At least now we are getting a glimpse at some of the campaign strategies that the Democrats will be using in the 2010 election cycle. As support for the President and his henchmen in Congress falters, they have begun an almost childish campaign to attack anything that stands in opposition to their grand plans. So far, this effort goes beyond the negative and has actually descended to the level of a kindergarten fight over the only see-saw.
The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee (DSCC) http://www.dscc.org/ has invited visitors on their website to grab their crayons and add dumb slogans to a speech bubble attached to a picture of Sarah Palin. I remember doing things like that in third grade, at least until I got caught. To be kind, I would call it sophomoric but to be accurate, it is moronic. While I’m sure they thought this was clever and meant to amuse their devoted followers; after all, who visits that web-site anyway, but beyond that, the truth behind this ugly game is that Palin threatens them.
The website asks visitors to add a comment that reflects their interpretation of Palin’s Tea Party speech. Of course they are not looking for an accurate account of the speech or they would have simply re-printed it. What they are trying to illicit are comments that question Palin’s intellect, patriotism and honesty. They apparently cannot dispute her facts so they have to resort to letting would-be cartoonists have an attempt to make something up that could be used to ridicule and denigrate Palin personally. Truthfully, is this any different than some jerk with a magic marker drawing moustaches and eyeglasses on movie posters? Is this the best the DSCC and the DNC have to offer? If so, is it any wonder that the economy is still lagging and the government seems to be deadlocked trying pass legislation that Americans have overwhelmingly rejected while nearly half a million of our citizens are added to the unemployment rolls with each passing week.
The threat that Palin represents is not that her name has popped up here and there as a possible candidate for a Presidential run in 2012; they said that about Scott Brown the day after he won the Massachusetts Senate race so that is merely conjecture. Her threat is in her ability to galvanize the individuals that are the Tea Party. The Tea Party sees her as one of their own and when she says they must find unity or risk defeat in November; it is that message that scares the hell out of the Democratic strategists. The DNC was counting on the splintering effect diversity within the Tea Party could have spelled without Palin’s message so in short, Palin must be destroyed.
I also received an e-mail from Tim Kaine, Chairman of the Democratic National Committee. The focus of today’s e-mail was the Republican initiative to extend the Bush tax cuts. In his appeal, Michael Steele, the Republican National Committee Chairman made a comment that a million dollars is not a lot of money. Of course, the DNC is jumping all over that and calling for a letter writing campaign to local news papers and even provided a nifty little application that allows the reader to enter their zip code and send an e-mail to every newspaper in that circulation area as well as to some of the national papers. Wait a minute? I thought it was the Republicans that manufacture anger? The truth is, as much as Democrats have accused Republicans of seeding dissent, the Democrats directly support and control multiple organizations dedicated to just that purpose.
Michael Steele’s comment was taken completely out of context and now the Democrats are using that snippet in another classic attempt at class warfare. Their e-mail has an income calculator that allows the reader to enter their income to see how many years it would take to accumulate one million dollars provided they have no other expenses. Of course this is targeted to enrage the peasants (the working class in DNC doublespeak) so that they pick up their torches and pitchforks and march behind Obama on his campaign to punish those evil rich people. What Michael Steele really said was that in the context of investment and job creation, a million dollars doesn’t go very far at all. Democrats cannot begin to claim that their primary focus is on the economy or job creation when their ideology is framed by the mindless seizure of money from those that have traditionally created the majority of jobs in the United States.
Another thing on the radar screen is the much discussed healthcare summit scheduled for February 25th. The President has already said that he has no intention of backing down on healthcare reform and that scrapping the current bill is not an option so what kind of summit is this? Since the election of Scott Brown, the White House has been trying to put the best possible spin on this. Democratic strategists have blamed the loss on the stalemate with healthcare legislation and Obama blamed Bush (now there is a surprise) for the anger still permeating the electorate. Whatever they want to call it in public, the conversations they have in private are very different discussions. They know people are angry that the President has failed in his promise of transparency so for this meeting, the C-Span cameras will be rolling. They know people are angry at the refusal to let Republicans join in the discussions so the President announced that the meeting will consist of members of both Parties.
