Strategy

I've seen a lot of the liberal bloggers wringing their hands over Obama's perceived lack of response to early Republican attacks. Lord knows they have reason to be concerned. There have been far too many instances in recent elections where an attempt to take the high road and not respond seems to have led directly to the Democratic loss. Maybe Kerry was completely unelectable, but surely a more direct and angry response to the foolishness of "Swift Boat Veterans for Truth" would have been better than not saying anything and letting the mistatements and outright lies stand.

I'm trying to remain positive, and I recognize that we still have a long way to go. But I recently noticed the convergence of several different items that seem to point to a larger strategy. Am I the only one who noticed that, at about the same time:

1. Obama went on vacation to Hawaii,
2. The Olympics started, and
   
3. Edwards admitted an affair.

The timing on this is way too convenient. The Olympics drown out the news of Edwards' affair, while Obama is too far away and unavailable to the media for anything more than a soundbyte on a runway. I suspect that Edwards had decided to go public about the affair a while ago in order to not distract from the convention, and thoughtfully coordinated with the Obama campaign to do it in a way that would have the least impact. Further, if Obama had been coming out guns blazing already, the Republicans might have been more inclined to use Edwards against them. On top of that, after the convention McCain will have much less money to draw on than Obama, which will allow the Dems to set the tone going into the election.

Obama has never struck me as a shrinking violet. I think that when the time is right he will come out hard against the idiotic policies and stories that the Republicans have been spinning relatively unopposed up to this point. Plus, why should Obama take on this foolishness directly when one of the other targets of the "Celebrity" ad did it for him?

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