Strengthening Constitutional Self-Government

No Left Turns

Kristol on How McCain Can Still Win

Bill seems to say that the point has to be hammered home that Obama is way too liberal domestically and not really a friend of the middle class. Obama’s invocation of Wright’s hostility to middleclassness should also be employed. And the assault should begin with Sarah on Thursday. I completely agree that Sara has been mis- or overhandled, and I even predicted that would almost inevitably happen and warned against it. But she’s not really the one to turn things around at this point. I mainly posted this to show that Bill agrees that the McCain situation is fairly desperate and some new strategy (and, of course, tactics) is required to save the day.

Discussions - 5 Comments


Got any fear cards left in the old deck? Fear of gay marraige, fear of muslims, fear of the financial collapse, fear of terrorists, fear of taxes, fear of Reverend Wright, fear of Russia and Putin, fear of activist judges etc. Americans are literally tired of fear. There is more contempt in Lawler's recommendation of more of these Rove tactics than in all the little 'liberal condescension' crap from a few weeks ago.

The ones playing on fear are the Dems, as evidenced by the very first reply.

https://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalpunch/2008/09/attacking-obama.html


Attack Obama on his "truth squad"....stop making him seem like a tired socialist and show him for the true fascist that he his.

Some points,

1. On Palin, sure she has been mishandled but she also has not risen to the occasion in the two interviews. The good news is that this has lowered expectations for the debate with Biden and with a strong performance the negative publicity of the last few days will actually make her look better if she impresses. The same dynamic applied to her convention speech.

2. The finacial crisis has crippled the ability of economic conservatives to get a powerful positive message out. For over twenty years conservatives have relied on a combination of tax cuts and deregulation to attract voters. Neither seem like credible answers to the present crisis (they may actually be, hell I don't know). So conservatives are split between those reluctantly supporting a bailout that makes a mockery of their free market ideals or opposing a bailout with a snakey "I don't care what happens, I won't sell out to socialism even if it means a depression" stubborness. Neither position is a political winner, but at present, conservative ideology is facing a crisis that is both unfamiliar and painfully uncomfortable.

3. People's economic worries are terribly real. Any solutions that move them will have to be clearly connectable to their daily lives and anxieties. McCain's earmark fixation tatoos "OUT OF TOUCH" on his forehead.

4. The credibility of our financial and political elites are scrapping the bottom. All weekend, I was struck by the combination of contempt, disgust and resentment directed at the bailout and even the idea of a bailout. Everyone seemed convinced that the bailout was rewarding crooks with the money of taxpayers who might soon be unemployed. Even those who supported the bailout did so in a spirit of embittered resignation. No one had a good idea of what to do, and of course neither do I.

5. I have never seen conservatives so pessimistic about the prospects of the economy. This is a very bad sign. In an enviorment where economic stagnation is taken for granted, liberals are favored to win by offering to share scarcity. Conservatives only have a chance to win on economics if they can convince the majority that they will do better from economic growth than from redistribution. Tough to do that if you don't have the growth.

pete, i esp like 3 and 5

Leave a Comment

* denotes a required field
 

No TrackBacks
TrackBack URL: https://nlt.ashbrook.org/movabletype/mt-tb.cgi/12955


Warning: include(/srv/users/prod-php-nltashbrook/apps/prod-php-nltashbrook/public/sd/nlt-blog/_includes/promo-main.php): failed to open stream: No such file or directory in /srv/users/prod-php-nltashbrook/apps/prod-php-nltashbrook/public/2008/09/kristol-on-how-mccain-can-still-win.php on line 523

Warning: include(): Failed opening '/srv/users/prod-php-nltashbrook/apps/prod-php-nltashbrook/public/sd/nlt-blog/_includes/promo-main.php' for inclusion (include_path='.:/opt/sp/php7.2/lib/php') in /srv/users/prod-php-nltashbrook/apps/prod-php-nltashbrook/public/2008/09/kristol-on-how-mccain-can-still-win.php on line 523