The Ramp to Masada

Just to make the point clear that winning on the issues is for shit if you can't win on the message, I point you to this Josh Marshall post:

I must say, I hope the supporters of Social Security aren't resting on their collective laurels just because the president's jihad against the program got off to such an abysmal start.

Today, in newspapers and on websites across the country, headlines used words like 'broke', 'bankrupt' and 'bust' to describe what happens to Social Security when it starts running a deficit at some time in the middle of this century. Only weeks ago, President Bush was being forced to back off such misleading and deceptive language. And many Republicans were openly criticizing him for it. Now these are the words of choice in supposedly straight news reportage.

Supporters of Social Security really don't have the luxury of letting one lie or distortion go unchallenged or unanswered.

The polling on Bush' s Social Security plan is atrocious and has been getting worse by the day. Yet the Republican messaging has been absorbed fully by the establishment media and regurgitated full-blown at the first opportunity. The Democrats have spent months bringing down Bush's talk about "bankruptcy", but all that work meant nothing if we honestly examine the headlines.

Bush's program is being rejected. But his language is not. That language is The Ramp to Masada. It just makes it that much easier for the next attack to succeed.

I want to believe

I want to believe we live in a sane world where numbers like these indicate that Republicans will pay a huge political price for their involvement in the Shiavo case. But I've heard this tune before. I agree with Dave Johnson who scolds progressives for thinking that Republicans are stupid:

You mock the Republicans for blatantly acting politically, and ignore that they ARE ACTING POLITICALLY. In other words, they're acting in the way that will in the long term gain them more support for their candidates and issues.

You mock their politicians for flocking to this because of a Republican talking points memo telling them this will gain them a political advantage, yet you do not see that THIS WILL GAIN THEM POLITICAL ADVANTAGE.

You're nitpicking details and ignoring the larger narrative. They are "trying to save this poor woman." They are "defending this poor woman's family." Meanwhile, you are pointing out discrepancies in the finer details. "What about her husband?" you ask when they talk about her parents. "She can't feel pain," you say, when they accuse Democrats of starving her to death. How many people hear that they are trying to save this poor woman? Everyone. How many people, over time, will pay attention to the nitpicking details?

I want to believe that this will finally be the time when the Republicans over-reach. I want to believe that the American people will finally wake up. I want to believe that they will finally send these people packing. But history does not favor that belief. Again, Dave Johnson points out where progressives are failing:

Update Never mind polls showing the public thinks Congress shouldn't interfere, feels they would want to die in the same situation, etc. Those are narrow issue points. WE ALREADY KNOW that we win on issues. But they win on the larger strategic narratives. We know all these things and here we are doing it all over again.

We're arguing the details of their lies instead of reaching the broader, general public with a larger narrative that reinforces public acceptance of the benefits of underlying Progressive values.

Everyone knows that what the Republicans are doing is wrong. A whopping 82% disapprove of it. But unless Democrats can fit this story into a wider narrative that explains why it is wrong then the political benefit to Democrats will be short-lived (just as the political benefit of the backlash against the impeachment of Clinton didn't last very long).

Many people are wondering why the Democrats haven't been more vocal in their opposition to the Republican actions. But what would these people suggest the Democrats say? The Democrats don't have the narrative tools needed to make the counter-argument. Fortunately, Reid and Pelosi were smart enough to recognize this deficiency and they took the only option available: stay out of the fight. At least this way the Democrats could gain some short-term benefit from the backlash.

But backlash politics is not a formula for long-term success. America needs a party that can offer a compelling counter-narrative to the Rapture Wing of the Republican party. Until the Democrats can put forward that narrative, a narrative that will allow them to take a public stand against this outrage with a reasonable expectation of success, then the Republicans will continue to win the larger war.

I want to believe that such a narrative can be produced. Fortunately, that's one belief that can be justified.

The Costanza Gambit

There is a classic episode of Seinfeld in which George Costanza bemoans the fact that his instincts, when it comes to women, are all screwed up. Every time he follows them he strikes out. Jerry suggests that if his instincts are always wrong then maybe he should just do the opposite of what his instincts tell him to do. George does just that and immediately starts succeeding with women at a level beyond his wildest dreams.

I was reminded of this when reading this article in the Post. In the article every Democrats good friend, George W. Bush, warns the Democratic party that it will pay a price if it doesn't propose a Social Security plan of its own:

President Bush concluded a three-state swing to sell his plan to restructure Social Security, warning Democratic opponents Tuesday that they will suffer political consequences if they continue to oppose his proposal without providing one of their own.

