A friend of mine writes about the Obama campaign's "Seven Houses" ad:

Actually I have to say this is cheap and sordid, and I'm terribly disappointed in Obama.

First, I wonder in what context McCain said "the fundamentals of our economy are strong," because I could easily hear McCain say "The fundamentals are strong...but we have a lot of work to do..." Or the phrase could simply mean what it says...our fundamentals (capitalism, a large work force, etc.) are indeed strong. In fact, the phrasing tells me that McCain knows there are problems that need fixing, or else he simply would have cluelessly said "our economy is strong," without the qualification.

As for the fact that Obama is pointing out that McCain owns seven houses, well, this is appalling for a politician talking about "change" and promising a breath of fresh air from the usual politics. Its instead the same tired and cheap classism that politicans love to use and just makes the world a more painful place in the end. You could have said the same (and indeed far, far worse) for FDR, who lived in landed luxury while people waited in breadlines. And yet, a great president who loved and cared for his fellow citizens like few others have.

So I'm very angry that Obama is claiming that wealth makes a candidate immediately and necessarily incapable of understanding people's problems. (After all, Obama's not struggling to pay the mortgage on his very lovely house by any means. Shall we show him sitting happily in his well-appointed living room in the ad?).

Attack McCain's stupidity, his hypocritical (and disappointing) shift to the right, his inane ideas on drilling, his support for Bush's failed policies, his clueless economic ideas in general, and do it intelligently with a view towards educating the public about what a good economic policy would be. Don't take cheap shots filled with the same old shit that you claim you're moving us beyond.

This ad, just on its own, now just re-complicated my voting decision, which was just recently clear. Or, if Obama is doing it because he knows it will work, it made my hate my fellow Americans.

I agree that the part about "the fundamentals of the economy" is probably taken out of context, and that McCain probably understands that there are immediate problems with the economy.

On the other hand, I think that it's perfectly fair for Obama to point out that McCain has seven houses. McCain and his campaign have been hitting Obama incredibly hard on being an elite, or an "arugula-eater" and otherwise out of touch with regular Americans in a way that implies that McCain is a regular, down-home guy instead of the son and grandson of Admirals who, outside of his relatively brief Navy career has spent very little time with regular Americans... as soon as he came back from Vietnam he and his ex-wife were regularly hanging out with the Reagans. McCain is also somebody who came from comfort and married into a massive fortune that's well out of the reach of most Americans. I'll grant that Obama also is certainly not worried about his financial solvency like many Americans, but he also didn't have money until his books (which unlike most politicians he actually wrote himself). Also, living in Chicago with a couple of million dollars is a lot less distancing than living on a ranch in Sedona with $100 million.

I agree that wealth is by no means a disqualification to high office, and that FDR and other presidents who came from money have been able to still care about the poor and middle class. The problem with McCain is that, outside of veterans and active duty service members, he doesn't in fact seem to care much about regular Americans. He's shown almost no interest in any kind of credible economic program, outside of further oil drilling (which indicates that he either doesn't understand economics at all or is willing to baldly lie to the nation). I think it's fair to point out that it's possible that disinterest in economic policy at least partially derives from his distance from the economic pain people are feeling.

In conclusion, I think it does Oama and the country no good to sit back and allow McCain's campaign to paint Obama as an out-of-touch elitist and McCain as a down-to-earth hero without punching back. I think the goal of this ad was to neutralize McCain's thrust in that direction, and to the extent that it's successful in doing so I'm glad that it was made.