Excellent issue! With this you ought to get at least 3 or 4 votes that you wouldn’t have gotten anyway. Couple million more and perhaps you can win an election!
Another one that strikes right…well, at the base you already have. You may get an additional couple of votes from this I suppose. A vote here and a vote there, ehe?
More of the same…in case the sarcasm was lost, you are simply doing what you guys did in '04…pandering to the base. How did that work out for you guys?
Definitely hit on this one…but frankly its a no-brainer and nothing new. With that in mind I agree it is something the Dems can use and use effectively.
Frankly don’t really know how the American people feel about this. The left has been playing this up for years now, especially post AG in Iraq and it just doesn’t seem to have much traction. Its tough to generate sympathy for folks who blow up civilians and chop peoples heads off. Still, reguardless I fully agree…the Dems SHOULD draw a line here and run with this (even if it doesn’t really generate many votes for them that they wouldn’t have gotten anyway). I think this is the kind of thing the Dems can use to distinguish themselves (sort of a Value Added feature ).
Er…ok. I don’t even know what that is (I assume ‘libery’ is library ).
If we are talking about the Presidential elections in '08 I doubt anyone will care (unless something similar happens in the next 3 years). Besides, it seems that most folks think the ENTIRE government was to blame, not just Bush…those that blame the government at all that is. To me this is (once again) playing to your base. Hint: You ALREADY have them. Try to reel in some new fish.
Like the Dems never did this before, ehe? This is new somehow?
This will assure you at least a half a dozen new votes come '08.
By my calculations you ought to bring in at LEAST 100 new votes with this ambitious plan. If you get them all in the same place you MIGHT be able to swing a close county somewhere.
But you see, take out the donkey balls references and you practically have John Kerry’s stump speech. Kerry had plenty of good ideas (certainly more than Bush had), but since he couldn’t distill them into six-word sound bites, the new criticism was that he failed to articulate his ideas. As long as the conservatives are controlling the talking points, the Democrats won’t get credit for “new ideas” no matter what they do.
With Bush’s approval in the mid-30s and indictments and investigations all around, the Democrats would be foolish not to push that. The people who are in here telling the Democrats that they can’t win that way are the ones whose candidates haven’t been shy about putting their Democratic opponents’ pictures in ads next to Saddam Hussein or Osama bin Laden in recent elections, so perhaps they’re not the ones to ask.
I’m sorry to say this, but I think it’s true. Taking a firm stance aginst torture is a losing issue for the Dems. Pubs, too, but especially the Dems.
I’m not saying that it’s right. But I think many, many average Americans – and most especially the Soccer Moms and Nascar Dads you need to win elections – believe deep in their hearts that Col. Nathan Jessup was exactly right, and they do not want any politician to get in his way.
I’m not saying they have to endorse torture; but I can think of few things more likely to play into negative stereotypes of Democrats than making themselves the “due process for terrorists” party.
I now expect that at least two people will interpret the above as an endorsement of torture…
Seriously, I only saw one of Michael Badnarik’s ads and it didn’t have Saddam OR ObL in it…let alone standing next to Bush or Kerry. The only ad I saw was a kind of campy one where the man was disgruntled about Bush and the woman was disgruntled about Kerry, and they both decided instead to go Badnarik. Or did you not mean me?
I figured I’d get hammered on it too, or there would be a rant about how inhuman Americans are (or both). Its not really an endorsement of torture as it is a realistic look at the general reaction of the American people to this issue. I really don’t see the outrage on the issue in this country except by those who are outraged that Bush is still breathing. Now, this may grow in the next year or so, and another huge scandal like AG (or worse) then things may change and this could become a hot button issue. Certainly the attitude towards the war has gone south in the last year or so so at least in theory its possible.