Flanked by Republican Sens. Pete V. Domenici (N.M.) and John McCain (Ariz.), Bush invited Democrats "to come to the table" to help devise a solution to shore up Social Security's finances. "I believe there will be bad political consequences for people who are unwilling to sit down and talk about the issue," he said.

Now, in the past, when Republicans have told Democrats "jump!" the response has been "how high?" The Democrats have treated advice from Republicans as if it were a sincere assessment of the political consequences of opposition. And what have the Democrats gotten for their continued willingness to cooperate with Republicans? Bupkiss!

But the Democrats aren't playing by the established rules any more. The Republicans said the Democrats need to put forward a plan, the Democrats have declined. Result: Bush's plan is sinking and Democratic approval ratings on handling Social Security are going up. Similarly, the Republicans pushed through the Shiavo mess, daring the Democrats to oppose them. Again, the Democrats declined. Result: Overwhelming opposition to the Republican actions from the public and a growing sense that the GOP is dominated by extremists.

Every time in the last few months when the Republicans (and their allies in the opinion mafia) have said that the Democrats will pay a political price for not doing what they say they should be doing the Democrats have responded by doing just the opposite and, like George Constanza, they are starting to see some benefit.

It's still early and the Democrats could still backslide into their old habits. But they've taken the first tepid steps into the waters of being a real opposition party and they've discovered that it isn't as cold as they were told.

The War in Iraq is NOT two years old!

If you consider the start of the Iraq War to have been two years ago when the invasion began then the analogies to Vietnam appear shaky since that conflict lasted for more than 10 years. Surely we should wait a few more years before saying that the situations are comparable, no?

No. Because the conflict in Iraq started back in 1991. That's when we first went to war against Saddam. That's when we first started fighting within the territorial region of Iraq. Even after the major conflicts of the initial fight ended there were still large skirmishes and scattered bombings throughout the 90s. So the conflict in Iraq has been going on for 14 years. That is longer than our fight in Vietnam!

In fact, the first few years of our fight in Vietnam was comparatively  low key. It wasn't until Johnson escalated the conflict in 1967(*) that the war became a full-blown affair. Similarly, the Iraq War has only recently become a major conflict when Bush "escalated" in 2003.

I kick myself for not having made this connection before. I owe thanks to Sam Sedar, who commented on this very thing last night on Air America.

 

(* I think, I might be off by a year)

Imminent Death (not a Shiavo post)

In the early days of the net, even in the days before the web, there was a recurring phenomena of "people in the know" writing foreboding stories about how the net was expanding to quickly and that it would soon hit some particular barrier that would bring it crashing to the ground. These types of anxious reports were so frequent that they spawned one of the oldest internet jokes:

"Imminent death of the net predicted!"

There is a similar phenomena in American politics. Every few months there is a report about some member of the GOP openly criticizing their party or there is a report about some particular interest group grumbling about the course the party is taking or there is a report that is some variation of the other two. Each of these stories inevitably produces commentary suggesting that this is a sign that the solid GOP majority is about to collapse. In other words:

"Imminent death of the Republican coalition predicted!"

Now, I don't want to say that the coalition will never crack. I feel safe in saying that the odds of that happening are better than the death of the internet. But, as Oliver Willis puts it, "These guys stick together, and their principles have nothing to do with it. Federalism, states rights, whatever - they don't care."

The truth is that, as soon as any party member shows some signs of independent thinking, they are quickly taken back to Professor Rove's re-education camp and they soon re-emerge once again touting the greatness of the Republican cause. The GOP has gotten too enamored of the benefits of the coalition to ever risk it on such quant concepts such as ethics and responsibility and serving their fellow man.

But here is the bigger point: why should Democrats care? Do the occasional public qualms of a few shaky members of the collective add any weight to our own political arguments? Are those arguments somehow more legitimate if we can find one or two Republicans to agree with them? And isn't all this breathless anticipation of Republican crackup just another example of passive Democratic strategizing ("Let's wait for them to really step in it, then the people will vote for us!") Yeah, the people are really going to support a party that sits on its ass waiting for the other guy to fuck up.

A Democratic argument for the direction of this country should not depend on the kindness of elephantine strangers. It should depend on the strength and conviction of the Democrats who advocate for it. It is a strong Democratic position, pushed by strong Democratic leaders, that will eventually crack the Republican coalition.

And there is nothing imminent about that.

