by 99 Seats
I want you to remember these two articles. Read them both now. I'll wait.
Did you read them? Okay, let's discuss.
In six months, if President Obama wins re-election, I will send these links to my liberal friends who don't understand why, after receiving a public rebuke at the ballot box, the right remains in thrall of the "crazies." They will wonder why there wasn't a purge of the fringe elements and why the congressional GOP, most likely a few members smaller, aren't moving to the center and compromising. These two articles explain why perfectly.
The first, the polling article (h/t Isaac), is basically gibbering insanity. But the kernel of it is this: any poll showing Obama with a lead is oversampling Democrats and therefore skewed and not can that poll not be trusted but the polling outfit is in the tank. This is the beginning of the "Obama stole the election" meme that we'll be dealing with. We got a small taste of that with the campaign against ACORN, but with no ACORN to blame, it will actually get larger and more elaborate.
The second, primarily about Sarah Palin advising Romney to "go rogue" (whatever the hell that means), is also indicative of everyone's old friend, epistemic closure. First off, it assumes that Romney's struggles have nothing to do with his policies and statements, but instead with how he's framed them, with the added implication that he's hiding some worse truth. We're talking about a candidate who has repeatedly implied that the US is on the path towards becoming Greece. I don't really seeing how he's underselling the state of our economy. (For the record, we are not in any danger at all of becoming Greece. Not even slightly.) In the world of dog-whistle, there is the idea that Romney needs to take the gloves off and start running Jeremiah Wright and birther ads. But more importantly, the machine is starting up with another hoary old chestnut: conservativism never fails; it is only failed. Romney, who advocates low regulations, low taxes on top earners, voucherizing Medicare, privatizing Social Security, turning Medicaid over to the states, a federal ban on abortion and marriage equality, self-deportation and war with Iran, is insufficiently conservative. If only he would publicly hold some conservative ideals and see how popular they would be.
The other part that amazes is this:
“They not only need to use [Ryan] out on the trail more effectively, they need to have more of him rub off on Mitt because I think Mitt thinks that way but he’s gotta be able to articulate that…. I think too many people are restraining him from telling [his vision],” Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker told a radio interviewer Friday.
Where’s the evidence of Romney’s so-called “bold choice” in picking Ryan? others ask.
“Even in Wisconsin, I think he’s being underused,” Charlie Sykes, the radio host who interviewed Gov. Walker, told Politico. “I guess what’s frustrating is especially now that we’re embroiled in this conversation about the makers versus the takers, where is Paul Ryan? He is eloquent, he knows the numbers, he can frame this in a very compelling way. The fact that he is not front and center on some of this is, I think, a lost opportunity.”
Um. There was a time that Paul Ryan has a chance to express his beliefs and ideas in a very public forum. Remember how that went? Remember this? Apparently GOP consultants don't. They seem to believe that Paul Ryan can be some kind of honest broker or straight-talker. This is simply crazy. And completely ignores reality. What kind of reckoning can there be when there is practically a cottage industry generating opinions that have nothing to do with reality?
So...remember this. Remember these stories when you're trying to understand what's happening in our politics.
I think the post-election leverage change will fall mostly on Obama's veto pen -- if he dares to weild it. All the brinksmanship of the past couple years came down to an election gambit and if the President overcomes that by winning re-election, the republican caucus will have to go back to their jobs instead of the President's. This presumes Obama throws down some markers with his veto pen, of course, and he started to in his conventions speech. But note how the same phenomenon happened after W got re-elected -- there the siituation was different, but the same lame duck dynamic was in play: after standing should-to-shoulder with W for four years, his own caucus was too shagged out to follow him on immigration and social security reform. By consolidating all their political ambitions into the defeat of the president, they will, as a practical matter, be far less successful in a second Obama term.
Posted by: Karl Miller | September 23, 2012 at 06:59 PM