The Politico's Avi Zenilman and Ben Smith published an article yesterday on what they described as the Obama campaign's "counterpunching style":
For a candidate sometimes mocked for being too soft to win a political fistfight, he has shown an uncanny ability to take a punch and then rear back and deliver one in return.
When Obama responds this way, it leaves him open to charges that he's undermining his so-called politics of hope. But, showing remarkable dexterity, he has a knack for using these flare-ups to pivot back to the central theme of his candidacy: that politics is broken, and he knows how to change it.
The article goes on to list numerous examples over the course of the primary campaign of Obama refusing to apologize or backtrack from his own purported "gaffes" and instead using them to mock or undermine his opponents.
This pattern has continued with the controversy over his comments about the bitterness he's observed in small town America. Check out his remarks on the matter this morning:
Obama on Tuesday morning told the Building and Construction Trades union representatives at the Washington Hilton that there is a lot of anger in small towns because of troubling economic conditions, and candidates who do not realize that are not in tune with what voters are saying.
“If anybody denies that people are frustrated and angry and, yes, sometimes bitter, then they are out of touch,” Obama said.
The Illinois senator added that anger and bitterness have to be tied to hopefulness in order to achieve results.
“If you’re not angry about something, then you're going to sit back and let it happen to you,” Obama said. “I’m mad, but I’m also hopeful.”
While the Clinton campaign is using Obama's latest "gaffe" to essentially argue against his viability in the general election, my hope is that the superdelegates -- and remaining primary voters -- are noting his campaign's approach to these "molehill" controversies.
Regardless of who the Democratic nominee is, they are inevitably going to make occasional clumsy remarks that invite attacks from the GOP. Al Gore did it. John Kerry did it. And we've seen Clinton herself do it this spring. What's important is that the candidate react forcefully, rather than remorsefully; that they not only explain their actual position, but also criticize this political culture that turns misstatements into bombshells.
So far, the Obama campaign has shown that they understand this and I think it represents a huge asset heading towards November.
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