Where to Focus the Anger...

[LoneStarDem]

This is an off-shoot of this thread:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=104&topic_id=917051

While I don't agree with most of the reasoning of the above thread, it did remind me of a concern I have had for a while about the direction of the rhetoric on our side of the debate.

I'm from Texas (note avatar), so I have been living under the Bush regime for going on nine years now (imagine how much that sucks). Just between you, me, and the wall, I believe, have believed, and will continue to believe that, as the bumpersticker says, "Bush Is A Punk-A*s Chump". But the problem is that this isn't a universally held view and that, more importantly, there is something of a fissure in public opinion that few, notably but not exclusively here at DU, have noted. I think it has to be recognized that there is a difference in public opinion of the Admin (policies, effectiveness, etc) and in public of opinion of Bush as a person. I have noticed that his personal likeability is usually much higher than his general appraisal or his re-elects (I can't lay my hands on any recent polls at the moment, perhaps someone else can). The reason I think this is important is that it has serious implications for how we should approach the GE (and what are the primaries if not the GE preseason). While it is certainly understandable (and fun) to place Shrub out there as the figurehead for all that is sordid and wrong with this administration, and certainly it's true that come the GE it will be him versus whoever our guy ends up being, I worry sometimes that painting Bush as overly evil, particularly to lay audiences, could possibly turn people off. I think the meme (Lord Jebus help me for using that term) should not be that he is bad or evil but that he is *incompetent*. This is for a number of reasons.

1. I'm not sure it's possible to instill or inspire anger. I think that the vast majority of people who will be angry at Bush come November are already angry at him (barring some additional very public screw-up, which I wouldn't take Vegas odds on). There is the potential to work on single-issue voters, and of course generally educating the public is always a plus for us, but for the most part those have to be targeted.

2. The Mushy Middle. I'd really like to see some numbers on this. While I think that firing up the base is both necessary and good, I believe that it's folly to dismiss the non-partisans in the middle. One thing I think people miss is that while there are many independents, split-issue voters, libertarians, etc, in that middle, there are a substantial number of apolitical people that vote in presidential elections. You don’t have to “move to the middle” to get these people. These people, like the vast majority of the public, are woefully under-informed, don't watch the news, don't follow politics or policies, and don't care to. They participate and choose their candidate for a multitude of reasons. For some it's just residual civics; for others it's just the idea of a horse race. A good number, I'm sure, just go with a "gut feeling", that the guy they choose is a "good guy" or that he reminds them of the nice boy who lived down the street. These kind of people, particularly if they have a pre-conceived notion of the opposition as a "nice fella", are not going to be swayed by anger; in fact it could backfire. This is why charisma counts, and why policy arguments to the contrary don’t carry water. If you can get these people it’s a double win; you get the votes and you don’t even have to change your platform. You’re selling the sizzle, not the steak.

3. The Presidency vs. The Man. This is a corollary of Reason 2. Many people, the ones not strongly partisan in either direction, have a certain amount of built-in inertia with regards to the Presidency. People want (and should be able) to view the President as a strong leader, as someone to look up to. To be evil or bad (as a person) indicates not just action but intent. So when trying to convince a lay person that the President is wrong (particularly with regard to topics as esoteric to most people as foreign policy), you are already at a disadvantage. PNAC, BFEE, LIHOP/MIHOP, etc, true or not, cause a serious disturbance in most people’s reality-maintenance field, and given an opportunity and an excuse, most people will marginalize these sorts of points if for no other reason than to maintain their comfy worldview. I don’t believe, at this point, that we have the time, the resources, or the media access to engage in a wholesale revolution in the American mindset.

4. Focus on the Job. It should go without saying, but this entire thing is about who gets to be President. Therefore, it would behoove us to try and focus on what exactly the role and purpose of the President is and why our guy is better (by almost any conceivable measure) than theirs. Remember, we’re already fighting against incumbency. Anger is great, it gets people moving, but only if they share that anger. Anger presupposes an emotional attachment to a particular issue or issues, and if that isn’t present, it becomes all too easy to disregard. Additionally, angry or overtly aggressive politicians (think smear adds and dirty politics) are already on the average person’s version of ignore. Most people hate politics and only follow it to the bare minimum that it affects them. Focusing on anger at Bush makes it about the person that is angry; focusing on incompetence makes it about Bush. And incompetence is a much easier standard to prove.


