Rick Davis, Giuliani Attack Media for Talking About Palin

Tue, September 02, 2008 - 1:08 PM

John McCain's campaign manager Rick Davis and top McCain ally Rudolph Giuliani, the former New York Mayor, offered a hint Tuesday morning of the campaign’s strategy for addressing both the increasing focus on Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin and the emerging consensus that the campaign did not comb her background thoroughly enough before choosing her.

You might be familiar with this strategy: attack the media.

Speaking to South Carolina Republicans at a breakfast meeting, Davis criticized the media for focusing on the sudden news of Palin’s daughter’s pregnancy on a day when Hurricane Gustav was lashing the Gulf Coast.

“What does our media cover?...The tens of thousands of reporters that have nothing better to do than to stir up a pot of innuendo and personal attacks and the kind of journalism that hasn’t distinguished itself in this election cycle very well,” he said. Press play below for the video.



I caught up with Davis after the speech. I asked why he was criticizing reporters for discussing it during Gustav, since his campaign made a strategic decision to release the news in the morning, just as the storm was making landfall. That was a deliberate strategy, McCain spokesman Tucker Eskew told the New York Times.

They hoped that releasing the information on a day when they expected cable networks to be totally focused on Hurricane Gustav would minimize its impact.

Or, as Eskew put it, Monday was a good day to “flush the toilet.”

That strategy backfired somewhat when the storm delivered less of a wallop than expected, giving CNN, MSNBC, Fox News and all the major newspapers time to explore the political ramification of the bombshell.

They also focused on other emerging stories that seem to contradict McCain’s marketing of her as a political reformer and raised questions about the vetting process: her changing stances on the “Bridge to Nowhere”; her hiring of a Washington lobbyist to secure federal earmarks as mayor of a small Alaska town, which McCain derides as pork; her hiring of a private attorney to deal with an investigation into allegations that she used the power of her office to settle a family dispute.

Davis told me that the campaign had to release the statement Monday, because rumors were circulating about Bristol Palin’s pregnancy. Regardless of whether they confirmed it or not, it would have been covered, he argued. Press play below to hear the audio.



I’m not sure’s that accurate. While liberal blogs were discussing it and the National Enquirer was tracking down the story, it’s unclear that cable news outlets would have reported – at least so extensively – on such a sensitive issue based on unconfirmed rumors.

Meanwhile, after speaking to South Carolina Republicans at a breakfast meeting in Minneapolis, Giuliani lashed out at a reporter who asked him if “the issue of Palin’s daughter is going to detract from the convention.”

“Frankly, you should be ashamed of yourself for asking that question. This is a personal issue that the family is handling in the most appropriate way it can be handled. Other American families have to handle this…it doesn’t have the slightest relationship to a presidential campaign,” Giuliani said. Press play below for the audio.



As for the offical talking points on Palin for GOP surrogates, Marc Ambinder at The Atlantic has posted them on his blog.

--Sean Mussenden