Obama's Batting Average Just Went Up

19.08.2008

It's a typical summer night in the Cohn household, which means the Red Sox are on television. McCain has been advertising pretty heavily on the New England Sports Network (NESN) for the last few weeks, usually with some version of his "celebrity" ad, presumably to reach the heavy New Hampshire audience. Obama, meanwhile, has run far fewer spots--and what I've seen has been relatively tepid.

(It's an unscientific sample, yes, but I catch most of the games, so I have at least some basis for making this judgment.)

Tonight, though, the NESN broadcast included an Obama contrast ad. It splices McCain talking up the economy with average Americans talking about their struggles to pay for gas, find a job, or cover their health care costs. It's simliar, although not identical, to this ad that the indispensible Marc Ambinder posted on his website yesterday:

This is precisely the kind of sharp, hard-hitting issues ad I had in mind earlier today. As Paul Krugman, among others, has noted, Obama's problem isn't a lack of policy specifics or even, of late, a lack of attention to them. It's the way he talks about the issues. There's too much wonkish discussion of the tax code, not enough straightforward, indignant messaging. This ad, thankfully, keeps it simple: Like the closing line says, how can McCain fix the economy when he doesn't think it's broken?

One other note: Juxtaposing everyday people, rather than a narrator's voice, with McCain seems particularly shrewd. It creates the impression that they--not Obama--are the ones attacking McCain. Now if the Obama team could just cut similar ads focusing on, say, health care and Social Security...

Of course, as I write this, the Sox are winning 6-2.* That may be putting me in an unusually optimistic mood.

*Update: Final score, Boston wins 7-2.

--Jonathan Cohn

Posted: Tuesday, August 19, 2008 9:13 PM with 6 comment(s)

Comments

You must be logged-in to comment.

Not a subscriber? Click here to get a digital or print and digital subscription to The New Republic!

icarusr said:

"Now if the Obama team could just cut similar ads focusing on, say, health care and Social Security..."

I'm sure it had not occurred to them; they'll appreciate the suggestion ...

"It creates the impression that they--not Obama--are the ones attacking McCain."

It's amazing, isn't it; how something that works for selling detergent can also help sell candidates. Now, WAIT for the Republican attack machine to go after these poor people, upending their lives, showing how one is a dyke, another a two-timing wife-beater, a third sacrifices children for Passover - all of which will be proven to be lies, but not before the damage is done to them and to their families.

One suggestion I have: Edwards, the brilliant litigator, as penance, should offer to represent any ordinary person maligned by the Republican machine in a massive defamation suit.

August 19, 2008 10:07 PM

CAM2 said:

Batting average up? But he needs home-runs

horribledictu.cpm

August 19, 2008 10:12 PM

dylanposer said:

Red Sox? What does that have to do with Carl Levin?

August 20, 2008 2:55 AM

GoodLiberal said:

But can Matzusaka stop walking so many batters? Will Beckett regain his dominace of last year? Are Wake, Lester, Bucholz, Byrd and others enough to create a rotation that the likes of the Rays and Angels fear?

Oh, wait, sorry...

Yeah- this is exactly the type of ad that Obama should have been running from the get-go, but I never know why Obama hasn't been hammering McCain on that Wall Street Journal quote where he said that he was 'still educating himself on economics'. Why not go after McCain saying that he is too inexperienced to handle the economy? It would be attacking his strengths in the same way that McCain went after the celebrity thing...

August 20, 2008 10:39 AM

sabatia said:

When the Red Sox win, we all win. A victory for the Sox means a victory for Obama, liberals, intellectuals, working folks, the poor, educators, women, Christians(whether they know it or not)and probably the Georgians, Lebanese, and Dafurians. And, of particular note, a win for the Sox is good for the Jews. So what else is there?

August 20, 2008 11:40 AM

cleavet said:

Jason Bey--great pickup for the Sox.

August 20, 2008 12:03 PM