Although Barack Obama is already attempting to define John McCain as a candidate of the past, hopelessly wedded to President Bush’s policies, McCain is not yet ready to define Obama.
“It’s a little premature for us to be looking at sort of how we contrast with the Democrats,” said Rick Davis, McCain’s campaign manager, in response to questions from The Examiner. “It’ll take us a little more time, but I think we’ll get there on our own pace.”
On Tuesday, Obama invoked McCain’s name no fewer than five times while addressing 17,000 people in Madison, Wis. Buoyed by a string of victories in Democratic presidential primaries, Obama left no doubt about how he would run against “John McCain, the likely Republican nominee.”
“It’s the past versus future,” he said. “It’s about whether we’re looking backwards or whether we’re marching forward. And when I’m the Democratic nominee for president, that will be the choice we have in November.”
Although McCain is closer to cinching the GOP nomination than Obama is to cinching the Democratic nomination, the 71-year-old Arizonan seems still unready to go after the 46-year-old Illinois senator. By contrast, in 2004 President Bush raced to negatively define his opponent, John Kerry, before Kerry could define himself in a more positive light.
“From our perspective at the campaign, we are still very much in primary mode,” Davis said at a luncheon hosted by the Christian Science Monitor. “Until such point in time that we’re really set on the nomination, we’re not going to pay that much attention to the Democrats.”
But Davis did reveal one planned line of attack against Obama that recalled Bush’s criticism of Kerry in 2004. That was the year National Journal ranked Kerry as the most liberal member of the Senate. This year, the distinction went to Obama.
“He’s listed as the most liberal member of the United States Senate,” Davis said of Obama. “Now I don’t know if all 17,000 people who were in his audience last night know that. But they will. I promise you that’ll be right there on your refrigerator under one of those magnets.”
