Wednesday, November 5, 2008

Funny RedState.com post

http://www.redstate.com/diaries/dave_in_fla/2008/nov/05/can-we-now-dispense-with-some-myths/

Let me summarize:

1) Americans are dumb and therefore accept socialism: I would argue that as the world gets smaller thanks to advances in communication technology and more accessibility to travel what we're actually seeing is most of the industrialized countries returning to a type of social responsibility that small towns and villages have had for thousands of years. It's harder to ignore people's suffering when it's so accessible to you. It's hard not to empathize. Most importantly when the economy is bad it's hard not to believe you could be in that situation yourself someday. I think most people are willing to make a small sacrifice to help others.

2) Bi-partisanship is a waste of time: Erm yeah... just keep thinking that guys. The thing about bi-partisanship isn't that you're going to actually get any significant number of votes from the other party but you will get votes from the independents who find bi-partisanship extremely important. One of the reasons McCain lost this election was how obvious it was that, if he had won, nothing would have got done because of the ugly, offensive, and insulting way he treated President Elect Obama and the sizable population in this country who considers themselves democrats by extension. Obama's bi-partisanship wasn't even really based on policy. It was having a positive attitude and respectful way of addressing the issues.

3) Image matters: You guys did attend High School right? Of course it matters. I don't really think Sen. McCain is an angry, racist, disrespectful, absent minded, erratic Bush clone but it sure did look it at times. It's hard to win elections when you're running on a negative message all the time. It makes you look ghoulish.

4) You have to fight everyday: Factual disagreements aside I think the Republican party suffers from the "boy who cried wolf" syndrome. I think the Democrats have a problem with that too -- especially from 2000 to 2005. If you want to fight everyday you have to pick your fights wisely and make them matter. That means you can't say in 2004 that Bin Laden wants Kerry to win (suggesting Kerry is a terrorist sympathizer) then come out in 2008 an say Obama pals around with terrorists. Oh and, of course, in 2001 we had to hear Clinton & Gore let Bin Laden get away. You can't just keep running on the same tired and disgusting political tactics again and again and expect anyone to take you seriously. Especially not these days where YouTube and casual voter interest is a huge factor.

5) Social conservatism is a losing issue: I absolutely 100% agree. Keep it in the churches where it belongs. I understand things like abortion and gay marriage are very important issues to 25-30% of the voters in this country but you guys have to accept it's a personal choice. Your tools are the churches, not the government. You can't legislate this stuff. All you can do is try to change people's minds at the most grass root level. This country is too diverse to keep pushing extreme born again Christian religious law on people. It's perfectly fine if people choose to live their own life that way but it's not the job of the government to make laws for you.

6) Wah wah mainstream media is so liberal: You've got a huge advantage on talk radio. You have access to the same Internet we do. You've got Fox News. We all have NPR, PBS, BBC who are extremely objective. Just about every news stand carries a wide variety of papers from both political ideologies. Blaming the media is just a joke at this point. Look at 2004... the media hated Bush and he still won. People might be influenced by the media but they know how to spot bias reporting.

7) Fighting fair is for losers: Yep. We learned it from watching you.

8) 2nd amendment: I pretty much agree on this too but it goes back to the "boy who cried wolf" thing. Republicans have been saying for years the Democrats want to take away all your guns and it just hasn't happened and never will. We don't want to take away all your guns. We want to have some reasonable restrictions. Criminals shouldn't be able to buy guns. Background checks and waiting periods work. Some types of guns are just too dangerous if they fall into the wrong hands. So overall I don't think it's that people don't understand the issue or care about the issue but rather another example of how the Republican party has just lost their credibility on the issue.



As for his solutions... the only one I care to comment on is "winning their hearts and minds" Well, here's an idea... stop insulting us. Stop telling me I'm a bad person because I am not an extreme radical christian. Stop telling me I hate the troops because I don't support the war. Stop telling me there's a "real America" that I am apparently not a part of. Stop suggesting anyone going through some hard times who needs help is a welfare leech. Stop telling me if I want to protect the environment I'm a "crazy moonbat" (whatever that means) If you ever want to get back to having some mass political appeal you guys have to really cool it on the hate. I don't know what it is making you guys so angry but you just can't insult people and expect them to vote for you. Pandering to your own extremist base is a bad thing.

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