What do you do when you have no record on which to run, and no serious plans for the future? Run the most negative campaign in history, of course:
Scholars and political strategists say the ferocious Bush assault on Kerry this spring has been extraordinary, both for the volume of attacks and for the liberties the president and his campaign have taken with the facts. Though stretching the truth is hardly new in a political campaign, they say the volume of negative charges is unprecedented — both in speeches and in advertising.
Three-quarters of the ads aired by Bush’s campaign have been attacks on Kerry. Bush so far has aired 49,050 negative ads in the top 100 markets, or 75 percent of his advertising. Kerry has run 13,336 negative ads — or 27 percent of his total. The figures were compiled by The Washington Post using data from the Campaign Media Analysis Group of the top 100 U.S. markets. Both campaigns said the figures are accurate.
It’s a bit desperate and pathetic, don’t you think?
Even Republican professionals agree that the administration doesn’t have a record to run on:
Scott Reed, who ran Robert J. Dole’s presidential campaign that year, said the Bush campaign has little choice but to deliver a constant stream of such negative charges. With low poll numbers and a volatile situation in Iraq, Bush has more hope of tarnishing Kerry’s image than promoting his own.
“The Bush campaign is faced with the hard, true fact that they have to keep their boot on his neck and define him on their terms,” Reed said. That might risk alienating some moderate voters or depressing turnout, “but they don’t have a choice,” he said.
What’s funny about this is that a lot of the Democrats in the primary race often campaigned against Bush, and it struck me that they really needed to be campaigning for themselves first and foremost. Yet here we see the Bush campaign running against Kerry–a sign of both weakness and fear. Still, attacks need to be addressed, and so we should all keep an eye out on our local media outlets and take whatever opportunities we can to blunt the Bush campaign’s negative tactics.
