Tuesday, April 13, 2010

How Not To Win Over The Electorate

The Democrats are in trouble and they know it. Systematic corruption, legislative failures and dirty-tricks, overspending, misplaced spending, and now the health care bill have doomed them. They hoped the stimulus package or ObamaCare would have saved their sorry rear ends, but it’s only made things worse. Now they have a new plan. Unfortunately for them, they picked two things the public just doesn’t care about: financial regulation and nuclear weapons.

1. Financial Regulation (yawn)
The Democrats actually think that “regulation” of Wall Street will resonate with the voters. Talk about delusional.

The first, most obvious, problem with using this as a sales pitch is that the public just doesn’t care about the issue. The reality is that most voters assume that whatever regulations are needed for things like banks are already in place. If a change needs to be made, then make it and shut the heck up about it. . . stop bothering us. Does it matter to you if hedge funds must obey “the tick rule” when engaging in trades or that banks need to account for mortgages as tier two or tier three assets? I didn’t think so. No one cares about this. Even the people who know what Basil Two means don’t really care. These are arcane rules that voters don't want to know about -- one mention of derivatives and securitization and people’s eyes begin to glaze over.

For the Democrats to think that they will be rewarded for passing such regulations is laughable. When Congressman Dirtbag walks into a townhall meeting in his district in flyover country and says, “we regulated those evil financial institutions!” all he’s going to hear is a big yawn, followed by angry questions about why everyone in the room is losing their health care -- no one's going to rush to shake his hand for slaying the evil banks.

Moreover, the Democrats have a credibility problem on this issue. Despite their talk about being the anti-Wall Street party, it’s now well known that the Democrats get most of their money from Wall Street and that they are nothing more than Wall Street’s crack whores, ready to do anything for another hit. Consider. . .

Everyone knows that the TARP, the TALP, the bailouts, and everything else were nothing more than an orgy of bankers sucking down public money and unloading failed bets on overburdened taxpayers. And all of that was made possible by Pelosi and Frank and Dodd and the Democratic Party.

Everyone knows the Democrats could have passed financial regulation at any time during the past two years, but didn’t because the money kept pouring in from Wall Street.

Everyone knows that the Democrats have stripped everything that should be in “financial regulation” out of their bill, and that they’ve left only the promise of future taxpayer bailouts. . . “too big to fail” means “taxpayer protected.”

And everyone knows that taxpayers are going to get screwed again by these regulations.

So when the Democrats rail against Wall Street, no one cares except to the extent that we all know we’re about to be bent over by the Democrats to help their rich, banker friends. That’s not going to bring anyone to the polls on their behalf.

So let’s sum up this policy. The Democrats will trumpet an issue that should have been fixed a long time ago and that people don't want to hear about. Moreover, in so doing, they are raising suspicions that all they are doing is lining up taxpayers to be raped by bankers again in the near future. Yeah, run on that.
2. Nuclear Weapons
The second issue the Democrats intend to trumpet is Obama’s treaty to cut nuclear weapons. Really? Let’s do a simple test. Before Obama raised this issue, were you afraid of a Russian nuclear strike? Didn’t think so. No one else was either. What about now that he’s worked his magic, do you suddenly feel safer? No huh? So they’re relying on an issue that no one cared about before they raised it, and they’re selling a plan that hasn’t made anyone feel any safer? I can’t wait to see the ads on this one.

Moreover, this issue will backfire in several ways. First, raising this issue when no one is thinking about it only upsets people -- never a good idea for the party in power. Secondly, real or imagined, this plan raises fears that the Democrats are weakening our country. That will bring people out to oppose this plan, not support it. Third, this plan sounds like a smoke and mirrors diversion from the real nuclear issue, which is Iran. That will make people feel like they’re being tricked, which is again not a great message to send to voters.

