mindyfinn's blog

Pre-Election I posted about the disease the Republican Party has suffered from: arrogance, complacency, failure to adapt.

The disease has led to the President’s low approval rating, the loss of both houses in 2006, a less-than-inspiring 2008 presidential primary and now the sweeping in of President-elect Barack Obama.

The Republican Party’s disadvantage in organization, fundraising, and even favorable media coverage are all symptoms of that same failure to change.

Yet, now is not the time to hang our heads and feel sorry for ourselves for being diagnosed with this disease, it’s the time to pursue the cure.  It’s a time to focus only on the causes of the disease for the purpose of remaining focused on the specific steps we can take to “get well.”

The election of Barack Obama is the turning point, the rock bottom.  Not only the numerical election results, but also the sheer exuberance that accompanied them should be the wake-up call Republicans, and our country, needs.  In the same way Type-2 diabetes, or a heart attack, is often the wake-up call one needs to diet and exercise, or a chronic cold is what one needs to slow down and reevaluate their lifestyle, we must act now. 

Again, I repeat this seemingly obvious quote, what I suggest as the mantra for the Republican Party in the next few months: if you don’t change, you won’t change.  I also point to a few guidelines for recovery from my last post on this topic.

If we don’t start now with a new, optimistic, yet aggressive approach towards reviving the conservative movement and the Republican Party, we will most definitely only have ourselves to blame.  If we want to survive, we can’t be like those chronic emphysema patients who bemoan their decrepit health, yet continue smoking through their bronchial tube. 

The vote count is in (mostly).  It’s time to finally admit that the status quo is not working; it’s time to democratize the Republican Party, to rewrite the playbook; it’s time to rebuild.
 

As I write, we don't know the victor of most elections across the country, but there is one thing we know for sure about Election 2008: traditional ________ is dead.

Here are 10 items that could be filled in the blank:

1. Polling
2. Fundraising
3. Media
4. Announcing for Office
5. Advertising
6. Debates
7. Voter ID
8. Get-Out-the-Vote
9. Campaign Structures
10. Candidates

Enough said.

We complain about the superficial, biased coverage of the MSM. We are justified in doing so. Thus, we must not succumb to the same trite discussion of why McCain is losing and where the GOP went wrong.

The answer, my friends, is not found in one person, wing of the Party, policy approach or tactic.  The reasons the "circular firing squad" now points to – inconsistent message, poor fundraising, inferior integration of new technology, even the President's low approval rating -- are symptoms of the disease, not the cause of it. 

The disease is complacency with the status quo and arrogance.  The same disease that caused Republicans to lose the majority in both houses in 2006.   Americans demand change. Duh.   

David Frum summarizes this well in The Week as reported by Politico:

In The Week, former Bush speechwriter David Frum wrote of McCain's travails in a way that seemed to take defeat for granted and warned the GOP faces a long road back. "That's not a failure of campaign tactics. It's not even a failure of strategy. It's a failure of the Republican Party and conservative movement to adapt to the times."

The Republican Party must heed this quote in the coming months: If you don't change, you won't change.  

If the Republican Party doesn't re-establish a core set of principles that address the issues the majority of Americans care about, we will continue to lose support.  If we don't understand that raising money is not the most important function of a campaign or political organization, we will continue to raise less than our leftist counterparts.  If we don't stop holding ourselves hostage to an entrenched consultant class, we only have ourselves to blame.  If we don't set specific goals and make investments in new media and political technology training, we will continue to cede grassroots dominance to our political opponents.  And if we don't start listening to the American people, and addressing their concerns, rather than pursuing our own agenda, we will continue to be unpopular.

Election Day is one week away.  No matter the specific Republican vote count for President or seat count in the House and Senate, it will be time to finally admit that the status quo is not working; it will be time to democratize the Republican Party, to rewrite the playbook; it will be time rebuild.

It will be time to stop throwing blame around, and for every Republican official, candidate, staffer and consultant to open their eyes and ears to a new approach.

As someone who has advocated a new approach to the Republican Party for the last four years, I look forward to a more open, inclusive discussion about the way forward.  Meanwhile, I look forward to your input here.

A few weeks ago I joined the Open Debate Coalition, an effort to make the presidential debates more accountable to voters and in touch with the Internet Age.

