Obama’s '08 Mile – How to neutralize the upcoming onslaught by the McCain campaign

The failing economy, new voter registration in the hundreds of thousands, the erratic behavior of the GOP VP candidate, and the disaster of McCain’s campaign suspension have all worked to Obama’s favor. As the polls show, his lead continues to climb even in states that were not considered to be in play.

So what’s left in the GOP arsenal? I agree with what most of the pundits have been observing on the Sunday shows – McCain’s next surge is to go negative. Deeply negative, and to try to question the integrity of the opposing candidate, and bring up an onslaught of accusations (true or not) of associations, records, etc, in the hopes to muddying the conversation just enough that the public will be too scared to vote for Obama.

The efficacy of this tactic (not to be confused with a strategy, apologies to McCain) will soon be evident. The fact that McCain even has this as an option does speak to the Obama campaign’s continuing challenge of convincing skeptical voters that he is truly like them. Part of it is this country’s obsession with personality politics, and how mediocrity in our leaders is celebrated over intelligence as seen by Palin’s popularity and her Joe-six-pack tag lines.

A storm is coming. McCain has nothing to lose, and in these 30 days to the election, McCain will unleash a flurry of negativity unlike anything we have seen. It is almost certain they will take the low road in the upcoming weeks because it seems to be the only thing that makes traction against Obama. The lipsticked pit bull has already begun, trying to re-link Obama with former domestic terrorists and corrupt local Chicago politicians. Most of these accusations were debunked during the primaries, but can still do reputation damage among voters in crucial states. The Democrats must be prepared to not only weather this storm but come up with a real plan to neutralize it so that voters focus on the issues which McCain has not be able to dominate in – the economy, health care, education and alternative energy.

For a defense strategy that I believe will work, Obama has but to look toward a movie released in 2002 set in Michigan, the state Obama just recently forced McCain to concede. 8 Mile is a movie about working class youth in Detroit struggling to make it and still pursue their dreams. The main character participates in “rap debates” where he matches wits vs. area hip hop hopefuls in front of live crowds, not too dissimilar to the presidential version in that style often trumps substance, the candidates play to crowds, and the battle often gets extremely personal. In the final match, the main character walks onto the stage knowing that the opposing team will surface some potentially damaging events in his life that might sway the crowd in their direction. Rather than allow them to control the tone, he preempts everything that might be said against him, leaving nothing for the opposing party to address. His final line challenges his speechless opponent to trump his own words saying, “ Here, tell these people something they don’t know about me.”

If you can ignore the more vulgar parts of the performance, the brilliance of preempting the opposing side's arguments is the best way for Obama to protect himself and at the same time go on the offensive. He needs to walk into the debates next week, and while on the stump, telling the crowd what McCain is going to do and let them know the desperation from which these tactics come. Additionally, he needs to keep on message and not seem to be reactive, and finally, he needs to not constrain himself by “the rules.” In the movie, the main character runs out of time and the music is shut off, but continues his turn acappella. If in the coming debates McCain starts to attack trying to squeeze in accusations, wether Obama's turn is over or not, Obama needs to respond and respond strongly. If he does this, McCain will have nowhere to go, and his attacks will seem petty and juvenile. The politics of fear have no place in this election, and if handled correctly, Obama can cause McCain's tactics to backfire on him.