Hillary Goes Negative

As we've been stating, Hillary Clinton's persuasive strategy has changed dramatically after her stunning losses in the potomac primaries. Instead of running a positive campaign, she has changed her strategy again. This marks yet another change in strategy.

Prior to Iowa, Hillary ran a positive campaign.
After her loss in Iowa, she and her husband turned modestly negative.
After her win in New Hampshire, she and her husband turned incredibly negative.
After her stinging loss in South Carolina, she learned the ostensible lesson and became positive.
After her string of eight losses, she has now turned negative again.

Consider the following examples of her attacks (also note my previous blog on a mailer Senator Clinton sent out to residents of WI):

• Senator Clinton: "I am in the solutions business. My opponent is in the promises business."(source)
• Senator Clinton: "There's a big difference between us - speeches versus solutions, talk versus action." (source)
• Howard Wolfson, Mrs Clinton's spokesman, said: "We are seeing a pattern here. Senator Obama does not have long record of public service. He is running on powerful oratory...So when he is found to have lifted passages from another elected official it is significant." (source)
• Bill Clinton said: "It would be truly tragic if the Democratic Party walked away from universal health care for the first time in 60 years when we finally got the business community and the medical community in line behind us," (source)
• Clinton also accused Obama of supporting "billions of dollars of breaks for the oil industry" (source)
  
• "My opponent says that he'll take on the special interests," she said. "Well, he told people he stood up to the nuclear industry and passed a bill against them. But he actually let the nuclear industry water down his bill -- the bill never actually passed."(source)
• Clinton also accused Obama of supporting "billions of dollars of breaks for the oil industry" by voting for an energy bill she opposed and said he did not support the workers of a Maytag Corp. plant that closed in his home state of Illinois.(source)
• "Speeches don't put food on the table. Speeches don't fill up your tank or fill your prescription or do anything about that stack of bills that keeps you up at night."(source)

Clinton is trying to attack Obama's greatest strength: oratory.
However, in order for attacks to be effective, the attacker cannot stop attacking after a few days.
Hillary needs to attack consistently and begin to create impressions and stigmas about Obama.