England for Obama

Obama’s campaign doesn’t just talk about change, it is change. By building a grass roots political campaign in just six weeks with thousands of volunteers across the State, it’s a a movement which makes Hillary Clinton’s campaign look very ‘old politics’ indeed.

With over 1,300,000+ individual donors nationwide, not taking money from lobbyists and Corporate Political Action Committees (PACs), and even returning the smallest donation if it’s thought to be from either, the Obama team has been able to both outspend and criticise Hillary Clinton’s campaign:

The large numbers of individual donors has swelled the Obama team’s coffers; he raised $41 million in March and had $42 million available to spend in April.

There’s also a very good reason why only Obama was able to hold a the largest rally in the campaign’s history - 35,000 strong. It’s because he can, and Hillary can’t.

Yet despite all this, it is Hillary Clinton’s campaign which, according to their own internal figures, are allegedly leading in Pennsylvania by 11 points. The reason: negative advertising, reinforced by an appallingly biased debate.

The Obama campaign may have spent millions of dollars more in television advertising in the Pennsylvania primary, but Clinton’s negative campaign has used their dollars more destructively. For instance, this last minute Obama ad about healthcare was soon tarnished by a personal attack ad in response by Clinton:

As if in resignation of the Clinton camp’s current ownership of the agenda, the final Obama ad for Pennsylvania also directly addresses the negative Clinton campaign:

That’s a shame, because it’s the exact opposite of what the Obama campaign is really all about. 35,000 people don’t cram together to hear negative attacks, they do it because they are inspired with a positive message of hope and change.

Personally I just hope they will change their advertising.

UPDATE: In the dying hours of the primary Clinton’s campaign aired a new attack ad questioning Obama’s ability to deal with world events as President. Evoking images of the 1929 stock market crash, Pearl Harbor bombing, Cuban missile crisis and long lines for petrol and then to a shot of Osama bin Laden, followed by New Orleans under water, the final question — who “has what it takes?”

Within hours of it’s release, this response ad was aired (yet again confirming the Clinton campaign’s dominance of the agenda right up to polling day):

This entry was posted on Monday, April 21st, 2008 at 11:34 am and is filed under Opinion, Video. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.