As I said earlier though, I think the Dems SHOULD make it a plank issue if they feel strongly about it…I just don’t know how it will play when it comes to getting them new votes (I doubt it will but I could be wrong). It will be a sharp distinction to the Republicans and help to define the Dems on something that is core to their own values. Especially if they actually lay out what they would do about it without a lot of political doublespeak and meaningless soundbites. We pretty much know what the Republicans will do…they have done it. Ranting about that will get you some, though not much traction. Telling us what you would do differently will at least let us evaluate your proposed actions against what the Republican’s are doing.
The problem has been that they have harped on this issue for quite a while now without getting major traction on the issue. AG came out BEFORE the elections after all…and the last GD thread I recall the US seemed to be taking steps to make things better. The CIA revelation of black sites in other countries hasn’t really been all that much a revelation…and I also don’t see a huge public outcry over the issue (course, there was lots of heat over it HERE).
It doesn’t take much rewording to get the opposite answer. Try: “Which party is more likely to let the gas companies raise prices as high as they want to?”
More generally, an effective campaign has to hit 'em high *and * hit 'em low - nobody disagrees, right? It’ll take not only “Look how badly they’ve screwed up and screwed you”, but “Here’s how we’ll do better”, and get our lapdog mass media to actually report that last part instead of “See, the Democrats don’t have a plan - we haven’t been reporting one, have we?”.
I didn’t have to look at your location field to see that you weren’t in North Carolina :). Outsourcing is a pretty big issue here, what with the death of the textile industry following pretty much immediately on the heels of the nineties free trade agreements. This is something that, if well articulated, could gain some serious traction in some traditionally red states, where lots of jobs have been lost.
I agree, and I think that this gets back to one of the problems people have had with Democrats: they think that Democrats are running based on poll numbers, not based on convictions. We need Democrats going forward and saying, “Look. Terrorists are scum. We have got to win the fight against them. But the rules about torture? This isn’t a discussion about terrorists: this is a discussion about us, and who we are, and who we want to be. Torturing captives goes against our Constitution, and it goes against our faith [when appropriate], and it goes against everything it means to be a beacon of freedom. We will not do it.”
DoctorJ, I agree that Kerry did have something of a plan. I’d guess, though, that if you listened to his speeches, he spent far more time criticizing Bush than he spent delineating his own plan. And if he didn’t articulate his plan well enough, then that’s something the next candidate needs to work on. The truth is, a lot of people felt that Democrats didn’t have a plan, and that worked against the party last time around.
I’d say the opposite; that he spent too much time discussing nuances and aspects of reality, and instead of sounding like he understood situations in depth he sounded wishy-washy instead. The bulk of the electorate instead seems to be more convinceable by sound bites delivered confidently, willing to let details sort themselves out as long as the general thrust of the effort is taken in an active and inspiring way - Joe Average prefers action to thought, ISTM, without serious concern about it all going wrong, and Bush gave the impression of being more activist.
So yeah, the 2008 Dem candidate is going to have to dumb it down and smile more. It is what it is, baby.
What? Are you suggesting the Dems will apply price controls? That worked really well in the 70s and 80s, didn’t it? I can see the Democratic pitch now:
“Before Bush took office, we had a terrific president. Someone who cared about the American people. We need to reach back to that time and find a source of strength. America, we give you: Jimmy Carter!”
No, we’re only talking about campaigning in this one, not governing. Totally different disciplines. For campaigning, you want to get the voters to blame the other guys for something they’re pissed off about. Which party is easier for the spin doctors to pin gas prices on? The ones whose Pres and VP are *from * the oil industry and whose image is that generally support laissez-faire, of course. What, you think the RNC can effectively blame them on Democratic taxes?
See, this is what you get for making any specific claims about what you’ll do – those claims will be misinterpreted and exaggerated until you’re advocating Soviet-style communism, from what you’re hearing. Go negative, stay negative, don’t give 'em a thing to grab on to.
