As her once-solid lead slips away in the run up to the March 4 Texas primary, the Clinton campaign yesterday put out this ad to air in Texas:
You would think it would be above Senator Clinton to pick a play right out of Karl Rove’s dirty tricks manual, but such is the way of the Senator’s struggle to keep her candidacy viable. It’s interesting to note that almost 25 years ago, in the 1984 Democratic primary, Walter Mondale put out an ad not so different from this one against his opponent Gary Hart:
I’m doubtful as to whether this last-ditch effort at fear-mongering is going to affect the dynamic of the Texas race. For one, national security is taking a backseat to more kitchen-table issues, especially for the blue-collar working class that constitutes such a large proportion of primary voters in Texas. If anything, this ad will shore up the support she already has from this voting bloc. But what will really prevent this ad from gaining any traction is the rapid response of the Obama campaign, which put out this ad as a rebuttal, just hours after the Clinton ad:
