HALPERIN'S TAKE ON BOB NOVAK'S CLINTON-OBAMA REPORT
Obama's fast and aggressive response statement is a truly striking move. Instead of ignoring a weekend item by a conservative columnist, the campaign decided to create another moment in which it forcefully challenges Clinton and her association with the "old" politics of Washington. It is a tough call-to-arms for his supporters.
The campaign's response also -- whether intended or not -- just might insulate Obama from any actual revelations, allowing his campaign to claim that anything that comes out is the product of the "politics of personal destruction" engineered by the Clinton political machine. It would be the very tactic employed by Bill Clinton in 1992 -- a catch-all defense which moves the focus from the candidate's past to the timing of disclosures and the motives of those disclosing (or those accused of disclosing).
The Clinton campaign's lightning-quick response demonstrates that they, too, are in full-battle mode. Also notice that, like any smart campaign, they're using the opportunity to put their most devastating frame on Obama, by raising the issue of his inexperience.
Still, there are several questions begged. Who gave this information to Novak? Why did they do it? Why now? And, of course, to what does the "scandalous information" allegedly refer? These are the topics that will be lighting up the blogosphere (left and right) and, if the weekend remains quiet, will likely animate Rush Limbaugh's show and other talk radio venues on Monday.
This story is, rest assured, already the talk of the Chattering Class and will surely get plenty of attention in the green rooms of the Sunday morning programs. Novak has a few pretty good sources in Clinton's world, and they will come under some scrutiny. And/but there are those who will say that Novak has produced some copy with his eyes more on mischief-making than fact-finding.
In the near term, the most important point to keep front of mind is this: Along with the Romney negative phone call story, and now this, we are hitting a hyper-intense final period of two colossal nomination fights, and the press is going to have to rise to the occasion or the Freak Show political-media culture will define who wins. There is more of this kind of thing on the way. Obama, apparently, is prepared to take it all on. And so is Clinton.