That’s not the opposite of what I said: that’s what I meant when I said, “And if he didn’t articulate his plan well enough, then that’s something the next candidate needs to work on.” Note that I didn’t say thoroughly enough; I said well enough. In a campaign, “well enough” means, “So that it can be easily summed up and remembered, with a couple of bold specificities, and all the details available for folks who want to look for them.” Kerry, I believe, lacked the first two.
Evil Captor, when Democrats go negative and don’t give anything to the Republicans to grab onto, how do Republicans respond? What becomes the Republican message at that point? And how do voters respond?
I believe the Pubbies will lie and go negative as they always have. The Republican message, if the Bush admin continues to tank, will be all about individual candidates and what their plans are. They don’t want 2006 to go national. But it will.
It’s all in how it’s played up, and how the spin is generated. Play to the base, and convince the undecideds that they are getting fucked. People can be selfish bastards. Don’t appeal to any “do nice shit for somebody else”, convince them they are screwed and they start to care. Some issues are more than just partisan crap. Torture is one of them, and so is government spying on private citizens. Anyone who doesn’t care must be seriously “ethically challenged”.
You can’t have shades or nuance - everything must be painted black and white, us against them, “they” must be portrayed as being no damn good. It’s politics. If you don’t want to play that way, you lose. Period. The end.
Libery was my swipe at Some Certain Person, who will probably have his own prezudentchal libery after he steps down. The only book there will be that pet goat one (whatever) .
The problem is Steve that only your base really thinks they are getting fucked right now. Most of the issues you brought up ONLY play to either a very narrow voter base (like your outsourcing example), or play to folks who are already going to vote for you. If you want to get those ‘undecideds’ you need something that THEY are interested. Simply saying they are fucked isn’t going to cut it unless the majority of those folks THINK they are getting fucked. I see no evidence that this is so.
Remember…Bush is unpopular atm and his numbers are dropping. But…you won’t be running against Bush and probably not against anyone in the current administration next time. You might be running against someone like McCain. Saying you aren’t Bush and look how bad Bush is really isn’t going to be a winning strategy. After all, when you RAN against Bush LAST time saying those things didn’t get you in the Whitehouse.
Well, here is your big chance then to explain how you would keep the price of gas at the pump down without instituting price controls. I really don’t see how you (or the Dems) could possibly pull it off, but if you think you have a way, lets hear about it.
Leaving aside the ‘lie’ part, if you think the Republican message is all about negatives then you really haven’t been paying attention. I’m not even a Republican and had no intention of voting for Bush and I can say that they mixed things up between the positive and the negative. If you are expecting the Republicans to come out fully negative and not play up the positive aspects of Bush’s reign (or what THEY think are the positive aspects) then you are once again letting your own partisanism blind you.
I really hope you guys get your heads out (I’m talking about the Dem party leadership…obviously the folks on this board don’t have shit to say about the Dems strategy in '08) and come up with a new plan instead of trotting out the same old bullshit we saw from Kerry. I really think the country needs a good moderate Democrat at the helm in the next term (someone like Clinton in his second term, but without all the slimyness and scandal), someone fiscally responsible who can also lead the nation and try and heal some of the wounds we’ve taken in the last few years.
You can’t just say it, you have to convince them, or at the very least, sow the seeds of doubt.
That’s where more spin comes in. Blame it all on “them”. Say it is all “their” fault.
Make bleak predictions about how it will get worse, in the darkest most pessimistic terms possible.
Come up with a fighter who will go on the offensive, instead of defending all the time. Example: What did Kerry do about the Swifties? Nothing. He should have come out blasting, and then attacked Bush and Cheney’s own war record (or lack of one). What did he do when called on Iraq war votes? He voted for before he voted against - he should have attacked and started hollering about what could have been portrayed as deliberately slanted or false “evidence for war”. He never jumped on Bush for saying Bin Laden was no longer important (marginallized). He could have compared the slogans against the actual occurrences and facts, re Iraqis greeting us with open arms etc. Kerry could have called Bush on an old statement that armies are not meant for “nation building”. He had all the ammo, he just never used any of it. Did he even WANT to win? I wonder. He simply did not fight hard enough. You can’t just defend, you have to fight or you will lose. You have to show some balls. You have to go for the jugular and never let go in order to win.
