Is Obama Too Soft?

"As New York Magazine's John Heilemann noted, 'we now have an inkling of just how deep in the mud McCain and his people are willing to wallow in order to win in November: right up to their Republican eyeballs.'

"The problem is, we're right down there with him. That's because all it takes is one of the two candidates to decide to yank the discourse into the ditch and the media -- and as a result, the public -- follow.

"Instead of the media calling the McCain campaign on its pathetic trivialization of the presidential race, they have been engaging in meaningless horse-race analysis of 'did the ad work?' The conventional wisdom appears to be that it did."

It's our job to report on each campaign's tactics and not to denounce them as, say, pathetic. There's certainly been plenty of criticism of the McCain ad--though everyone likes the Paris spoof--and at the same time, it seems to have worked in changing the campaign conversation. Still, you'd have to admit there's been plenty of preening over Paris, especially on the tube.

More theories on why Obama doesn't have a bigger lead from Atlantic blogger Marc Ambinder:

"White, generational racism. Maybe racism accounts for Obama's difficulties with older white voters and white men, in particular. But with one exception -- older white women -- his fall-offs among these demographics roughly track the norm for Democratic presidential candidates.

"Otherness. There is a thin version, as expostulated by David Brooks, is that Obama, a 'sojournor,' and 'voters have trouble placing him in his context, understanding the roots and values in which he is ineluctably embedded.' Basically: the Peter Hart problem. The thinker version: whether it's his name, his binational background, his biracial identity, his urbanity, his inexperience -- people don't really trust him.

"Bambiness. Obama doesn't counterpunch effectively, and to the extent that baseline opinions about character are being formed now, bruises that were just about to fully heal from the primaries are blushing again. Put it another way, just as the McCain campaign is offended by the rank inexperience and presumptuous of the Obama campaign and aren't bottling up their feelings, the Obama campaign is offended by the rank immaturity and stupidity of the McCain campaign and aren't bottling up their feelings."

In the WSJ, Karl Rove offers some advice to the Republican candidate:

"Mr. McCain is the most private person to run for president since Calvin Coolidge in the 1920s. He needs to share (or allow others to share) more about him, especially his faith. The McCain and Obama campaigns are mirror opposites. Mr. McCain offers little biography, while Mr. Obama is nothing but.

"The Republican Party's convention next month is Mr. McCain's biggest chance to improve his posture. The best minds in his campaign should be carefully working on its script."

After my piece this week on McCain keeping national reporters at bay for the first time in two presidential campaigns, NPR also details the lack of access. Key quote from Mark Salter:

"Obviously, every campaign has to get out there, and every day you get up and you've got a certain thing you want to say. And if you spend a lot of time talking about things other than what you want to say, it often gets diluted or you guys don't report it."