Progressive Movement

Two important Americans died this week. Former President Gerald Ford and James Brown. Which one got more coverage? Ford. Which one is already getting greater eulogies and hagiographic praise? Ford. Which one had a greater effect on America? Brown.

But do not let that stop the right wing media from cannonizing another former Republican president. We had to suffer through this to a much larger extent in 2004 when Reagan died. You would have thought it was Mother Theresa the way everyone genuflected to Reagan’s legacy, including liberals. And while the histrionic groveling before the cult of Reagan is understandable for conservatives, it made no sense that no one, at least those covered by the MSM, publicly blasted Reagan for the irrepairable harm he has caused this country, his numerous illegal activities, basically being senile in office, and the fact that he hoodwinked millions of Americans into thinking conservatism was mainstream and had their best interests at heart.

Ford was no such leader. (more…)

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So no important messaging post here.  Tell the world what’s on your mind.

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Its the holidays, not much is happening politically, except that Bush, despite years of saying his military strategy in Iraq would be based upon what his generals thought was the best course of action, has now decided to ignore the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General John Abizaid, and many other generals and escalate the war in Iraq by adding troops.

If the Democrats cannot take this Christmas gift of blatant hypocrisy and ram it down Bush’s throat, then they really must be drinking too much egg nog.  One of them is Sen. Bill Nelson (FL), who supported the excalation if it was in Anbar but not in Baghdad.  He then refered to the conflict in Baghdad as sectarian violence, not a civil war.  Note to Bill Nelson:  you just got re-elected to a six year term by clobbering right-wing nutjob Katherine Harris.  You can speak your true mind.  Listen to the public and stop this escalaltion before we are really up the creek without a paddle.

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As if he was not listening to the American public, soon to be Sen. Majority Leader Harry Reid on Sunday claimed that he would support a temporary increase in U.S. troops to Iraq if it was ultimately used to  decrease our troop levels.  Some Democrats publicly diagreed with this this unfortunately statement, but the damage was already done.  If the Senate Democratic leader does not have a spine on this issue, it continues the perception that the Democrats do not have a plan and will simpy let the Republicans take the lead on this issue.

Nor does it convince the public that the Dems care about what they think.  The mid-term elections showed that the public wants out of Iraq.  Opinion polls on the Baker-Hamilton Commission showed high public support for their proposals.  And yet Harry Reid cannot see that vigorously opposing increased troop levels shows the public he is willing to fight for their beliefs, all the while letting John McCain’s absurd solution to the Iraq crisis gain traction, making McCain look like the one with all the ideas.  If this continues ‘08 will be a cakewalk for McCain.

Even Hillary, while initially saying she opposed increased troop levels, undercut that by saying she would support it if part of a more comprehensive plan to stabilize Iraq.  Well, that is exactly what the Republicans are saying, so her disagreement with Reid is no disagreement at all.  They both essentially said they would support troop increases, as their conditions for supporting the increase are the Republican talking points for increasing troop levels.  That is, it will improve stability and allow our troops to come home sooner.

What should Dems say?

What Gov. Tom Vilsack said on The Daily Show Tuesday night.  It is time for Iraq to put up or shut up.  If they refuse to take responsibility for their own country, we cannot help them.  And most importantly, that our presence allows Iraq to not take that responsibility.  All Dems should follow his straightforward, common sense position and adopt his messaging.

Messaging

1) More troops does not solve the political problems in Iraq.

2) There has been more than enough time for Iraq to stand on its own two feet.

3)  Only Iraq can decide it wants to move forward as a nation, and so far they have not done that.

4)  Our presence babies Iraq by allowing them to ignore their problems.

You have to couch this in terms of Iraq abdicating its responsibility.  The responsibility frame is huge and many Republicans have it.  So we have to counter the responsibility frame of ‘you broke it; you buy it’ with our own.  Reality will support our viewpoint.

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One more interesting set of polling data from the CBS poll. I replicate it below from the pdf.

U.S. Troops Levels Should be…

Now 10/06 3/06

Increased 18% 16 10

Kept Same 18 27 25

Decreased 34 26 30

All removed 25 24 29

This shows the power of messaging. The war got worse in October, particularly in relation to March. There were no major breakthroughs politically in Iraq during that time and the civil war had gotten much worse. So why the better numbers for increasing troops in Iraq or keeping the levels the same in October? You guessed it, Republican election propaganda.

Now post election, as the rhetoric dies down, what happens? The numbers for increasing or keeping troop levels the same drops to the same level as in March, and the numbers for decreasing or withdrawing troops shoots up to the previous March levels. Interesting, no?