Talking Points Tuesday: The Four Narratives

Here's a recommended diary over at the dailyKOS by one jedc. It is an account of a speech given by Robert Reich at the London School of Economics. The speech had two parts, the first being a discussion of what we can see in Bush's second term while the second was a discussion of partisan politics. It is this later part which I'd like to quote:

What came next was quite an interesting idea.  Reich described four narratives that every successful campaign must have.  They are:

HOPEFUL narratives

• Rags-to-riches
• People coming together (think Frank Capra)

FEARFUL narratives

• Mob at the gates
• Rot at the top

Essentially, Bush had narratives for each of these four boxes.  From the top: the "ownership society", faith-based issues, terrorism, and liberal elites.

Reich discussed how the "Rot at the top" narrative has changed in the last 30-40 years.  It used to be the rot at the top of businesses.  Then it became the rot within government and Washington.  But now that the Republicans have control over the entire government they have managed to shift this narrative to rot of elites, specifically the "godlessness" of the liberal elites.

So what the hell does Robert Reich think Democrats should do?  DEMOCRATS MUST TELL THEIR OWN TRUE AND COMPELLING STORIES.  True and compelling narratives CAN get through the filters, even right-wing media filters.  And once a narrative is laid out for the American people, the policy ideas the candidate has can be truly understood.

The Four Narratives is a good model for developing talking points and it is a good suggestion that they be told through individual stories. Our challenge in the coming months will be for liberals to develop these narratives, find the stories that express them and then spread them far and wide.

Here are some suggestions just off the top of my head:

HOPEFUL narratives

• Rags-to-riches - Stories about people overcoming their troubles through the help of liberal programs.
• People coming together (think Frank Capra) - Stories of liberals organizing to achieve liberal goals (think unions).

FEARFUL narratives

• Mob at the gates - Stories about radical right-wingers imposing their morally elite views on the rest of the country (think Teri Shiavo).
• Rot at the top - Stories about corruption in the Republican controlled government (think Tom DeLay) and corporate boardrooms (think Enron).

Enough of the people

Good point by commenter GussieFN over on the dailyKos:

Listen, it's not only abortion--that's the least of it. We've all read What's the Matter With Kansas?, right? How come we always miss this shit?

This is the thing: the Taliblicans know Ms. Schiavo will be taken off the feeding tube. The ones who know anything, that is. Many of them, the non-true-believers, even understand what 'persistant vegitative state means.' They're not playing to win, they're playing to LOSE.

Why?

Because for the next ten years, the tragedy of Ms. Schiavo will be exploited to rally the troops. You think this is red meat to the base? No: it's not a carrot, it's a stick in the hands of the Taliblican commanders, they will whip the footsoldiers into a frenzy whenever they choose with Ms. Schiavo's face and story and the PRO DEATH Democrats!

Only thirty-percent say the gov't should get involved? Who cares? The hard-core activitst all live in that 30%. Those are the people who multiply their efforts. Those are the ones at the rallys and the meetings and the talk shows. You think that the feds medding in the most personal decision violates Republican principles? This isn't about Republicans--it's about those Christian Taliban activists and the people who control them. That's all. This is motivation. They will lose--and, in losing, they will win. Big.

Abraham Lincoln is famous for saying "You can fool all of the people some of the time or some of the people all of the time but you can't fool all of the people all of the time." Well, the Republican leadership understands that you don't need to you. You just need to fool enough of them enough of the time.

Even if only 30% support the Republican's actions, that 30% can translate into 50+% at the polls when you factor in motivation. Almost all of that 30% will vote in 2006. How many of the 70% will do the same?

Remember, Hitler came to power with only 30% of the vote.

The Shiavo case is all about abortion

The "logic" goes something like this:

If you believe that the soul is the seat of consciousness, and

If you believe that the soul is connected to the body as long as it is physically alive, and

If you believe that the perception of the soul is not tied directly to the physical well being of the body

Then it is reasonable to believe that an individual's soul is present and aware of its condition regardless of the physical state of the brain.

The brain has nothing to do with the essence of who we are. The brain is just another collection of tissues of no more importance to defining us then our spleen or lower intestines. Terri Shiavo is as much Terri Shiavo today, in a vegetative state, as she was before her collapse. Thus cutting off life support is as much murder as it would be to stop the beating heart of a fully conscious individual.

The presence of the soul is dependent on the continued life signs of the body. If this were not so then it could be argued that not all humans with life signs have a soul. But that would validate the argument that a fetus may not have a soul in which case abortion may not be murder.

Thus, in order to maintain the assertion that abortion is murder it is absolutely essential to maintain that all humans with physical signs of life are fully in possession of their soul.

To let Terri Shiavo die is to let abortions continue.

(Please note that I am not advocating for this position. I'm only illustrating the necessity of "saving" Terri Shiavo in the radical anti-abortion mindset.)