When Minnesota Republican Rep. Michele Bachmann hired campaign veteran Ed Rollins earlier this year to manage her run for the GOP presidential nomination, the wisdom of such a move was questioned. Would Ed Rollins be the right fit for a candidate like Bachmann?
Although Bachmann isn’t technically affiliated with the Keep Conservatives United Super PAC, a group that released an ad this week attacking her opponent Texas Gov. Rick Perry, Weekly Standard editor Bill Kristol is wondering if Rollins’ thumbprint is on this ad. In an appearance on Thursday’s “Hugh Hewitt Radio Show,” Kristol called the ad “pathetic” and called it ill-timed.
“That’s pathetic I think, honestly,” Kristol said. “Ninety-five percent of the people who admire Michele Bachmann are well disposed to Rick Perry and vice-versa and I would count myself among those – and Mitt Romney too for that matter. The last thing people want to see before Labor Day is negative attack ads, and pretty substance-free negative attack ads I would say by one conservative on another.”
Kristol explained that this sort of tactic isn’t what got Bachmann to where she is politically and goes against her “brand.”
“I think it’s really a huge mistake for Michele Bachmann,” he continued. “Her brand, if I can use that term which I don’t like – why she’s interesting and attractive to people is that she’s new, she’s different, she says what she believes. She’s a citizen politician and here she is doing the most kind of hackneyed, silly attack ad on another conservative.”