Stole that title from Kanye. Anyway, Bush vetoed health care for kids this week, and the outcry among Democrats was pretty strong, but not quite the right message.
Check out these comments by key Democrats regarding Bush’s veto of the popular, bipartisan SCHIP program.
Van Hollen: “We’re going district by district to tell Republicans and President Bush to stop obstructing progress and start putting children first. Republicans who continue to vote in lockstep with President Bush and against children will be held accountable.”
Emanuel: “The President and 15 Republicans stand in the way of 10 million children receiving the health care that we receive here as members of Congress. There have been three vetoes in President Bush’s term–one to end the war, one to permit stem cell research, and now one to allow 10 million children to get their health care. That says it all about President Bush.”
The Democrats have not quite gotten the messaging down on this SCHIP bill yet, even after Bush’s veto. It is a little too dry, focusing on how the public overwhelmingly supports the bill. Sure, there are some good talking points out there, but the leaders need to speak more forcefully about this.
Not so good messages:
Obstructing progress
Being out of step
Better messages:
Not caring about the health of our kids.
Wanting our kids to be sick
Republicans are cold-hearted misers
It may seem extreme, but people think in black and white. And the public does actually support the Democrats on this issue, so they have more room to pound Bush and other miserly Republicans.
Congress needs a victory, and if progressives can cast Republicans as cold-hearted misers that would rather kids suffer bad health than pay a few dollars to cure them, then that victory will be theirs. Pelosi only needs a few more votes to override the veto in the House, and a hard core messaging push will pressure enough swing votes to do the job.
The messaging blitz has to be national as well, otherwise it is difficult to create the narrative of cold hearted Republicans not wanting kids to be healthy in order to save a few bucks in the short term.
It will be interesting to see what the Sunday talk shows bring in terms of messaging. And there are only a couple of weeks to get it right.
Your contrast between “not so good” (i.e., “typical Dem”) and “better” message seems right on target to me. As you note, people tend to think in black and white, and this issue fits that pretty well without much stretching. But DC Dems still take it into the “gray, flat and unmoving” zone.
Keep up the good work.
Left by mitchipd on October 7th, 2007