It’s hard to say, though Rod is probably ahead of Jack! right now, but he is quickly developing a dislike of both of them similar to the late Steve Neal’s deep dislike of Dick Durbin and Peter Fitzgerald.
In Thursday’s column he takes on Jack!’s new communications director.
# First, understand why your opponent has problems with significant elements of his base, and drive wedges where you can, to the maximum extent possible;
# “Second, recognize that it is not your campaign’s job to tell the objective truth, it’s your campaign’s job to tell the version of the truth that puts your opponent in the worst light possible (it’s his campaign’s job, after all, to do the same to you);
# “Third, don’t get suckered into the trap of only talking about issues the media says are important – instead, choose the issue matrix over which you want to wage war, and stick to it no matter what;
# “And fourth, if need be, if you can’t make a legitimate argument against your opponent on a key issue, use your opponent’s party’s position on the issue as the battleground, and wrap it around his neck. Make him pay for the sins of his party. Guilt by association still works, so don’t be shy in exploiting it.”
The problem with the Ryan campaign is every time they put out a fire, another story pops up about how it is running essentially a negative campaign and getting it from enunciating any message of its own.
There are two sides to that. Jack! partisans can point out this is lazy journalism looking to fit the evidence to the preconceived story. To a degree that has some merit, though I wouldn’t tar Schoenberg with that claim.
The flip side is if the shoe fits…
And Jack! is making the shoe fit a bit too easily.
Case in point from the column:
But then what does a May 26 news release from the Ryan campaign say about the kind of campaign Ryan wants to run? The release, titled “Knock, knock. Who’s there? Obama, the criminals’ good friend,” got personal about Ryan’s Democratic opponent, BARACK OBAMA.
Obama, now a state senator, voted against a bill in the legislature that would allow people to defend themselves against local ordinances banning gun possession if they have to use a gun to protect themselves on their own property.
“Once again, Barack Obama has shown his true colors,” the release quotes Pascoe. “He’s an outside-the-mainstream, weak-on-crime liberal who cares more for the rights of criminals than he does for those of law-abiding citizens.”
Jack! has never defined himself in any sense of what he stands for to the public. Yes, we can go to his website and see his issue positions, but despite a fairly good bio to run on, since the primary it has been all attack all the time instead of defining himself, locking up his base and then going to war over the center–which in Illinois is slightly to the left.
The real story appears to be at the top and it is tied back to everything that is loony in Conservative Republican Politics in Illinois–the Illinois Leader and its co-founder Dan Proft:
After the second column, Proft let me know in a 1 1/2-page e-mail that he wasn’t happy.
“Barack, er uh, I mean Bernie,” it began.
“I’m willing to try and do damage control for you with your friends in the Democratic Party but I don’t know … people are expressing a lot of disappointment with you for your personal assault on Bill Clinton. … But I stood up for you, I said, ‘Bernie is a good Democrat. … I mean, look at all the water he’s carrying for Sen. Obama.'”
Proft said he was embarrassed for me because I let Obama “get away” with his explanation of his vote against the fees, and he wondered why I didn’t press Obama on the budget problems of the Democrats now running the state.
“I know you’re loathe (sic) to report on any infighting among the Democrat hegemons much less make Obama have to answer any difficult questions about who’s right. …”
Well, it’s always nice to know they’re reading your stuff. But Proft may have missed some of the not-so-glowing columns I’ve written about the style and “substance” of Gov. ROD BLAGOJEVICH, who happens to be a Democrat.
Antagonizing the press is generally a really bad strategy. Of course, Proft was probably the guy who decided an unsigned editorial in the attacking Judy Baar Topinka and Frank Watson would be a good idea.
You get a mighty small coalition as a Republican if Frank Watson is too conciliatory.
The ultimate problem though? Staffers keep get press over the candidate. That should never, ever happen. I know other campaigns do everything they can to avoid that.
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