3rd September 2008, 7:29 PM
(This post was last modified: 3rd September 2008, 8:09 PM by A Black Falcon.)
Lying works (we hope)!
If anything has rung through loud and clear, it's that all Republicans can do is lie about Obama and the Democrats. "They will raise your taxes!"
But Obama has promised to LOWER taxes on 95% of Americans.
"Democrats hate America and freedom!"
Because Democrats all hate America? Did you skip Obama's acceptance speech or something?
"Democrats don't understand America's values"
But polls show, on many issues liberal positions have solid majorities.
etc... that's not going into word usage either, because everyone does that kind of thing -- "we're in favor of letting parents decide where their children go to school", for instance, as opposed to how a Democrat would put it, "you want to destroy the public school system"... but that's expected, everyone wants to put their side in a good light and the other side in a bad light. So both sides on the abortion issue are "pro", for instance. Pro-choice, Pro-life...
Oh, and the other lesson? Abortion is back as a major political issue, in a big way. The Republicans are pushing it, HARD. I really hope that this will backfire, because a solid majority of the American people are opposed to banning abortion. And the Republican party platform's abortion plank is in support of an absolute ban -- no exceptions.
It has been pretty interesting to see how so many Democrats made so big of an effort to only attack Republicans on issues and not question their character (see, for instance, all of the praise for McCain's military service), cumulating with Obama's speech and its masterful combination of outlining a platform of core Democratic party positions with a continuation of his Washington-is-too-partisan theme of, for instance, his 2004 DNC keynote. I'm sure part of it is that I like the Democratic attacks on Republicans while I don't like the Republican attacks on Democrats (because I happen to like many of those policies... once you remove the lies and spin they're layering on top of what the Democrats actually want to do, that is), but still...
This is a long-term theme, really. Republicans are always harsher in their attacks, and, I think at least, looser with the truth... and it does help them win. Obama has proven throughout this campaign that he's a bit weak on the attack politics angle; the Clintons are much tougher there. Obama's trying, but if Hillary were the nominee instead of Obama, responses to Republican attacks would definitely be harsher, I think. But at least Obama is doing a much better job of fighting attacks than Kerry did.
But anyway... the Democratic convention was fantastic, one great major speech after another. But the Republicans... they know they're down and struggling, and all they can think of is trying to win once again by rallying the base and playing the politics of fear and hate, tactics that have done very well for them for a long time now. I'm just hoping that it doesn't work this time... the polling looks good so far, but we'll see.
(Oh yeah, and did you know John McCain was a POW? It's true!)
Now... will McCain himself come out tomorrow with another attack speech like the ones of the past few days, or will he aim at a general audience? It makes sense to attack, of course -- conventions are for the base and party activists first an foremost, of course. Many Democrats did somewhat comparable things. So we'll see what McCain says... though I do think the tone here has been, like usual for the Republican party, more viscous than the tone the Democrats were setting. As if it's tougher and better to lie and be mean than just try to debate actual policy differences...
Though if all you listen to are TV ads, I can see how it would work.
If anything has rung through loud and clear, it's that all Republicans can do is lie about Obama and the Democrats. "They will raise your taxes!"
But Obama has promised to LOWER taxes on 95% of Americans.
"Democrats hate America and freedom!"
Because Democrats all hate America? Did you skip Obama's acceptance speech or something?
"Democrats don't understand America's values"
But polls show, on many issues liberal positions have solid majorities.
etc... that's not going into word usage either, because everyone does that kind of thing -- "we're in favor of letting parents decide where their children go to school", for instance, as opposed to how a Democrat would put it, "you want to destroy the public school system"... but that's expected, everyone wants to put their side in a good light and the other side in a bad light. So both sides on the abortion issue are "pro", for instance. Pro-choice, Pro-life...
Oh, and the other lesson? Abortion is back as a major political issue, in a big way. The Republicans are pushing it, HARD. I really hope that this will backfire, because a solid majority of the American people are opposed to banning abortion. And the Republican party platform's abortion plank is in support of an absolute ban -- no exceptions.
It has been pretty interesting to see how so many Democrats made so big of an effort to only attack Republicans on issues and not question their character (see, for instance, all of the praise for McCain's military service), cumulating with Obama's speech and its masterful combination of outlining a platform of core Democratic party positions with a continuation of his Washington-is-too-partisan theme of, for instance, his 2004 DNC keynote. I'm sure part of it is that I like the Democratic attacks on Republicans while I don't like the Republican attacks on Democrats (because I happen to like many of those policies... once you remove the lies and spin they're layering on top of what the Democrats actually want to do, that is), but still...
This is a long-term theme, really. Republicans are always harsher in their attacks, and, I think at least, looser with the truth... and it does help them win. Obama has proven throughout this campaign that he's a bit weak on the attack politics angle; the Clintons are much tougher there. Obama's trying, but if Hillary were the nominee instead of Obama, responses to Republican attacks would definitely be harsher, I think. But at least Obama is doing a much better job of fighting attacks than Kerry did.
But anyway... the Democratic convention was fantastic, one great major speech after another. But the Republicans... they know they're down and struggling, and all they can think of is trying to win once again by rallying the base and playing the politics of fear and hate, tactics that have done very well for them for a long time now. I'm just hoping that it doesn't work this time... the polling looks good so far, but we'll see.
(Oh yeah, and did you know John McCain was a POW? It's true!)
Now... will McCain himself come out tomorrow with another attack speech like the ones of the past few days, or will he aim at a general audience? It makes sense to attack, of course -- conventions are for the base and party activists first an foremost, of course. Many Democrats did somewhat comparable things. So we'll see what McCain says... though I do think the tone here has been, like usual for the Republican party, more viscous than the tone the Democrats were setting. As if it's tougher and better to lie and be mean than just try to debate actual policy differences...
Though if all you listen to are TV ads, I can see how it would work.