The effort kicked off with a letter from Stanford Law Professor Larry Lessig, who also founded the school’s Center for Internet and Society, and asks two things: 

1) Debate footage be authorized for public use.  Currently, it’s owned by the media and prohibited for reuse or repackaging by the public.

2) Townhall debate Internet questions be chosen by the public, and not solely the media.

Signers include political and new media enthusiasts from both sides of the aisle, mostly the Left (Arianna Huffington, Craig Newmark, MoveOn, Roger Hickey), but also right-leaning friends (me, Ruffini, Henke) including latest signer Grover Norquist.

While both candidates (McCain and Obama) blessed the letter with their endorsement of its principles, the debates did not change.  The media and the commission took minimal steps to support the release of debate footage and no steps to reform the debate format.

It’s too late to address the latter problem in this election, but the Commission does have a chance to make right the debate footage issue.  As Norquist said today:

If the Commission wants to show any bit of responsiveness this year, they'll make sure that debate footage is put in the public domain so people can put clips on YouTube and otherwise share key moments without being deemed copyright lawbreakers.

Nonetheless, both presidential candidates’ public endorsement of the open debate coalition principles set the standard for future presidential debates – and hopefully down-ballot debates in the interim. 

Democratizing the debate process -- something the Internet makes more possible -- goes beyond party or ideology.  It's about making the debates more accountable to those it's intended to serve -- the voters.

The candidates updating their approaches in response to the changing force of interactive media isn’t enough.  Debates matter.  And unless the presidential debate commission embraces reform, 2008 could well be their last year sitting on the debate throne.

Has the McCain campaign considered that the time to change their ad strategy is NOW, and only because two weeks ago is no longer an option?

In the last month, McCain's favorability rating has dropped 6 points, from 56.4 to 50.1, and Obama's favorability has increased, from 55.3 to 57.4, according to the RCP polling average.  The Obama-focused campaign is not working.

Now Election Politics 101 dictates that when you're down and your opponent is hovering at 50% in electoral polls, it's time to enlighten voters to the negative aspects of your opponent, commonly known as "negative" ads.  The McCain camp followed this rule to a tee.  And in this case, it did not work. 

They can blame the media and say it's because the media has a double standard for the two campaigns, and they do.  They can probably blame the failed negative ad strategy on other factors as well.  But the bottom line is it has not worked, and it's time to change course.

Rather than set their sights on Obama's unfavorables, how about playing to their strengths? Remember the McCain bio videos -- those that recount his experience as a war hero, a man who suffered for the sake of his country and his country men and women?  What happened to the Country First theme dominating the Convention?

And we never saw ads that tout McCain's independent, pragmatic record in the Senate.

No scramble necessary to concoct concepts, use McCain himself, at his best.  There's a reason this guy was popular -- at times.

Perhaps there is concern about shirking the playbook and going back up with McCain-centered ads with 20 days left to play.  Yet, the reasons for going positive at this point grossly outweigh any conceivable risk:

1) McCain may not win, but I'm sure he would prefer for it to be close rather than get trounced by a Senate newbie like Obama.

2) McCain may not win, but he doesn't want to be responsible for a Democratic filibuster-proof majority in the Senate, and a Democratic deluge in the House.

3) McCain may not win, but he can go out on a positive note and preserve his pride and his image.

4) McCain may not win, but he's not winning anyway, and he has nothing to lose.

While McCain's chances of winning are slim and getting slimmer every day, his campaign owes it to themselves, their supporters, and the Republican Party ... and John McCain ... to go back to basics.

With less than one month to go,  John McCain has few winning moves, and Barack Obama is headed to "Check Mate" on the chess board of Election 2008.  

What is McCain to do? 

Two McCain advantages remain.  And they are true advantages, not bloated attacks on Obama or overused GOP talking points.

1. Senate Record
One reason the voting public distrusts  and dislikes politicians is that politicians fail to follow through on election promises.  For fence-sitting voters, especially those bombarded by campaign ads and phone calls, it's hard to believe either candidate will do what they say. 

With two Senators at the top of each party's ticket, the candidate's disadvantage is the public's advantage -- a record by which to evaluate each candidate, to predict how they will perform in office.  

Obama claims he will give 95% of taxpayers a tax cut.  He claims that he will reach across the aisle and find compromise solutions to our nation's challenges.  He claims he will move us closer to energy independence.  He claims he cares about Main Street and will hold Wall Street accountable.  But what has he done while in the Senate to achieve these goals? One look at Obama's past votes and legislative behavior, and it's clear his campaign promises are inconsistent with his record reality.  