So let’s sum up this policy. The Democrats have poked an issue that wasn’t an issue and in the process, they’ve raised suspicions that they’ve weakened our defense and they are causing people to wonder if this isn’t a smoke screen for their pending failure in Iran. Yeah, run on that too. Idiots.


21 comments:

Joel Farnham said...

Andrew,

I am so looking forward to November.

I hope these idiots keep this up.

StanH said...

Nothing new liberals without a clue!

Not to change the subject if you have a moment check out Herman Cain speech from the SRLC this past week, a remarkable man, great speech. There is hope for the Republican Party.

AndrewPrice said...

Joel, Me too. Right now it looks like the Democrats are intent on making all the wrong moves. Talk about blinded by their ideology!

AndrewPrice said...

Stan, I'll check it out.

patti said...

seriously, i can't stop laughing. wth are they thinking? who is running that circus? i keep telling anyone who will listen that my birthday is election day 2010, and i expect the BIGGEST present i get will be from the dems. FOR ME?! so generous! it just keeps getting bigger and better!

LawHawkSF said...

Andrew: I think the Democrats are losing their ability to demagogue major issues. The only thing they understand about banking is what they learned from It's a Wonderful Life, and they think that's what the American people think. They also think the people haven't noticed the Democrats are the evil bankers.

The nuclear issue is not only an issue that Americans had on their C list, but now that Obama has brought it to the A list, he's managed to scare most Americans with his lily-livered stance and energize Republicans who can now point out that he doesn't care one bit for keeping America safe.

Maybe it's their new strategy--win the electorate by confusing them. New Democrat slogans: "A penny saved belongs to the government." And "Damn the torpedoes, we're unilaterally disarmed," with the corollary: "We have not yet begun to surrender."

AndrewPrice said...

Patti, I hope this will be a huge birthday for us all!

AndrewPrice said...

Lawhawk, I think the banking stuff comes straight from them thinking that the American people are in a populist mood, so now is the time to promote fake populism. But no one is going to buy that.

The nuclear thing seems to be them trying to reach for their base, but their base doesn't care -- it was total disarmament, not partial disarmament.

Neither strategy makes any sense to anyone who actually understand the country, but probably makes sense to that small cadre of people who form their activist flank -- it just doesn't do anything to satisfy them.

AndrewPrice said...

P.S. Lawhawk, I think the banks are actually behind the financial regulation because it does nothing to limit them, but it provides them with PR cover -- "the banks are safe again" -- and it includes promises of future bailouts.

LawHawkSF said...

Andrew: All true, and the reason the demagoguing is getting more difficult for them by the day.

Tam said...

Did you hear Anderson Cooper compare Deal Leader's nuke policy to Reagan? PHHFFT...nice try.

Tam said...

*That should be "Dear Leader" although "Deal Leader" does seem oddly and unfortunately appropriate.

AndrewPrice said...

Tam, I can compare it to Reagan's deal as well:

Reagan's deal = well timed and smart.

Obama's deal = poorly timed and stupid.

I take it Cooper missed those points?

Tam said...

Yes...he said "Obama is doing the same thing Reagan did with arms negotiation so why are republicans so upset? Waaah waaaah waaaah."

AndrewPrice said...

Tam, I guess that shows that Anderson isn't very bright doesn't it?

BevfromNYC said...

The real mistake the Democrate are making is that they still think they can control whatever message they want to put forward. Such old school thinking for such a "progressive" crowd.

We the people, can read the these bills and the fine print now and judge for ourselves. We share information instantly and no longer need to rely solely on what we are fed from the Whitehouse.

Tam said...

Andrew, the crying like a baby was a dead give away. And very unprofessional.

AndrewPrice said...

Tam, I can totally see that!

AndrewPrice said...

Bev, I think you're right. In the past, they did whatever they did and then their friends in the media put together a good way to sell. These days, people are looking for themselves to see what they did. Suddenly, the old lies don't work anymore.

Writer X said...

November can't come fast enough this year.

AndrewPrice said...

Writer X, Isn't that the truth!

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