The question many have is will this summit really be an exchange of ideas or are they planning a “gotcha” moment for the Republican attendees? I think the President is too single minded to allow the election of Scott Brown stand in his way. I expect this will be a public forum to shame Republicans into support for the bill or be labeled as obstructionists. Well, gotcha is only gotcha if you don’t see it coming. Republicans must enter the room prepared to talk about the common sense reforms that American’s really want and not be coerced into supporting this massive and expensive expansion of government if the President concedes on a few minor Republican initiatives.
Republicans need to realize that the bill, as written, leaves much of the nuts and bolts decisions on healthcare to an advisory board created under the bill. The people seated on that board will all be directly appointed by the President or appointed by people that the President has already appointed to existing agencies. Regardless of what is promised to Republicans during the summit, those promises will evaporate in committee once the ruling board has been established. Worse yet is that the bill already contains language that would make it nearly impossible to reverse decisions made by the board. They need to be very clear in that this bill was a partisan project on the part of Democrats and there can be no bipartisan support unless the bill is scrapped and a real effort to reach consensus is apparent in whatever takes its place.
Unfortunately, the Democrats still control Congress and there can be no bipartisan discussions as long as they don’t need the Republican vote to advance their agenda. The election of Scott Brown may have taken away their ability to shut down debate without at least one Republican but there are still a few so-called Republicans out there that can be swayed to provide that 60th vote so that bills can come to a vote. We saw that in the healthcare debate when Olympia Snowe added the single Republican vote. Not that her vote was actually needed, but that one vote gave the Democrats the ability to claim that the legislation was now bipartisan. Snow later voted against the legislation but once legislation is at that stage, only 51 votes would have been needed anyway. It’s an old trick previously mastered by John Kerry giving him the authority to utter those famous words: “I voted for it before I voted against it.”
Republicans need to find the same unity that Democrats have been using against them for years. If they do not speak with the same voice and espouse the same ideals, the message will be blurred and the people will find it hard to believe that Republicans have learned their lesson and are willing to bring a new conservatism to the nation. Despite the antics of a desperate Democratic campaign machine, they must take the high road and leave the negative tactics to their Democratic challengers. People want to know someone has good ideas and real solutions to their problems; solutions that negative ads and mud-slinging cannot address. Coakley lost an enormous amount of support by going negative. Let’s not make the same mistake.
Paul
The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee (DSCC) http://www.dscc.org/ has invited visitors on their website to grab their crayons and add dumb slogans to a speech bubble attached to a picture of Sarah Palin. I remember doing things like that in third grade, at least until I got caught. To be kind, I would call it sophomoric but to be accurate, it is moronic. While I’m sure they thought this was clever and meant to amuse their devoted followers; after all, who visits that web-site anyway, but beyond that, the truth behind this ugly game is that Palin threatens them.
The website asks visitors to add a comment that reflects their interpretation of Palin’s Tea Party speech. Of course they are not looking for an accurate account of the speech or they would have simply re-printed it. What they are trying to illicit are comments that question Palin’s intellect, patriotism and honesty. They apparently cannot dispute her facts so they have to resort to letting would-be cartoonists have an attempt to make something up that could be used to ridicule and denigrate Palin personally. Truthfully, is this any different than some jerk with a magic marker drawing moustaches and eyeglasses on movie posters? Is this the best the DSCC and the DNC have to offer? If so, is it any wonder that the economy is still lagging and the government seems to be deadlocked trying pass legislation that Americans have overwhelmingly rejected while nearly half a million of our citizens are added to the unemployment rolls with each passing week.
The threat that Palin represents is not that her name has popped up here and there as a possible candidate for a Presidential run in 2012; they said that about Scott Brown the day after he won the Massachusetts Senate race so that is merely conjecture. Her threat is in her ability to galvanize the individuals that are the Tea Party. The Tea Party sees her as one of their own and when she says they must find unity or risk defeat in November; it is that message that scares the hell out of the Democratic strategists. The DNC was counting on the splintering effect diversity within the Tea Party could have spelled without Palin’s message so in short, Palin must be destroyed.
