dagblog - Comments for "The Purple and Ambivalent Voter"

For the purposes of this

Elusive Trope — Fri, 19 Aug 2011 21:47:49 +0000

In reply to What is "the liberal agenda"?

For the purposes of this blog, it is the points made in the blog above regarding the standard Democratic stump speech in regards to the economy, jobs and the role of government.

weakening the plausibility of

Elusive Trope — Fri, 19 Aug 2011 21:46:18 +0000

In reply to I thought that we were

weakening the plausibility of the conservative view is another way of saying of weakening the plausibility of cuts only approach. In order to due that with those buy into both narratives, one has to also show one is willing to cut those areas where cuts can be made, while increasing spending in areas that need to be increased in. (Everybody knows about the $2,000 hammer or the $5,000 toilet seat purchased by the pentagon.) The purple voter is someone who buys into the narratives, among other narratives, that there should be some increases. Once has established this common sense approach, the purple voter is going to be more open to the idea of increased revenue to have money spent on the government, which in general they don't trust to spend the money well.

So weakening the plausibility of the conservative view is not to be equated with fully disproving the legitimacy or validness of the second narrative. It is about showing that a person or party that takes the view of the second narrative as the sole means to solving our problems are taking an inherently flawed stance since it only incorporate part of the path to success.

Hope not, but probably so,

Peter Schwartz — Fri, 19 Aug 2011 15:17:42 +0000

In reply to I like it. Is it too late to

Hope not, but probably so, for Obama.

At any rate, he has to be about jobs now.

Even if he wins and the economy recovers, the most he could do (maybe) is add a PO to the mix.

He thought he was doing the right thing by offering a "middle ground" proposal, but all he got was everyone hating it--sort of as with his presidency, I'm afraid.

People don't really want "compromise," they want the "right thing" and someone to show them why it's the right thing.

I thought that we were

Michael Wolraich — Fri, 19 Aug 2011 13:36:12 +0000

In reply to We're on two different

I thought that we were talking about weakening "the plausibility of the conservative view." I don't see how targeted Pentagon cuts weaken the plausibility of anything. Nor do I see how it's a winning campaign issue for Democrats.

What is "the liberal agenda"?

Dan Kervick — Fri, 19 Aug 2011 13:12:46 +0000

In reply to We're on two different

What is "the liberal agenda"?

We're on two different

Elusive Trope — Fri, 19 Aug 2011 12:01:46 +0000

In reply to You lost me somewhere in the

We're on two different tracks. You're thinking about how Obama or other Dems can win the purple people over to the liberal story, and I am thinking about how the Dem running for a seat can appeal to the purple people by incorporating both stories in a way that will not damage the liberal agenda overall if the politician holds true to their word when elected.

Let me apologize before I get

Richard Day — Fri, 19 Aug 2011 09:08:41 +0000

In reply to The Purple and Ambivalent Voter

Let me apologize before I get into this but:

You lost me somewhere in the

Michael Wolraich — Fri, 19 Aug 2011 03:23:57 +0000

In reply to Something very similar to

You lost me somewhere in the first paragraph. I was looking for an example of something that Obama could tell the purple people that they might find persuasive enough to favor the liberal story over the conservative story. I'm not sure what this has to do with targeted cuts at the Pentagon.

I like it. Is it too late to

Resistance — Fri, 19 Aug 2011 00:38:33 +0000

In reply to This is basically on the

I like it.

Is it too late to use this idea?

This is basically on the

Peter Schwartz — Thu, 18 Aug 2011 22:53:26 +0000

In reply to Exactly what Obama needs to

This is basically on the right track.

If memory serves, though, Obama did focus on the benefits of the plan, plenty.

The communications problem was that the plan has too many moving parts for people to hold on to it as "one thing."

In advertising, we say a letter has to be about "one thing," and you have to keep coming back to that one thing. It can have a lot of supporting parts, but they have to support the one thing.

Ideally, the one thing is both new and old, or new and familiar and familiar in a good way. This allows you to reassure and surprise and put some excitement into your proposition. So it can't be same old...but it also can't be so new that it seems from outer space. The familiarity factor makes it easy for people to "get" what it is and hold on to. The new makes it exciting and worth trying.

Obamacare stuck because it was "one thing" people could hold on to. No one knows the actual name of the bill and no one can tell you what's in it, even if they've been told many times. Even if they like the plan.

So Jason's name AmeriCare would have been excellent. Easy to hold onto, patriotic in feel. A positive and reasssuring feeling. The guts of it should have been Medicare for All. Again, easy to hold on to, familiar in a positive way, and yet new, because the program would no longer be just for oldsters.

And by bringing in a lot of new, young, and healthy people, it could easily have been sold as a way to shore up Medicare's finances. A win-win. No mandate; maybe a small extra tax to cover it.

You no longer have to worry about your insurance. You can leave your job if you hate it and not worry you won't be covered. Forget about pre-existing conditions, because Medicare is designed to handle pre-existing conditions. Providers are still private, so it isn't government-run health care.

Of course, the opposition would have attacked it as government-run health care. BUT, in this case, we'd have had an easily understood program with many decades of goodwill to blunt the attacks. Everyone's known someone on Medicare, so they couldn't have demagogued based on the great unknown. And it's well-liked, so they would've had to turn around people's feelings that have been built up over decades of very positive and personal interaction with the program.

With Obamacare, there was no reservoir of good feelings and experience to help us. And the LAST thing people want when it comes to their health is the uncertainty of the unknown. As crummy as our current system is for some people, at least we know it, and that's made it a better alternative.