onslaught of foolishness that's coming his way during the general, no matter how many members of the press corps John McCain charms with his "I'll be so respectful" routine...
Perhaps the most effective attack leveled by the Clinton campaign at Barack Obama, which the campaign continued today, is that as chairman of a subcommittee of the Senate Foreign Relations committee, he has failed to hold a single hearing on Afghanistan, even though his subcommittee includes oversight over U.S. policy in Europe, and our participation in NATO, the main fighting force in Afghanistan. That's a substantive charge, and one that the right has already picked up on, along with the media (Lou Dobbs hit Obama on that tonight.) This is one weakness for Barack that the GOP will definitely exploit this fall, although it remains to be seen whether voters not already disinclined to vote for Obama will care more about hearings than about the overall policy in Iraq and Afghanistan.
For Hillary, though, the danger is that her attacks on Obama, and her campaign itself, could begin to be seen by Democrats as a service, not to the Democratic party or to women seeking political lift, or to history, but to Republican opposition researchers. If Hillary appears to be trying to torch Barack Obama's campaign in order to preserve her opportunity to run again in four years, she can kiss that opportunity good-bye. The same voters and superdelegates she's hoping will rescue her this summer will have a say in her future, too, say, as Senate Majority Leader, or as a future candidate for any office who needs friends (and that, by the way, is every candidate...)
Labels: 2008 election, Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, presidential candidates |