I also received an e-mail from Tim Kaine, Chairman of the Democratic National Committee. The focus of today’s e-mail was the Republican initiative to extend the Bush tax cuts. In his appeal, Michael Steele, the Republican National Committee Chairman made a comment that a million dollars is not a lot of money. Of course, the DNC is jumping all over that and calling for a letter writing campaign to local news papers and even provided a nifty little application that allows the reader to enter their zip code and send an e-mail to every newspaper in that circulation area as well as to some of the national papers. Wait a minute? I thought it was the Republicans that manufacture anger? The truth is, as much as Democrats have accused Republicans of seeding dissent, the Democrats directly support and control multiple organizations dedicated to just that purpose.
Michael Steele’s comment was taken completely out of context and now the Democrats are using that snippet in another classic attempt at class warfare. Their e-mail has an income calculator that allows the reader to enter their income to see how many years it would take to accumulate one million dollars provided they have no other expenses. Of course this is targeted to enrage the peasants (the working class in DNC doublespeak) so that they pick up their torches and pitchforks and march behind Obama on his campaign to punish those evil rich people. What Michael Steele really said was that in the context of investment and job creation, a million dollars doesn’t go very far at all. Democrats cannot begin to claim that their primary focus is on the economy or job creation when their ideology is framed by the mindless seizure of money from those that have traditionally created the majority of jobs in the United States.
Another thing on the radar screen is the much discussed healthcare summit scheduled for February 25th. The President has already said that he has no intention of backing down on healthcare reform and that scrapping the current bill is not an option so what kind of summit is this? Since the election of Scott Brown, the White House has been trying to put the best possible spin on this. Democratic strategists have blamed the loss on the stalemate with healthcare legislation and Obama blamed Bush (now there is a surprise) for the anger still permeating the electorate. Whatever they want to call it in public, the conversations they have in private are very different discussions. They know people are angry that the President has failed in his promise of transparency so for this meeting, the C-Span cameras will be rolling. They know people are angry at the refusal to let Republicans join in the discussions so the President announced that the meeting will consist of members of both Parties.
The question many have is will this summit really be an exchange of ideas or are they planning a “gotcha” moment for the Republican attendees? I think the President is too single minded to allow the election of Scott Brown stand in his way. I expect this will be a public forum to shame Republicans into support for the bill or be labeled as obstructionists. Well, gotcha is only gotcha if you don’t see it coming. Republicans must enter the room prepared to talk about the common sense reforms that American’s really want and not be coerced into supporting this massive and expensive expansion of government if the President concedes on a few minor Republican initiatives.
Republicans need to realize that the bill, as written, leaves much of the nuts and bolts decisions on healthcare to an advisory board created under the bill. The people seated on that board will all be directly appointed by the President or appointed by people that the President has already appointed to existing agencies. Regardless of what is promised to Republicans during the summit, those promises will evaporate in committee once the ruling board has been established. Worse yet is that the bill already contains language that would make it nearly impossible to reverse decisions made by the board. They need to be very clear in that this bill was a partisan project on the part of Democrats and there can be no bipartisan support unless the bill is scrapped and a real effort to reach consensus is apparent in whatever takes its place.
Unfortunately, the Democrats still control Congress and there can be no bipartisan discussions as long as they don’t need the Republican vote to advance their agenda. The election of Scott Brown may have taken away their ability to shut down debate without at least one Republican but there are still a few so-called Republicans out there that can be swayed to provide that 60th vote so that bills can come to a vote. We saw that in the healthcare debate when Olympia Snowe added the single Republican vote. Not that her vote was actually needed, but that one vote gave the Democrats the ability to claim that the legislation was now bipartisan. Snow later voted against the legislation but once legislation is at that stage, only 51 votes would have been needed anyway. It’s an old trick previously mastered by John Kerry giving him the authority to utter those famous words: “I voted for it before I voted against it.”
Republicans need to find the same unity that Democrats have been using against them for years. If they do not speak with the same voice and espouse the same ideals, the message will be blurred and the people will find it hard to believe that Republicans have learned their lesson and are willing to bring a new conservatism to the nation. Despite the antics of a desperate Democratic campaign machine, they must take the high road and leave the negative tactics to their Democratic challengers. People want to know someone has good ideas and real solutions to their problems; solutions that negative ads and mud-slinging cannot address. Coakley lost an enormous amount of support by going negative. Let’s not make the same mistake.
Paul
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