TPM: Primal Scream

The TPM email bag this morning is chock of emails saying, in so many words, is it time to panic? I'm actually not taking much summary license here. Most of the emails I'm talking about actually ends with some form of that sentence. Since a lot of you are asking this I thought I should provide some sort of answer.

First, I think the USAToday/Gallup poll is an outlier. I wouldn't put much stock in it. It's clear that McCain is getting a sizable bump out of his convention. But remember, Obama did too. It quickly subsided, as was expected. And we should expect McCain's to as well. We'll know more by the end of the week.

Polls aside though, I continue to see a campaign in which the McCain camp has a consistent and aggressive message. They're constantly on the attack and largely defining the debate. The Obama campaign is largely reactive, parrying the attacks -- sometimes rapid response, sometimes slower response, but defined largely by response. It seemed that way to me in July, in August and it seems that way to me now.

more here...http://talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/214608.php

I agree with everything that Josh Marshall says here!

of simply responding to the GOP narrative. I notice he didn't do that against Hillary in the later primaries, and it cost him--she would start the day with a coordinated attack, and he would say, "am not" and she would say, "are too", and then before he could rebut it further, she'd be on to the NEXT slam. It really helped her. The media isn't going to be fair to him, but he does need to start driving the narrative.

Because every time he said anything about Hillary, her campaign screamed unfair and sexist. He was trying to preserve a modicum of goodwill for the GE. As long as he comes out strong within a week or so, he'll be okay.

The real problem is the media though, and whether they broadcast anything he has to say.

prop up whomever he's against. Otherwise, it wouldn't be close. But since he must understand this reality by now, he has to be more aggressive and start driving home a devastatingly effective, coordinated message. I would suggest he starts an ad campaign that ends with the words: "John McCain, Maverick? No, just another Republican." Same thing can be used with Palin--despite all the moose and mommy stories, she's not a reformer, "just another Republican". Gotta make "Republican" a dirty word--gotta make people NOT want to belong to that club. I also think an ad campaign by the DNC that shows very ordinary-looking Americans saying something like "I'm a Democrat, I believe in America's workers, not corporations", "I'm a Democrat, I believe that our military should be strong, but shouldn't be the world's policemen", "I'm a Democrat, I believe in equal pay for equal work", etc. We need to define ourselves a little better, so that swing voters at the last minute decide to join our team.