And what about the "Present" votes while in the Illinois State Senate.  What kind of commitment did that show?

McCain's must be accountable to a much longer record, but it's one that is consistent with the domestic and foreign policy agendas outlined on the campaign trail. When it comes to reaching across the aisle, as Mike Murphy said on Meet the Press today, "You look at any piece of bipartisan legislation in the Senate that got done the last five years, John McCain's been the quarterback ... McCain is a guy who can get things done in Washington with two parties." 

2. Runaway Liberal Agenda
Also on MTP today, Murphy referred to the "runaway Democratic train" that comes with an Obama presidency.  

How many moderates and independents would prefer a Congress to have limits, the checks and balances so cleverly built into our political system?  With Congress' abysmal approval rating, scary is the thought of a liberal Democratic president putting forth an agenda that Congress will ratify quickly and easily. 

With a liberal and a moderate as our choices, even left-leaners may consider a moderate out of fear of the reckless decisions made possible by a Congress who says "Yes, We Can" to every proposal the liberal president desires. 

(McCain should take care in presenting this as a problem with an Obama presidency.  Voters don't like hand-wringing and demagoguing either.  Nonetheless, McCain can stand on his record as someone who forces compromise, which is better than forcing unchecked bad policy.)

McCain must try these two moves now ... or never. 

Obama won the primary based on his bottom-up, "yes, we can" message.  As I listened to the speeches at the DNC, including Obama, it struck me that the candidate's message strategy collides with his policy strategy.  People-powered vs. people-controlled.

Republican strategist Alex Castellanos writes:      

Obama empowered his supporters, telling them they, not the old political establishment, could achieve anything. ...

Barack Obama may believe "change doesn't come from the top down, it comes from the bottom up," but the leadership of his party doesn't. The national Democratic establishment, from the Daily Kos and MoveOn.org to Pelosi and Reid in Congress, still believe in top-down big-government from Washington, especially if they get to run the factory. ...

They believe the era of big government is back, not over. They would keep money and power in their hands, not devolve it to the average American. 

The liberals need to stop the insanity.  They love to claim the "power to the people" mantle.  How does more government control and regulation put the power back in the hands of the people?

When you were a kid and your Mom or Dad gave you $10 to take to the mall, did you feel empowered?  How about when you set up a lemonade stand and made $5?  And what about when your Mom or Dad took $2 from your lemonade stand profits, and $3 from what they gave you for the mall, and handed them to your brother? Then, they said you must pay them more before you set up your lemonade stand the next day.  

I would feel like giving up at that point! 

Before Obama and the Left "establishment" goes around touting their belief in people power, let's clarify their definition of people power.  For me, it certainly doesn't mean more government control.  

Is our country more concerned about change, or trust?  

One might conclude that with McCain's recent insurgence in the polls, he is winning the change game.  Yet, are the voters who have moved to McCain -- since the choosing of Sarah Palin for VP -- convinced that he will bring about more change?  

Or do they like the air of authenticity that the ticket embodies vs. the urban, blue-blood, highly polished, Washington-insider ticket of Obama-Biden? 



I propose that voters' "change"-ing opinions of John McCain have to do with the likeability of Sarah Palin.  Her small town values and family life, and a "you go girl!" response to her mastery of unexpected challenges, win over voters.  Not just because she's a woman, but also because she's not an Ivy-league educated CEO or lawyer from the glamorous regions of America.

The undecided Midwest -- suburban and rural -- voters can trust Sarah Palin (she's real), and thus trust McCain by association. 



Compare the McCain-Palin ticket then to the Obama-Biden ticket.  The majority of American voters are likely to gravitate towards the service to country ideals more closely aligned with the Midwest and West, the ideals summed up in the "Country First" theme recently touted by the McCain campaign.  
Compare that to the lack of understanding, and even fear, that most Americans feel towards the self-serving inner-city and inner-Congress wheeling and dealing associated with the Northeast and big cities.  



Simply, McCain is from Arizona and Palin is from Alaska; Barack Obama is from Chicago, Illinois and Joe Biden is from Delaware.  McCain began his adulthood by risking his life many times for the security of our country.  Obama began his career in Harvard Law School and then spent a few years as a "community organizer;" he's on his way to career politician-hood. 

