James Carville suggests Bill Richardson is a modern-day Judas.

Bill Clinton calls Barack Obama's campaign a fairy tale.

Hillary Clinton says she's a lot like "Rocky," except Rocky lost to Apollo Creed in a split decision.

In the artful pursuit of the perfect stump speech -- or sometimes the perfect, scalding insult -- the '08 candidates have sought to sprinkle their language with flourishes and rhetorical devices that emphasize a certain quality they'd like voters to see, either in themselves or their opponents.

Only more often than not, these metaphors and allusions backfire or fall flat.

Obama said Wednesday in Philadelphia that he's the rightful heir to any Rocky movie references, since he's the "underdog" in Pennsylvania.

That was after Clinton the day before said that answering calls to end her presidential campaign would be like "Rocky Balboa had gotten halfway up those art museum steps and said, ‘Well, I guess that's about far enough.'"

She said Rocky and she "have a lot in common." They never quit.

Obama reminded her it's just a movie. And again, in the original movie Rocky ended up bloodied and a loser in the final round.

Sound like the makings of the Democratic primary season?

"I'm not sure why everybody wants to be Rocky, unless they can rewrite the ending," said Democratic strategist Susan Estrich.

Michael Steele, FOX News contributor and former Maryland lieutenant governor, said the campaign trail language has started to border on "hyperbole."

"I think some of the language has gotten a little bit to the point of being silly," Steele told FOXNews.com. "It's creating the visual ... the question is in doing that do you diminish yourself, do you make a caricature of yourself that people just find (is) not believable?"

The war of words has dragged on, with candidates and their supporters continuing to try to out-metaphor each other.

The "Rocky" remark came after Clinton loyalist Carville likened Richardson to Judas for endorsing Obama, after he served as U.N. ambassador and energy secretary under former President Clinton.

The name-calling riled Richardson. But Carville, in retrospect, thought his choice of words was dandy. He later wrote in a column that "the metaphor was too good to pass by," since he was asked about Richardson on Good Friday.

And the Carville flap came around the time retired Air Force general Merrill "Tony" McPeak compared Bill Clinton to communist-hunting Sen. Joseph McCarthy for seeming to question Obama's patriotism.

The Clinton campaign called that "absurd."

Taking the storyline of the campaign to a new level, Obama's controversial pastor Rev. Jeremiah Wright Jr. even compared Obama to Jesus in last year's Christmas sermon.

And in a campaign memo Tuesday, Clinton Chief of Staff Maggie Williams compared suggestions that Clinton halt her tireless campaign to efforts to end the 2000 Florida recount, and somehow to Chicken Little.

"The last time that we were told we'd better cut the process short or the sky would fall was when the Supreme Court stopped the Florida recount in 2000. But Chicken Little was wrong. What was true then is true now: there is nothing to fear -- and everything to gain -- from hearing from all of the voters," she wrote.

Estrich said voters shouldn't expect the colorful language and retorts to end anytime soon.

"Everybody's looking for 'Where's the beef?' The problem is for every 'Where's the beef?' there's seven that fall flat, like 'Change you can Xerox,'" said Estrich, a FOX News contributor, referring to Clinton's "Xerox" line at a February debate where she mocked Obama for plagiarism charges. That line drew boos from the crowd.

"The search for a good line in politics is never-ending. Most candidates feel they're that one good line away from capturing their message and getting it across -- and it's usually not true, but it's a nice thought," Estrich said.

Clinton has also seen some unfortunate imagery used to describe her campaign, most notably the "kitchen sink strategy" and the "Tonya Harding Option."

Of course, they're not all bad.

Clinton's April Fools Day suggestion that she and Obama resolve the taut Democratic primary battle with a "bowl off" not only jabbed at Obama for his recent score of 37 at a Pennsylvania bowling alley. It may have also offered commentary on the desired trajectory of her race from here on -- out of the gutter?

And presumptive GOP nominee John McCain seemed to get away with his lofty and lengthy Internet ad in early March that interspersed his own speeches with those of former British Prime Minister Winston Churchill and former President Teddy Roosevelt.

But there is one hole in that historical comparison.

According to a recent study from the New England Historic Genealogical Society, Churchill is actually a distant cousin to Obama.

FOX News' Bonney Kapp and Aaron Bruns contributed to this report.