You call that negative?

The term "negative campaigning" should be reserved to mean the nasty, mean spirited, or misleading stuff that has become so common in American politics. Here, CNN calls a Hilary Clinton Wisonsin campaign commercial "negative" when all it does is goad Obama for refusing a debate, which he has done because stratically it is wise for him to do so and for Clinton, generally a better debater, to try to bring on more debates. This is not exactly the type of thing we saw back in the elections of the 1800s where candidates took outrageous shots at their opponents.

We can have a spirited, healthy interactions free from the media-induced nonsense that tends to color everything in the most confrontational light.