What message did they find?  I missed that.

If McCain puts out any more ads like this, Obama needs to run an ad similar to the Harry & Louise and the radio spots. Just a couple talking angrily about how ugly McCain's campaign has gotten with the tagline, "How stupid does he think we are?"

I'm not sure you're right, here (and most of the time I'd agree with you).

The difference is:

1) This is direct associates/corruption vs. associates/corruption. Obama's already been doing this with his lobbyist series -- indeed, maybe this is what McCain considers a response to the lobbyist ads. The focus is already on associations.

2) Keating 5 is directly related to the economy. Running it now is a two-fer. It doesn't just hit McCain as having had bad associations, it hits him for being part of the cause of the biggest bailout prior to this round.

I've been thinking Keating 5 was just lying in wait for Rezko. If Obama is going to play it, this is the time -- it pivots off Rezko-defense back to offense and it ties to the economy ("would you trust McCain to handle a financial crisis, considering he was a major contributor to the last one?").

3) Running a direct response to this allows Obama to run all the praise the Chicago Tribune heaped on his candor over Rezko.

I don't disagree that your response is potentially effective -- if the media will pick it up and run with it as "McCain's just interested in trivial distractions". My fear is that they won't and we wind up with Swift-Boat Veterans For Truth again -- a weak attack that sticks because it's not countered.

However, if Obama comes out and says: look, you're attacking me for connections to people who either 1) aren't bad people (Daley) or 2) I've been investigated and cleared. Now let's look at your associations, Senator McCain. Let's see: corruption, influence, bad policy, etc etc.

That I think is pretty effective.

It should, as with all personality attacks coming from the Obama side, be done with a strong mocking tone (and obviously no defensiveness). Something about "Senator McCain seems to be worried about who I might be associated with. Perhaps he should check his own associations first."

The Paris Hilton ad wasn't a lie, it was opinion. Opinion isn't lying. I never laughed at it; it's dumb but it's the sort of dumb that works. Saying "Obama is a big empty celebrity" is opinion -- we may have a different opinion, but it's not really subject to fact-checking.

But McCain/Palin have been lying about black being white for the past couple weeks. Their credibility has correspondingly fallen. And this isn't an opinion ad, this is allegedly a factual ad, and as a factual ad it fails, because it alleges that some connection is a major connection.

The Paris Hilton ad was clever and outside-the-box. It made people laugh. THAT'S why it got everyone's attention. It made an impression.

This "Obama knows people" ad is like what you'd see for an Alderman on basic cable. They don't even name any wrongdoing, the thrust is just "Obama knows these people you've never heard of. And these people are scary. Trust me, they are." Might as well have McCain come on and say "Obama shouldn't be president."

"This ad is pitched at the media, not at voters. "

BINGO! Right. They want to see if they can get the media to work the Rezko issue, and, if they can, it allows their surrogates to "talk about Obama" NOT about the financial train-wreck in progress.

But, this ad will not sway percentages, Low information voters are a crap shoot anyway.

Yup, that's the only thing that makes sense, to get the media to run with the Rezko ball. But that's dumb, too.
The media knows Rezko is a dead story. (Meaning boring and with nothing to talk about). And McCain's been running so many scummy ads that this one's pretty tame. I mean, they've got an ad out that says Obama kills babies and wants sex-ed for five-year-olds. "Obama knows scary-sounding people" just isn't going to get any attention.

This could be a very bad sign for McCain. They may have "blown their load" early. By going SO scummy SO early, they may have exhausted any shock value to their ads.
If the campaign does pivot back to personality crap, the narrative just might be "McCain full of shit while Obama talks economy."