Bill Clinton?s Wrathful Rebuttal to Vanity Fair is a Playmaker''s Primer

This past Sunday, the Office of President Bill Clinton responded with a furious memo to a Vanity Fair article, which suggested that the former president has been a negative influence on his wife’s campaign.

Our Play Action Map (see link on the left) deconstructs the claims and counter-claims of the master playmaker''s rebuttal:

• Clinton''s team relied heavily on the Mirror to introduce as much new information into the debate as possible to shift public opinion in his favor.

• Clinton''s team ran Red Herrings as a diversionary tactic to shift the debate away from claims made against him and his wife and on to John McCain and Barack Obama.

• Aggregated data (pg. 2 of the Play Action Map) demonstrated that Clinton relied on plays from the Frame, Freeze and Attack subclases. These are the subclasses most often used by politicians when building an argument or refuting accusations.

Posted by: John Koval