"It's a calculated, everyday, in-your-face, take-no-prisoners strategy by Steve Schmidt"

[kurth_]

http://abclocal.go.com/kgo/story?section=news/politics&id=6383682

Lipstick outrage part of Republican strategy
Wednesday, September 10, 2008 | 7:35 PM
By Mark Matthews

It is the great American lipstick smear. "You can put lipstick on a pig, but it's still a pig" is a common expression, but it has got the Democrats on the defensive. As it turns out, that is a big part of the Republican strategy. Tuesday, Democratic Sen. Barack Obama told a Virginia audience that Republican Senator John McCain was seizing on the change message while sticking with the policies of George W. Bush. Now the McCain campaign is calling Obama's comment about putting lipstick on a pig, a smear of Republican Governor Sarah Palin. The McCain Web ad starts with Palin's now famous line from her convention speech... then accuses Obama of smearing Palin.

"It's a calculated, everyday, in-your-face, take-no-prisoners strategy by Steve Schmidt," says Democratic political strategist Gale Kaufman in reference to McCain's chief strategist Steve Schmidt. She says she watched Schmidt, a Karl Rove protégé, use similar tactics when Schmidt ran California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger's reelection campaign. "He kept Arnold away from the cameras except when he wanted them to talk to him. He never made him available all the time and he attacked and attacked and attacked," says Kaufman.

Kaufman also says the news media is being manipulated. Our political analyst thinks so, too. "It's very clear that the strategy is to keep on doing this every day to make a new outrageous claim and to keep the Obama people off balance and to also make sure that there is really no discussion of the issues," says Professor Bruce Cain, UC's political expert in Washington and ABC7 political analyst. Cain says McCain wants to keep the conversation about character rather than issues because Obama polls better on the issues. So the tactic is to control the media.

"Once again, if the media complain about it, they'll simply say the media are liberal, they can't be trusted. I think that's basically what the plan is and they will pursue that as long as it works," says Cain.

[msongs]

1. once again r epubs control the media, the message, and the election lol nt

[TheKentuckian]

2. Who's off balance???

SMASH MCCAIN'S FACE EVERY SINGLE TIME HE TRIES!!!

[Marsala]

3. The only ones off balance are the media

Even they are now directly commenting on these awful tactics.

[Historic NY]

4. Well if you know thats their strategy...then get busy and stop whining.

Lets get our surrogates and 527's working 24/7