Picking apart the new McCain ad that slams the 'Chicago Way'
ONLY ON LYNN SWEET'S BLOG . . .
Making a reference to the "Chicago Way," the Republican National Committee links together Tony Rezko, Bill Ayers and William Daley in a new overheated negative spot released Friday to run in Wisconsin and Indiana, battlegrounds adjacent to Illinois.
The McCain team continues to focus on Barack Obama's associations as the world economy is sinking and the Dow is plunging again.
(AP)
The spot takes a parochial approach -- pumping up presumed anti-Chicago sentiment in the Hoosier and Badger states.
Voice-over: The Chicago Way. Shady politics. That's Barack Obama's training.
My comment: The McCain camp is trying to make Obama into yet another hack Chicago alderman. Unless you're talking about deep dish pizza, saying something is "The Chicago Way" is not a compliment. Actually Obama's political roots in Chicago are related to the Democratic faction aligned with the late Mayor Harold Washington -- not the Daley family. It was later in Obama's political life that he formed important alliances with the Daley faction; his top strategist, David Axelrod, is Mayor Daley's top adviser and his counselor-at-large in the presidential campaign is Valerie Jarrett, who comes out of the Daley City Hall -- as does Michelle Obama, who worked for Jarrett.
His teachers . . . William Ayers: Leader of a terrorist group that bombed the U.S. Capitol. Obama's first campaign was launched at a gathering at Mr. Ayers' home.
My comment: This line suggests that Ayers was critical to Obama's political career. He was not. Getting the early backing of then-state Sen. Alice Palmer was more important, because that got him entree with local powerbrokers. Obama and Palmer would go on to have a falling out that lasts until this day.
Palmer decided to run for re-election; Obama would not drop out; Obama challenged the signatures on her nominating petitions and knocked Palmer -- and all his opponents off the ballot, letting him claim a state senate seat without a fight.
Now that's the Chicago Way.