dagblog - Comments for "Don’t tell ‘em. Sell ‘em"

Obama's fellow pols are not

AmiBlue — Sat, 08 Jan 2011 17:51:19 +0000

Obama's fellow pols are not alarmed by him now and I doubt they were before he was elected. I believe they had his number by the time he had been in the senate a while and knew how to use his concilatory nature to their best advantage. However, they have used his otherness to their advantage to terrify the voters, the white people and uneducated people who are feeling shaky anyway. We saw results in the recent election. There were other reasons for the rout, of course, but the flight of the white middle class was one of them. Appeasing these frightened people underlies Obama's basic nature at least partly, I believe. I'm guessing he donned this mantle at an early age. Whatever his reasons, I agree that his tactics are counterproductive in his role as president. He loses the people who would otherwise fight for him and is left with little choice but to capitulate.

You might be right about

Ramona — Sat, 08 Jan 2011 17:18:19 +0000

In reply to What has become clear to me

You might be right about Obama's reasons to be conciliatory, but it's actually having the opposite effect, and it seems like he should have seen that by now. They see any attempt to be reasonable as a sign of weakness, and they've proven that over and over again. He can't reason with them and still be effective. It's like taking baby steps in the playpen when he should be marching up the mountain. It's clear they're not seeing him as a threat anymore. That's bad.

What has become clear to me

AmiBlue — Sat, 08 Jan 2011 17:13:22 +0000

In reply to Historically, nothing has

What has become clear to me is that conservatives don't simply disagree about how to go about governing, they are absolutely terrified of anything that Democrats might do. Literally. I also believe that Obama's otherness - his color, his name, his foreign father, and probably his off-beat mother (even if she was from Kansas) - have magnified the terror and divided the country irretrievably. Obama probably is aware of how his cultural background has affected many people and that probably is one reason he is so conciliatory so as not to alarm them further.

My head is bruised from

AmiBlue — Sat, 08 Jan 2011 17:03:51 +0000

In reply to This is an amazing piece,

My head is bruised from beating it against the wall with frustration. We have some smart people. How can they sit by for decades and not understand the importance of what was happening? As you say, onward and backward.

Historically, nothing has

seashell — Sat, 08 Jan 2011 15:54:39 +0000

In reply to Don’t tell ‘em. Sell ‘em

Historically, nothing has terrified conservatives so much as efficient, effective, activist government.

I remember reading that this is the exact reason conservatives maniacally hated Clinton. As Perlstein mentioned, Republicans had dodged the threat of the next 20 years as the minority party when they defeated health care reform, but Clinton then hit them on their own issues, notably free trade, crime and welfare reform. And then there was the economy. The same dire economic consequences we heard would fall on our heads if the Bush tax cuts were not extended today, were rabidly predicted in 1993 over Clinton's proposed tax hike:

Rep. Newt Gingrich (R-GA): We have all too many people in the Democratic administration who are talking about bigger Government, bigger bureaucracy, more programs, and higher taxes. I believe that that will in fact kill the current recovery and put us back in a recession. It might take 1 1/2 or 2 years, but it will happen.

Rep. Joel Hefley (R-CO): However Clinton wants to spin his tax plan, the bottom line is this: It will raise your taxes, increase the deficit, and kill over 1 million jobs.

Rep. Christopher Cox (R-CA): This is really the Dr. Kevorkian plan for our economy. It will kill jobs, kill businesses, and yes, kill even the higher tax revenues that these suicidal tax increasers hope to gain.

Ooops.

Whether those of us on the more liberal end of the Democratic party agreed with all of Clinton's policies or not, they were undoubtedly much better than anything the Republicans would have offered or passed. Besides, most Democrats and swing voters were happy with Clinton. What really screwed with the conservative minds, though, was that Clinton's popularity rose during his impeachment, while their own plummeted, sorta like the black plague:

“A thoroughly first-rate man in public service is corrosive,” the former president of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce argued in an interview published in the journal Nation’s Business in 1928. “He eats holes in our liberties. The better he is and the longer he stays the greater the danger. If he is an enthusiast–a bright-eyed madman who is frantic to make this the finest government in the world–the black plague is a housepet by comparison.”

This is an amazing piece,

Ramona — Sat, 08 Jan 2011 14:28:26 +0000

In reply to Don’t tell ‘em. Sell ‘em

This is an amazing piece, AmiBlue. Thank you so much for passing it along--and for your own thoughts. I read it this morning and it spurred me on to blog about it, too. What's stunning to me is that all along they've hidden nothing--not their strategies, not their motives, not their goals--and still they come out smelling like a rose. Their power grows and grows.

That whole "job-killing" mantra seems ridiculous on its face, but damn--it works!

You're right about the Dems and their goofy counter-attacks. Why announce what they're going to do? Because they never learn. Why do they never learn? It's the question of the ages, and if anyone comes up with an answer, I'd like to be among the first to see it. (Poor Anthony Weiner, et al. They've scratched their heads bloody and grown hoarse from screaming, and nothing seems to get through to their compadres.)

Meanwhile, onward and outward and inward and upward and downward. Whatever it takes.

I have heard that Frank Lutz

wabby — Sat, 08 Jan 2011 12:48:00 +0000

In reply to Don’t tell ‘em. Sell ‘em

I have heard that Frank Lutz doesn't care which team he works for, just as long as he gets paid. Anybody wanna start a kitty?