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Edwards wins debate, but Obama wins the battle by Eric Schmeltzer
Tue Jan 22, 2008 at 10:06:45 AM PST
Sometimes for those of us who sip on Mr. Pibb all day and constantly refresh political websites, it's hard to separate ourselves from the debate, and look at things from the bird's eye view that many undecided, casual voters see things, or think how the debate might play out in the long-run.
It's tough, but when I watched last night's debate just as a PR person, I tried to keep that in mind. And I might as well make a formal disclaimer here: None of what I'm about to write means I think one candidate is right or wrong on the issues, or whether one candidate or the other would make a better nominee or president. It's strictly an objective view as a strategist.
OK. So, when all was said and done, I came away with two conclusions: John Edwards came off looking the best and "won" the debate, but Barack Obama won a key battle which could pay off with immediate and intermediate dividends, in a big way.
Eric Schmeltzer's diary :: ::
First, Edwards. I firmly subscribe to the belief that when two candidates snipe constantly, the third candidate who brings the debate back to reality pretty much always comes off the best. John Edwards struck gold, in that regard, jumping between Clinton and Obama and asking, hey, how does this get children health care, or create jobs, or help the economy? I can't imagine an undecided voter, or a voter who has 'soft' support for another candidate, didn't nod their head in agreement with that, and took that away from the debate. I don't think this is too radical a notion, so I won't go on trying to prove it.
Yet, winning a debate rarely, if ever, wins someone an election, and it's questionable as to whether a single debate moves votes in the end. Indeed, in CNN's focus group (which is about all I have to go on in the short-term), voters said they liked Edwards in the debate, but would probably vote for Obama.
Knowing this, Obama's team made a very shrewd move, and ended up far outmaneuvering the Clinton campaign (not something that could be said often in recent weeks).
:: First, they correctly recognized that they could afford to "lose" the debate and let Edwards come out smelling like roses, as long as Hillary "lost" it too - thus, dragging her into a fight was an acceptable short-term tactic to achieve....
:: The second point. They correctly felt that they had to move the debate off of her turf, which is the experience argument. But, even more importantly, they recognized that the "hope" argument is really just the flip-side of the "experience" debate. As long as he talks just about hope, the subconscious thinks, "Yeah, but does he have the experience?" which is a winner for Hillary.
And so, the Obama campaign moved the debate to what they see as a clear winner for them, and a clear loser for Senator Clinton - trust. (more on that in a second)
:: Third, to buoy that argument, they set up a couple of traps that made Hillary fall into Clinton-speak, which never looks really honest. Specifically, when Obama challenged Hillary over whether he said Republicans had "good ideas," and she more or less had to admit that's not what he said, and went into a rather wiggily argument about the "context" and what one might take away from what he said, etc. To me, she sounded like someone caught in a lie.
Surprisingly (at least to me), it seemed like Clinton, as well, made the decision to fight Obama on the trust issue, intimating that Obama was slick ("...it’s just very difficult to get a straight answer"), and that he worked for a slum lord.
I can't think of a worse issue for Clinton to try to match Obama over than trust. So far, trust hasn't entered the debate. It's surprising Obama didn't raise it before, because it tops the list of things people concern themselves with when voting (not surprising since we're coming out of W's administration). It's also an issue where Clinton is a clear loser (see questions 43, 44, 69). While voters fundamentally love what the Clintons did for the country in the 1990s, I think without reservation, most voters didn't see them as the most honest couple in the world.
In the battle to change the dialogue from experience to trust, Obama clearly won. It was definitely viewed as a victory by the Obama team, which released a post-debate dripping with references to 'trust.'
He's still waging that battle today, and Clinton is still taking the bait on it.
Today, Senator Clinton's team is still hitting on trust/truth, with Clinton saying this morning, "He has a hard time responding to questions about his record..." and " were so rehearsed that he kept on insisting that I had mentioned President Reagan in what I had said when I didn't mention President Reagan..."
Obama was quick to keep the trust/truth narrative right at the top, responding, "I don't think it's the 'fun part' to fudge the truth... If you get the kind of looseness with the facts that displayed, that erodes people's trust in government...It makes them cynical."
So, Obama won the battle he set out to win, last night. Time will tell if this overtakes the "experience" narrative of the past few weeks, or even benefits him at the polls. Certainly, his team has been doing a great job of ensuring that it is the new theme, and Clinton seems to be OK with engaging over it (essentially thinking they can win on the 'trust' issue).
But, if Obama starts to creep ahead in the next week or so and builds up momentum through Feb 5, pundits might look back at this debate as point when he pivoted the campaign back in his favor.
http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/1/22/111012/671/308/441072
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