By focusing on his failures as a President and not as a person, we can effectively separate his job evaluation from his likeability. We need to give people a reason or a cover (even if it’s just psychological) to vote against a person that they might like. I like to think of it in terms of a company (Or any position of power: doctor, lawyer, whatever a person can relate to). A guy might be a nice guy, guy you’d like to have a beer with, fun guy to hang out with; he may even deserve to be given a shot at the top of the ladder (cover for those who voted for him last time). But the proof is in the pudding. If he doesn’t do what’s right for his position, he has to be replaced. It doesn’t make him a less nice guy, and you don’t have to stop liking him as a person, but for the good of the people relying on him to do his job (in this case the country) he has to go. It also allows us to focus on his total performance and the discrepancies between his campaign promises and his follow through, not just on his current image. This is a man who has been an objective failure in every position of power and leadership that he has ever occupied; it shouldn’t be hard to prove a trend. Don’t forget to include Texas as an example to remind people that the rotten fruits of poor management aren’t always immediate, but they are inevitable.

We should start a Draft Bush movement for the President of Baseball. I can’t remember where I read it, but a number of his friends said that he never really wanted to be President and that his dream has always been to be the Commissioner. Lets let him have his dream, I just want my country back.

[Gingersnap]

1. awesome post and welcome to DU

I think you are, unfortunately, right on about the ineffectiveness of trying to spread anger. This last week's debate was a great example of how the media obfuscates the issues. If we can't get the issues out there and let people know why they should be mad at Bush, we are just going to look like "Bush-haters." I really like your description of the mushy middle too, who I think are a product to some degree of what passes for journalism in this country.

My question is, once we get rid of this president, how do we take back the media? Clinton's Presidency was an example of how the media a) aren't liberal, and b) don't just cheerlead for the status quo, we can't assume things are going to change just because the President changes, folks.

[LoneStarDem]

3. Thank you

Thanks for the kind words.

As far as the media goes, I think the problem isn't that the media is liberal or conservative, but that they are corporate and capitalistic in the worst possible sense. I mean, just the way we talk about them shows how far things have degraded. We no longer speak about "news" and "journalism" and "entertainment" and "advertising" as separate entities; now they are all just "the media". As a profit-driven enterprise in a highly competitive market, they will follow the smell of money where ever it goes, short or long term. There is no sense of obligation to a higher standard or to community service. Unfortunately, I'm really not sure that there is any way to combat these trends head on (although preventing rampant media consolidation would def. help). This is going to sound weird, but I think that, as a medium, television is just too new a venue for effective journalism. That isn't to say that good (or even great, groundbreaking) journalism can't be created for television, it's just that television journalism gets dragged down by weight of all of it's network siblings. Without a higher purpose (since journalism is at its essence education and the need for education draws on that higher purpose) it stands to reason that TV news would draw to the lowest High$$$ denominator. This also goes for other types of media (print, etc.), but to a lesser degree due to the fact they are not faced with the same level of overhead and the limitations of "bandwidth" (Only so many channels, only so much time in the day, etc...)

The only way I can see to overcome this is to outflank them on every front. More than anything else, the thing that I think would help the most in the long term is early and comprehensive education in logic, argumentation, and the media as a component of civics. If people desired a better class of news, they would get a better class of news. The economics are the lynchpin. If there was a way to separate editorial and content decisions from monetary decisions, we'd be nine tenths there. That and getting people to give a shit about the world around them.

[economic justice]

2. GREAT!

Thanks for a VERY good post!!

[LoneStarDem]

4. kick n/m

[ACK]

5. No move to the middle instead just left of center and populist

Jim Hightower style Texas man.

Listen you have to moderate on two issues -- gun control (Americans love their guns) and the death penalty (an eye for an eye = votes).

Everything else is up for grabs and can be explained out in a populist voice.

You got to fram it like my grandfather did to me once a good Georgia Dem , "Son the Republicans don't care about nobody but the rich man."

I have never heard truer words in all my days.

You paint the Repukes as radicals like Clinton did.

You explain to the selfish how progressive policies benefit them like Michael Moore does in, "Dude Where is My Country?"

Grassroots organization is the future of the Democratic party.

Learn the lessons from the late Paul Wellstone.

All the old-school Dems are getting a formal ass-kicking from the Deanies and the donation train. Use the new media and embrace it completely.

Don't be shy or afraid to get dirty when they go negative. I don't care what anyone says the Goldwater atom bomb ad was priceless. Johnson had plenty of faults but he knew how to take the campaign to his opponent.

Aim your message at your audience like Mike Warner's campaign in Virginia.

The blueprint for success is out there. We just have to have the will to pick it up and put the pieces together.

[ACK]

6. Too good to let die must kick baby

kick.

[rucky]

7. I still say the PNAC arguement is necessary to make

and it's winnable if you attribute the PNAC cabal to Bush's advisors - Cheney, Rummy, Wolfie. You can say that * is getting some really bad advice from a group with a (not-so) hidden agenda.