"The bottom line is Sen. Obama's words, for all their passion and eloquence, don't really mean anything," McCain said.
Obama, for his part, tried Wednesday to link McCain to President Bush, who is generally unpopular among swing voters. "Nobody here thinks that Bush or McCain has a real answer for the challenges we face, so what they're going to try to do is make you scared about me," he said in Springfield, Mo.
Obama's recent nine-day tour overseas won him wide and generally positive media coverage. The new McCain TV ad attempts to recast views of that trip.
Rick Davis, McCain's campaign manager, compared the Berlin rally to Obama's plan to accept the Democratic nomination before 75,000 supporters at a Denver stadium next month, rather than at the site of the party's convention.
Davis derided that plan as "a stunt."
"It's like someone releasing a new movie rather than running for president," Davis said. Voters, he said, are anxious "about the popularity that surrounds Barack Obama as a celebrity and the kinds of events he puts on with his adoring fans."
Still, Davis and other top aides acknowledged that they wouldn't mind a little more popularity for their own candidate. "I'd love to think that John McCain was a big international celebrity," Davis said. "But he's not."
The new TV ad mystified many Republicans.
"If you shut off the sound, almost all the images of Obama are very positive," said Tony Fabrizio, a GOP pollster. "Plus, I'm not sure what's the issue. That it's bad to be a celebrity? That he's bad? What's the message here?"
Todd Harris, who served as McCain's press secretary during his unsuccessful 2000 presidential bid, said the ad "has the potential" to be effective, or at least "get people talking."
"The assumption they're counting on is that people will think that if 200,000 Germans are cheering for him, then that should worry Americans here at home," he said. "I don't know if voters will go along with that or not."
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bob.drogin@latimes.com
peter.nicholas@latimes.com
