Are voters adults or children?

I'm sure by now everybody is sick and tired of the US campaign season (regardless of where you live). However, for anyone interested in studying the use of images, campaign season of course is one of the most fruitful periods, and TV ads are often most revealing (albeit not in the way the campaigns originally intended). Take this TV ad by the Clinton campaign and this response by the Obama campaign. In a sense, these ads neatly summarize the difference between Clinton and Obama: Clinton treats voters like children, who are clueless and who need a strong leader to protect them. Obama treats voters like adults, who can make their own choices based on information presented to them (and if you haven't watched his speech on race, you might want to watch it to see someone talking to people like adults and then addressing one of the most difficult issues the country still has to face).