• The snafu over Obama surrogate Wes Clark’s decision to publicly downplay John McCain’s Vietnam War service and then stand behind that statement in the face of withering outrage from McCain’s camp has become a central issue of the campaign lately. What was initially an eyebrow-raising quip that pulled a potential Veep out of the mix has been used by the McCain campaign and the GOP in general to portray Clark as a typical raving Obama supporter (think a white Jeremiah Wright) and Obama as silently approving of Clark’s message. No facts can back up the McCain spin, but the subject matter alone gives them a boost as voters could potentially recoil against shots being taken at what most Americans (even Democrats) believe is a certifiable war hero. And most Americans think that dramatic military service does matter in a presidential campaign - no matter how shallow that seems. Obama needs to be extra thankful that this controversy has popped up in late June/early July and not October. High gas prices or no, voters are thinking only of vacations (staycations?) and July 4th grilling fests. Wes Clark is not even a blip. Yet…
  • The intended strategy from the Obama campaign to actively court evangelical voters fed up with inept Republicans, political divisiveness and inspired by the Dem nominee’s focus on such topics as AIDS and poverty is indeed a reality. Leaving his liberal language behind in the Dem primary, Obama and his staff have worked hard to make a subtle shift to the center on key moderate issues like gun control and have built bridges with religious voters in an attempt to woo them away from the GOP. This has been easier than you might think due to Obama’s long history of involvement in the church (for better or worse), campaign message of an end to bipartisanship and his recent embrace of positive religious impact on parental responsibility and his call for an expansion of Bush administration faith-based initiatives. Obama is in the evangelical hotbed of rural Ohio today to deliver a speech on faith-based services and to stress that he will lead efforts to expand them. It’s a major gamble for a liberal Dem to talk of the importance of religion in government services and to pledge support for anything coming out of George Bush’s two terms. Does his target audience merely dismiss him as a flip-flopper despite his best efforts? The Obama campaign is betting no on that, as evangelical outreach takes on greater importance in their swing state strategy.
  • Wall Street an financial industry leaders are not deterred by Obama’s hostile language to wealthy Americans like them and his pledge to raise as many taxes as possible on the top of America’s money heap. Instead of running towards GOPer McCain, who has promised help for the Street and Big Business in a troubled economy, they are donating their piles of cash to Obama at a rate twice that of donations to McCain. The reason is that a trickle-up situation is what money leaders are banking on (ha, ha) to cure what ails the U.S. economy. They need Americans to start spending again. With McCain taking his eye off of domestic concerns in order to talk up his national security advantage, he has lost out on what was a huge base of support for Bush and other Republican candidates 4-8 years ago.
  • McCain has started his three-day swing to Colombia and Mexico to voice support for the federal government’s free trade policy and back NAFTA, the biggest elephant in the room when it comes to trade and blue-collar voters. McCain will get hearty applause from leaders in Bogota and Mexico City, but he is treading on dangerous ground when it comes to supporting NAFTA and trying to win in places like Michigan, Ohio and Pennsylvania. Attacking “protectionism” won’t help in hard-hit locales like the Rust Belt swing region.
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