One last thing. While the support for increasing or keeping the same now matches March, keeping the same is dramatically lower. Increasing troop level increases by the same amount. Why? Because everyone is attacking “stay the course”, even the Iraq Study Group. No one has been attacking the idea of increasing troop levels. So as the public looks to “change the course”, some of them embrace increasing troop levels since no Democrats thought to attack that idea during the elections, or even post election.

Guess what. Time to start.

The power of messaging my friends, the power of messaging.

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Where it stops, nobody knows.

Several new polls are out on Bush’s approval rating and Iraq. And Bush is losing even more support than previously thought possible. The cause of the drop is Iraq, plain and simple. In the CBS poll his approval rating is down to a miniscule 31 percent. That clearly means he is losing even conservative support.

His rejection of the Iraq Study Group report seems to have reinforced the realization that Bush simply does not listen to anything that goes against his preconceived notions, and that is a very bad quality to have in a President. Once thought a strength, it is now a permanent drawback in the public’s perception of him. Again, only 28 percent in the CBS poll thought Bush could make the right decisions about Iraq, a drop of 7 percent from last month’s post election CBS poll.

So what do the Democrats do? Well, the public generally supports the recommendations of the Iraq Study Group, but when asked about specific proposals, support increases significantly. Given that the public supports talking to Iran and Syria, reducing troop levels, and creating milestones or benchmarks that Iraq has to meet, the Democrats gain by taking specific stances on these issues. In the ABC/WP poll, 68 percent want U.S. troops largely gone by early 2008.

And these stances need to be strong. (more…)

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It is now clear that Bush will probably reject most of the recommendations of the Iraq Study Group. No surprise really. It is hard to advance moderate proposals in this town with and expect to get love from anyone. And Bush is definitely not one for moderation.

He has pushed back his decision on how to deal with Iraq until January. Call me crazy, but should the Administration not be constantly reassessing how to deal with Iraq? Apparently Bush only does it once in a blue moon. Glad to know our leaders are really concerned about stabalizing Iraq. One thing is for sure. They will miss the deadline for beginning a diplomatic offensive with Iran and Syria called for by Baker-Hamilton.

What options are on the table? Apparently McCain’s discredited idea of adding troops to Iraq, fighting Al Qaeda and not the militias engaged in the civil war, or just giving up on a representative democracy and only supporting the Shiites (the 80% doctrine) and ignoring the Sunnis. None of these will work, but the one that has the most legs, and thus must be shot down, is McCain’s send more troops to their death theory.

McCain is going to hammer his idea incessantly all the way through the ‘08 election unless Bush implements it first. Either way progressives and Democrats have to gear up to oppose this ludicrous idea.

Why is it bad? Because 20-40k more troops will not mean a hill of beans in Iraq. That amount of troops will not quell very much violence, as it simply displaces the civil war to where the troops are not. So we spend more money, put more troops lives at risk, annoy more Iraqis, continue to keep Iraq from learning how to stand on its own two feet, and generally accomplish nothing.

This theory misses the fundamental problem with the war in general. It was a bad strategy. (more…)

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How do you win even though you have lost? Simple, just tell everyone you are winning. In what should be a textbook example of how to keep your position intact when all the facts are tearing you down, look no further than George W. Bush’s recent comments on Iraq in his press conference with Tony Blair.

Bush said, “I thought we would succeed quicker than we did,” and “I am disappointed by the pace of success.”

So Bush not only claiming he thinks we will succeed, but that we actually are, just not as quickly as we had hoped. Brilliant! This is not a belief of ‘I think we will succeed’, in his statement, we actually are winning! It is not a debatable point.

In the minds of many, this statement of apparent fact means that pulling out our troops will cause us to lose. In other words, snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. It also shows that Bush realizes things are tough and we need to do something to speed up success. So he is on top of things and not clueless as many would have us believe.

All this is done by simply phrasing Iraq as a success in an indirect, but matter of fact way. And by extension, anyone who calls for withdrawing the troops wants America to fail and is a defeatist. Or a ’surrender monkey’ as the New York Post would say in a more blatant but ineffective way.

If the progressives want to succeed in the long term, or even on particular policies, you have to learn from this example. So on Iraq, do not debate whether it is a civil war; it is, and just refer to it as such. We are losing in Iraq and you should say so as if everyone believes it. This will go a very long way in changing the frame from which the public views the war. And once that reframing takes place, anything Republicans say contradicting that frame will fall on deaf ears, even Sen. John McCain’s warmongering attempt to add more troops to Iraq.

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