Legal Commentary

That McCain-can't-use-email ad.

Let's watch:

Here's a list of my thoughts on that ad:

1. Obama is trying to do a cute funny ad that will get the kind of attention that McCain's "biggest celebrity" ad got.

2. The ad begins with the can't-use-email mockery but switches to McCain's really serious cluelessness problem: McCain has said he doesn't understand much about economics. These 2 things taken together mainly convey the message: McCain is old. McCain's age is also a serious problem, and Obama is justified in massaging our doubts about it, but there's an odd disproportion between the not being able to use email and not understanding economics.

3. At the end, a third item is thrown in, the usual complaint about tax cuts for the rich and nothing for you, which doesn't really carry on the old clueless guy theme very well. Then, we see McCain arm-in-arm with Bush, and that's a fourth thing thrown in, the old McSame theme, making that ad quite a grab bag. I would have preferred more thematic coherence and artistic taste. It should all have been about what an early 80s relic McCain is. The sympathy for the rich notion is not 80s vintage. And Bush isn't a guy from the 80s. They just couldn't stick to one great idea. I'll bet at one point they had a better ad, and somebody decided they had to throw in a few more things.

4. After trying to make McCain look geezerly and then showing him with that other old guy George Bush, they show Obama standing next to Biden. (And Obama looks like he's helping Biden along.) News flash: Bush was born in 1946, and Biden was born in 1942. Obama voluntarily paired himself with a man who is older than the man he wants to link McCain too. So that screwed up the old-man theme.

5. As Glenn Reynolds and many others have noted, mocking McCain over email draws attention to McCain's war injuries and might upset lots of older voters who don't feel at ease using computers. I'm not so sure this makes the ad completely boneheaded. You know, plenty of old people recognize their own limitations and see that as a reason to doubt the capacity of other old people. Old people are not just a bunch of vain cranks who get pissed off if anyone ever dares to impugn old people. Some old people admire youthful vigor and flexibility.

Full post as published by Althouse on September 13, 2008 (boomark / email).