Spin wars
Posted: Monday, March 03, 2008 2:33 PM by Domenico Montanaro
From NBC's Mark Murray and Domenico Montanaro
In conference calls with reporters this morning, the Clinton and Obama campaigns sought to frame Wednesday's story lines.
The Clinton camp said it was confident of success in tomorrow's pivotal contests in Ohio and Texas. "I think it will be very clear Wednesday morning which campaign had the better day and which campaign had the worst of it," declared communications director Howard Wolfson. "I think there will be no question that we will be the successful campaign on Tuesday."
Wolfson added that with the advantages Obama has going into tomorrow -- in TV ad spending and momentum from previous contests -- that Obama losing would suggest a "serious case of buyer's remorse" among Democratic voters. (That said, Clinton had substantial leads in Ohio and Texas as of the middle of February.)
In the Q&A, a reporter asked Wolfson what happens if Clinton doesn't win both Ohio and Texas. He replied, "We are very optimistic about our chances of success" in those two states. "If the outcome is otherwise, we can discuss it then."
What about Obama's large lead in pledged delegates and whether Clinton can make that up? "We believe this race will continue, and we will be the nominee... There are a lot of states yet to weigh in here." He added, "We wake up on Wednesday; Clinton wins Ohio and Texas; we have a whole new ball game here."
Regarding the Rhode Island and Vermont races -- which also occur tomorrow -- Wolfson said: "I think we are going to do better in Rhode Island than Vermont."
The Obama campaign, for their part, re-emphasized that this should be about delegates not “any kind of creative spin” by the Clinton campaign. Obama campaign manager David Plouffe reminded reporters that that was actually a Clinton campaign line.
If Obama can “maintain or even build” on his pledged delegate lead, that “would be a win for us," Plouffe contended. He went further, calling March 4th “the last big window of opportunity for them to erase a serious delegate deficit.”
Plouffe added, “They were sitting on enormous leads two weeks ago in Ohio and Texas.... We’ve made huge strides in these states." More: "They like to present alternative, underhanded paths to the nominations…. They need to demonstrate how they are going to state by state to retake the delegate lead. The candidate who wins the pledged delegates at the end of this, will be the nominee. There’s the cold, hard reality of the math. They suggested a couple of weeks ago that they were going to erase the delegate lead” as a result of March 4.
“They keep trying to move the goal posts," Plouffe said, "but at some point you run out of field."