Bush ad may be a feint

[mrgorth]

Don't get me wrong. I think he'll happily take any of the bozos that say "you know what? They're right. I'm voting for Dubya." But I think Rove is smart enough to know that anyone that doesn't like the war is going to vote against Bush. He's throwing this out there to get us to pay attention to his left. In the meantime he's putting brass knuckles on his right. This is too easy. He's got something up his sleeve.

[Drifter]

1. Like a screen pass ...

Let the line penetrate, and then dump the pass where they used to be.

I still think Saddam Hussein has done that in Iraq, and now it is paying off for him.

Cheers
Drifter

[pocoloco]

2. You are right to be cautious mrgorth,

seems like I read somewhere that rove incorporated Sun Tzu's
"The Art of War" in his teachings. His statement about wanting
Dean is hard to figure out also. Hard to imagine what he will come
up with during the next year.

[mrgorth]

4. I wish

the neocons had read "art" because if they did they wouldn't have gone into Iraq. Put simply, Rove wants Dean (supposedly) because he thinks he can easily paint Dean as a tax raising, socialist, fag loving traitor. His mistake, IMHO, is in underestimating Dean's charisma and willingness and ability to take the fight to Bush. It'd be like the captain of the wrestling team picking the class weakling to wrestle against and finding out he's a king fu master.

[oasis]

3. Rove distances Chimpy from the hatchet job aspects of the ad by

putting Ed Gillespie's face at the end to keep intact Chimpy's pledge to "change the tone in Washington". :eyes:

[sandnsea]

5. Stir up Democratic dissent

I don't like Dean. Disclaimer. (like I needed that) This isn't intended to be an anti-Dean thread at all, although it'll probably sound that way.

Anyway, in my opinion, the Dean campaign is rather contingent on dissent between Democrats. If any Democrat, for example Clark, can take the focus off of anti-war & IWR, and put the focus on foreign policy or better solutions in Iraq; then a unified Democratic voice starts to emerge. We've seen that and we've seen Bush's numbers drop. Rove may well be counting on two different responses to this ad. One will likely be from Dean & Kucinch; Bush lies, illegal/wrong war, etc. The other approach, from Clark and a couple of others, might well continue with Bush failed policy. The bottom line is that if this ad brings anti-war/pro-war arguments to the forefront again, Bush wins because the focus is off of solutions. And Dean wins because he's got the antagonism and Democratic anti-war anger riled up again, which means Rove wins because that's supposedly what he wants. The only way Bush loses is if we somehow manage to send one message against Bush and that's that we'd love for him to fight terrorism and we're wondering when he's going to start doing that.

At least that's the way I see it.

[kentuck]

6. You may be right...

He would like to see how the Dems react to the ad about the war on terrorism or the war in Iraq? I'm sure they will be studying the impact of the ad with voters as well as with the Dem candidates.

[RetroLounge]

7. But just watch how Dean and we will counter it...

I love the bat!

Time to break out the checkbook again!

[Silverhair]

8. The ad is aimed at Joe & Jane Average.

They know they are not going to convert any DUers. The idea is that his support has been slowly slipping and needs to be shored up a bit. It is to reinforce the borderline supporters, and maybe take a few of our borderline types.

I heard a piece on the radio that we are supposed to know that ABL is in Iran, having arrived there under Iraqi Republican Guard. (Hey, I said I heard it, not that I believed it.) Interesting that this knews is coming out at the same time as the ad. Look for some sort of "development" in Iraq that appears favorable. That would fit with the ad coming out right now.

What it really means is that the continuing attacks on W from our candidates are starting to wear the Teflon off. This is an attempt to patch the Teflon.

[Silverhair]

9. Also, it makes us spend more money to counter it.

They have lots of money and aren't using much of it as they don't have a primary to go through. So they an easily afford to put out an ad or two, and we have to spend scarce money to counter it.