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Campaigns Shift as McCain Choice Alters the Race

by LotusFlower | August 30, 2008 at 10:58 pm

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The choice of Palin as running partner has thrown the Obama camp into a quandry as it had not considered Palin would be on the Republican ticket. The Obama campaign team had prepared lines of attack on Mitt Romney and Tim Pawlenty but not Palin. They now have to consider if an all out attack on Palin would be more counter productive than ratchetting up the pressure on McCain himself. Whatever route they take the election looks as though it will be full of claim and counter claim from both sides,not only on political but personal matters too.

A day after Mr. McCain announced his decision, catching almost everyone but his inner circle by surprise, both sides were trying to gauge the risks and opportunities of having a young, relatively inexperienced, socially conservative woman on the Republican ticket.

The Obama campaign and the Democratic Party had prepared advertisements and lines of attack directed at the two men who had been most prominently mentioned as vice-presidential possibilities for Mr. McCain — former Gov. Mitt Romney of Massachusetts and Gov. Tim Pawlenty of Minnesota — but had not considered Ms. Palin a likely enough choice to do the same for her. A new advertisement linking President Bush to Mr. McCain was quickly put together, but it contained only a fleeting mention of Ms. Palin.