Palin did not attain political success due to overt political ambition.  She had pure intentions of serving her family and community, and then her town and her State. She is a "real" person.  Biden, by comparison, has spent nearly his entire adulthood as a member of the most exclusive club in the nation: the U.S. Senate.

Fair or not, the perceptions Americans have of the two presidential tickets are accurate ...  because they are the perceptions of the two presidential tickets. 

With trust in government at an all-time low, which bona fides are more Americans inclined to place their faith in?   



I’ve heard time and again from women regarding McCain's pick of Palin that it's quite "presumptuous" of McCain to count on women to “vote for Palin just because she's a woman."

Ok. So these women, from metropolitan areas outside Washington, DC, Chicago, Houston, Boston and Los Angeles don't need to vote for her.  Most of them wouldn’t have voted for McCain anyway.

Yet, if women, and men (yes, they like her too!), from the Midwest and West are more enthusiastic about McCain, and if they turn out rather than sit out, it’s all over. Make room for McCain-Palin in the White House. 

Not even Nostradamus could have predicted that in 2008 the one woman on a major party presidential ticket would be a Republican, or Governor of Alaska, or mother of five, or a moose hunter.  Yet, today, we have all four in Sarah Palin.

Any betting American would have predicted Hillary Clinton as the “feminist” role model of the year.  Hillary Clinton, a product of the feminism of the 60s and 70s, where “femininity” meant weak and “motherly” a flaw.

Sarah Palin, the Republican Party’s new favorite daughter, is of the new breed of feminists, those who believe women have crucial roles as wife, mother, and nurturer, and because of that -- not in spite of it -- they can be powerful, and effective executives. (Note: The lipstick line) 

Last night, Palin gave the speech she needed to give and so much more.  She demonstrated why she was a superior choice for McCain vs. the other so-called "short list" VP picks. Not only is she smart, tough, articulate, and dynamic, but also feminine, compassionate, and real.
Some critics thus far have focused on the fact that she defied expectations because the bar was so low. Hogwash!

I ask them to watch or listen to Sarah Palin again. Her convention address would be considered enormous, even superior, by any standard. That she's a woman, a mom, from provincial Alaska, and was elevated to national player status less than a week ago, all make her showing on the campaign trail thus far all that more impressive.

The bar is now set so high that Palin faces an incredible challenge for the remainder of the campaign and her career: continue meeting the elevated expectations.

Yet, I’m confident Palin will do just fine.  As long as she holds on tight to her integrity – staying true to her values, her personality, her womanhood … as long as she emphasizes her strengths while acknowledging her weaknesses. 

In the primaries, American voters rejected candidates who appeared to “play” leader, rather than act like one -- hiding their true selves and letting the media bait them into running from their supposed flaws.

Palin brings the authenticity to politics that Americans demand more so in a YouTube, people-powered media environment, where everyone is the media and regular people become celebrities in an instant.

Almost every child dreams of being a star at some point, and the Internet makes that possible for more of us.  If you have what it takes, you don’t need to be part of an elite club or have required connections.  Be confident, set goals, reach your potential, stay true to yourself, take care of your community and there’s no limit to what you can do.  Read: Vice President, United States, Alaska Governor, Mom.     

Sarah Palin.  A new hero for women, and men, across America.

As the Wall Street Journal reports, there's a noticeable difference at Camp McCain since Steve Schmidt took the reins.  

I think some of the recent initiatives, what some might call gimmicks, out of the RNC and Team McCain are results of the campaign power shift, and they mark a positive difference. Although it's possible that I'm being overly optimistic, or too engaged in the day-to-day war games of the presidential race.  (I'd love to hear your thoughts)

 1. Just yesterday, the McCain campaign launched a video, make that two nearly identical videos, highlighting the media's love affair with Barack Obama.  Using real media footage of the media expressing their profound love and adoration of Obama, the campaign video(s) send a strong message.  

They could have stopped there, and the videos would likely have received average media coverage.  However, what makes the effort standout is the reason for the two videos -- two distinct audio tracks with a request for folks to vote on their favorite (after they provide their email address of course).

What makes this more than a gimmick is that by prompting a vote on the favorite audio track, folks are motivated to watch the video not once, but twice.  Two impressions of a message are always better than one.  Schmidt's reputation for hammering a message home through repetition is well-earned.