You didn’t make any claims about what you’d do, you made a statement about “letting” gas companies raise prices. AFAIK, there is no law against raising prices except in very specific areas under very specific circumstances (state of emergency).
Actually, I’d very much like to know how you would stop oil companies from raising gas prices. Are you proposing new legislation? What actions do you want the Democrats to take?
And I didn’t say anything about communism-- that’s a strawman.
In another thread, I recommended that a winning proposal for the Democrats would be to resurrect the “windfall profits tax” for oil companies and use that revenue to fund alternative fuels research. I don’t personally like that policy, but I think it would be a popular idea. If gas prices rise as a result, it will generally be seen as an action by the oil companies, not by the government.
He also had a resoundingly negative message. The problem with pounding a failing administration is that one runs the risk of coming off less as a strong voice offering to help us back on track and more like a whiny ass who is pissed that nobody listens to him.
Since the advent of radio speeches in 1924, exactly two dour and cynical candidates have beaten happy and optimistic opponents- Herbert Hoover against Al Smith in 1928, and Richard Nixon against Hubert Humphrey in 1968. The people we think of as being “the best” politicians are those who, even as they criticized their opponent or the administration, offered up an optimistic view of the present and the future. Reagan may have asked if you were better off today than you were four years ago, but he also held talked about what America could do given the opportunity. Bill Clinton lampooned Bush’s out-of-touch nature, but he also campaigned as “The Man From Hope.”
Compare that to John Kerry’s slogan: “Help is on the Way.” That’s not the slogan of a forward-looking American who thinks that great things are on the horizon; that’s the slogan of someone who thinks that things right now are broken. But as others have said: the people who think things are broken are already going to vote for you. The worst political slogan I think I’ve ever seen in this country was one I saw extoling Kerry: “Kerry and Unions: We Can Make America Work Again.” While a nice pun on “work”, it screams the idea that America is broken and needs fixing, which is not an attitude that will win over undecided voters. I mean, Christ, if I came to you and said, “The Democratic Party is broken. It is visionless, ruderless, and will never win another election. Unless, of course, you support this certain candidate”- is your reaction “Hm, he has a point, I do feel rudderless and visionless” or “Fuck off- this is my party and I don’t need to hear you talking shit about it!”?
Bush, meanwhile, talked about Democracy On The March and Terrorists On The Run. During the campaign, I would listen to WTOP (Washington’s all-news Radio) and hear campaign snippets and soundbites, and nearly invariably I would hear Bush talk about something as “We’re moving towards…” or “We can achieve…” while Kerry would talk about something as “This administration has failed to do…” or “This administration cannot…”. Bush came across as forward-looking and uplifting; Kerry came across as suffering from Carteresque malaise.
No kidding, but the President does have considerable “jawboning” authority that has been used effectively in the past. Not this one, of course - hell, he’s never even used his **veto * authority.
Again, since the comments you were addressing were mine, I’ll answer. In this context,* it doesn’t matter*. We’re talking about campaigning, not governing. Campaign promises melt away with the snow in the spring anyway. All that a successful campaign has to do with an issue is to get voters madder at the other guys than at you. When you win, *then * you can turn the policy wonks loose.
Well stated. I mean, I voted for him, and I’m pretty far to the left of him, and I still was very disappointed by his campaign. For the most part, I thought his debate performance was superb (although I joined in the national wince when he said “Global Test”–I knew that flub was going to haunt him); but campaigns aren’t won solely by good debate performance.
Give us a proposal for lowering elementary-school class sizes. Give us a proposal for increasing alternative energy sources in our country. Give us a proposal for bringing families out of poverty by raising the minimum wage. Give us a proposal for free puppies for everyone. Just give us something chewy, easily understood, and visionary!
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