I Can't Bear to Watch

The Obama campaign seems to have lost its aggressiveness the last few weeks. After winning the nomination, Obama was really tearing into McCain day in day out every time he opened his mouth. Lately, theres been very little. Even the Graham gaff about whiny Americans made yesterday, Obama spent a minute and a half on it yesterday proclaiming "We've already got one Dr. Phil and we don't need another." Thats it. Nothing further yesterday, nothing more today. Nothing from surrogates except when asked about it. Meanwhile the McCain campaign continues to hammer away when not being thrown off course like the last couple days- What gives?

Why doesn't Obama latch onto this like he's fighting for his political life and hammer McCain relentlessly? Force the media to cover it. Every word out of Obama's mouth should be related to McCain's apparent believe that the recession is "Psychological." He could win the white house on this issue alone. But he does nothing. As much as the Obama supporters dislike Hillary, she would be on this like white on rice. She would have herself and Bill, Terry McCaulif, Lanny Davis, Paul Begalla,James Carville, Wolfowitz, and every single member of that campaign blasting McCain minute after minute, hour after hour, day after day relentlessly for weeks. Every time you looked at McCain for the rest of your life that is what you would see. Obama ...

Nothing. No statement, nothing.

I know he has a lot of smart campaign people working for him. But I have no idea what they are doing. Its like they have no idea elections in the United States are not won on issues, but on media spin. Whoever best manipulates the media, usually wins. The Clintons were masters at it. The McCain camp is trying. The Obama camp either doesn't realize, or doesn't care. If he's trying to run a more civil campaign, I find that admirable, but its risky.The MSM has an unyielding appetite that must be fed. If Obama doesn't feed it, McCain will.

A perfect example of this is the apparent Obama flip flop on Iraq. A flip flop that doesn't exist. His use of the word "Refine" came at the end of his press conference and in no way changed any of his policies on Iraq. But the McCain camp said it was a flip flop and CNN and other networks said "O.K., sounds good to us lets run with it." Mark Halprin on CNN said this was the most important development of the general election. I was truly Baffled. I have been speaking the English Language for nearly 30 years now, I went to college and consider myself of at least average intelligence. The word refine in no way means to change or alter. It means to refine, to be more specific and lay out in more detail. In fact a fact checking website (Politifact.com) has looked into this and says this :

"Weighing all these statements together, we find the McCain campaign is off-base in saying Obama has changed position. Obama repeatedly said facts on the ground could affect the tactical moves of an overall withdrawal. Obama's position was not an iron-clad withdrawal timeline in the first place. We find the McCain campaign's statement that Obama has reversed position to be False."

Obama had to deny this for a week, and still now general perception is that he flip flopped. The MSM is not out for being fair or factual. They are out for ratings. Fox News is based on manipulating the public, and they do it very well. If Obama doesn't play the game, he might just lose the game altogether.