Although Atwater clearly approved of the use of the Willie Horton issue, the Bush campaign never ran any commercial with Horton's picture; instead they ran a similar but generic ad. The original commercial was produced by Americans for Bush, an independent group managed by Larry McCarthy, and Republicans benefited from the coverage it attracted in the national media. Referring to Dukakis, Atwater declared that he would "strip the bark off the little bastard" and "make Willie Horton his running mate". Atwater's challenge was to counter the "where was George?" campaign slogan Democrats were using as a rallying cry in an effort to create an impression that Bush was a relatively inexperienced and unaccomplished candidate. Furthermore, Bush had critics in the Republican base, who remembered his pro-choice positions in the 1980 primary, and that the harder the campaign pursued Dukakis's liberal positions, the bigger his base turnout would be.
