Legal Commentary

Alinskyite?

By Orin Kerr

I?m a bit conflicted as to whether to comment on my co-blogger Jim Lindgren?s new post once again criticizing a fundraising e-mail sent by BarackObama.com to its mailing list.   But just quickly, I see that e-mail as a pretty standard fundraising message.  If there?s something specifically ?Alinskyite? about that, I don?t know what it is.

In my experience, it?s routine practice in political fundraising to name names on the other side and use the unpopularity of those figures to get your allies to cough up cash. Thus, GOP fundraising appeals say ?Nancy Pelosi? as many times as possible. Now Obama?s folks are saying ?John Boehner.? Seems pretty routine to me.

It?s true that Obama is increasingly making Boehner the target of attacks.  Again, though, isn?t that pretty standard stuff?  Many influential Republicans and sympathetic media outlets like Fox News have worked hard to define Obama the person in a negative way in order to help rally opposition to his policies.   It?s proven quite effective.   Now Obama is starting to do the same back to the Republicans.   Maybe the attacks are merited, maybe they?re not.   But from a political messaging perspective, this seems like an obvious move.

I?m not going to open comments because I don?t have time to moderate them.  But I did want to respond.

Full post as published by The Volokh Conspiracy on September 16, 2010 (boomark / email).