In Barry Levinson's Wag the Dog, a satire astute enough to wind up genuinely influencing our national political conversation, a Hollywood producer watches the President's latest campaign ad. The slogan "Why Change Horses in Mid-Stream" doesn't really work - it's folksy and isn't relatable to most people. Of course, it's also about the least inspiring, motivating message a politician could choose.
"Everything's going so well! Let's not alter our course in any way, shape or form!"
Even if that were true, it wouldn't really motivate potential supporters. "Come join me! We'll keep things just as they are!"
That's why it's so surprising to me that Republicans have essentially been running on precisely this message. Via Americablog comes this NYT article, which confirms what anyone paying attention would have already concluded - the Rethugs 2006 campaign has completely derailed. This "stay the course" strategy is retarded and, clueless though Americans may be, even the Red Staters can see through this one. I mean, "a secret plan to end the Iraq War"? Hey, Conrad Burns...I know Richard Nixon, I've seen him portrayed byDan Hedaya, Phillip Baker Hall and Sir Tony Hopkins...and you, sir, are no Dick Nixon.
With three weeks until Election Day, Republican candidates are barely mentioning Iraq on the campaign trail and in their television advertisements.
Even President Bush, continuing to attack Democrats for opposing the war, has largely dropped his call of “stay the course” and replaced it with a more nuanced promise of flexibility.
It is the Democrats who have seized on Iraq as a central issue. In debates and in speeches, candidates are pummeling Republicans with accusations of a failed war.
I'm still not as optimistic about our prospects in November than most of the writers on the lefty blogosphere. I'm old enough to remember 1994, with Newt's ridiculous "Contract With America" and all that garbage, when this Christo-Crypto-Fascist regime first tasted real power. 12 years of this Nationalist Nightmare has left him pretty jaded. I'd still wager on a fradulent elections enabled by a corporate media followed by 2 more years of violence, torture, constant surveillance, secret prisons, kangaroo courts, illegal invasions and massive corruption.
Still, I'm encouraged that Americans have not totally lost their ability to think clearly. For a while there, it seemed like the nefarious influence of mass media propaganda had succeeded in the Dumbing Down of our nation, had robbed us of our collective sanity. I still think this is coming, but if Americans are still capable of rejecting this "stay the course" message being rammed down their throats non-stop...well, maybe there's some hope yet.
The development also suggests that what has been a classic strategy of Mr. Bush’s senior adviser, Karl Rove — to turn a weakness into a strength — is not working as well as the White House had hoped.
“As the Iraq war gets more unpopular, the environment for Republican candidates erodes,” said Mark Campbell, a Republican strategist who represents several Congressional candidates, including Representative Jim Gerlach of Pennsylvania, who is fighting for re-election in one of the toughest races.
“Only in an election year this complicated can Republicans be happy that Mark Foley knocked the Iraq war off the front page,” Mr. Campbell said.
A senior strategist familiar with Republican polling who insisted on anonymity to share internal data said that as of midsummer it was clear that “stay the course” was a self-defeating argument.
I mean...yeah...obviously...If polls are telling you that the majority of Americans are eager to get out of this war, why would you spend millions of dollars telling them to "stay the course"? I mean, as stupid as I find Conrad Burns' suggestion that Bush and Republicans have a super-secret plan to end the war, at least I can understand why he'd say that. He knows Americans are sick of the war, so he's telling them that he'll end it and his plan will work better than the Democrats'.
Now, of course, it's dishonest - he has no plan and that's why the crowd laughed at him. He's probably one of those Representatives who doesn't know the difference between a Sunni and a Shiite. But it was at least a strategic lie. Karl Rove, The President and their minions telling people that the we'll eventually have victory if we "stay the course" isn't going to make anyone feel better about anything. To me, going against popular opinion in that way, in such a patronizing way, feels like political suicide.
Could it be that the President seems so unconcerned about this election, and the Republican strategy has been so lax, because they don't mind losing the House of Representatives to the Democrats? I know that seems counter-intuitive, because why would they want Democrats to have subpeona power? But they would then have a chance to try and blame all of the coming failures on the opposite team.
You know that's what will happen regardless if the Democrats take one or both houses of Congress. "When we were running things, everythign was still going fine. But now that we have to share power with these liberals, things are worse than ever!" If Republicans remain in charge, they'll continue to take all the blame for all the horrible things they have done.
Just a theory. (Not my theory...I've read several commentators suggesting this possibility over the last few days.) We'll see what happens in November.
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