Idiot Son and GOP polls down, down, down. Dem polls? Not so good, either [View All]

[Stinky The Clown]

For weeks, now stretching into months, polling for idiot son and, indeed, for the GOP has been trending downward. Down to record low territory. Down to Nixonian levels. We know the reasons. Its just that the rest of a numbed and dumbed citizenry is also starting to see the light.

If you hold that last sentence to be true - let me say it again: 'Its just that the rest of a numbed and dumbed citizenry is also starting to see the light.' - then maybe you're as worried as I am.

As the GOP numbers fall, ours should be going up. Indeed, if we eliminate the undecideds (whoever the hell they are) our numbers should be the rough inverse of the GOP numbers. But they're not, and they're not.

Of late, we've been buoyed at the prospect of a more honest media. Clearly Katrina was a watershed event (no pun intended). Reporters on the ground saw it all first hand. Not just New Orleans, but the entire Gulf Coast. Red America. They saw the inaction and ineptitude of idiot son's 'first responders'. FEMA was out for a horse ride. Everyone was caught flat footed. Whites and Blacks were affected, but the pictures of Black America were so powerful as to urge (shame?) a nation to rise up in outrage. Our president, famous for not being able to identify even one mistake, had to eat a teaspoon or two of crow. True enough, that crow was sauteed and had a nice Marsala sauce, but it was, in fact, crow.

Yet, as his numbers plummet, as he is revealed to be a small, insecure, naked man rather than an Emperor With No Clothes, our numbers stay flat.

It is long past time to blame anyone but ourselves for this. Blaming Rove is a cop-out. He ain't that good. Evil and without conscience to be sure. But just another political hack, really. Okay. Super Hack. But still a hack.

I'd like to propose the following:

A sort of Shadow Government. Not to make policy. But to explain it. I challenge our doing-a-great-job-so-far DNC Chair, the good Doctor Dean, to establish this group. Perhaps an informal organization is all that's needed. But organization nonetheless.

The Heritage Foundation, among other RW think tanks, has for years had a speakers bureau that will supply talking heads on short notice to anyone anywhere. Getting the message out is everything. They script 'em, they school 'em (largely a class in shouting over debate opponents), and send 'em out. And they kick our asses all over the lot.

Wouldn't a more managed cadre of messengers be a better strategy for us? Imagine a cadre where there was a shadow Secretary of State to speak to foreign policy issues. A shadow Secretary of Defense to speak to military issues. A shadow Secretary of HUD when that's the topic. You get the idea.

Note that this is NOT in any way, shape, or form, a call to use talking points or some other scripted message. Rather, it is a call to choose the best of our best to be our messengers on given topics. And have more than one single person in each area of policy.

By way of **example** only:

State: Holbrook and Clark
Defense: Clark and Kerry
Treasury: Bob Rubin and (maybe) Larry Summers (or better yet, Paul Krugman)
Homeland Security: Hart and Kerrey
.... and so on. It can be these examples or others. The names, for now, are unimportant and not a part of my thinking. It is about the strategy.

And for specific hot issues, we do the same sort of thing:
DSM - Conyers
BBV - Stubbs-Jones
9/11 - McKinney
Katrina - Landreau

Whenever any media outlet calls for a quote, they get our go-to guys. If they call a particular politico's office, they get referred to the go-to guy. If the politico balks, he gets a smack from the DNC and called out for it. No room for traitors or Judas goats.

And remember - no need to manage the message. If we pick our best and most articulate, a more-than-acceptable message will get out. It may not be your perfect message or my perfect message or any given candidate's message, but it will be a good message for the collective party. Candidates are free to modify as they wish ***in their campaigns**. Not on our dime.

I see this as a way to cut through the media fog where the RW gets to speak about whatever they want and our people are foils, at best, or wack-a-moles at worst. No more of that. Now's the time to send in the heavy hitters. No matter the media question, we speak our *own* message. If the media doesn't like it, tough. That's who we send. Take it or leave it. Take it and we win. Leave it and the media look more than biased. They look partisan.

The only thing stopping a plan like this are our own media face-time whores among us. Keep them in check.

Ya listenin' Joe and Joe? Diane? Hillary?