Various wrong ways to handle a disagreement

Democrats against free speech? Naaaaa. Oh, wait.......they hate free speech. If you don't agree with me that is fine. Check out the video, and look at the fairness doctrine that the Dems have sponsored on Capitol Hill. What?

No recent posts

I wanted to apologize (mainly to myself) for a lack of recent posts. However, I have been writing......I have just been sending it into papers.

That is right! I have the right to free speech! Not to many staffers in politics have that right.

I have been sending my op-eds to the Kansas City Star. I am currently only at 2 written and 0 published. hmmmmmmmmmm. OK, one isn't actually submitted yet, and they have had the other for only one week.........not bad. Rejection is a major part of the op-ed excitement.

At some point in my lifetime I would love to be a member of an editorial board. That would be a great career or section of a career.

Anyway. I will get a couple of posts out this week. In the meantime........go to http://politicalbear.com and donate $10. I will send you a bear. Soon I will have a page up dedicated solely to the bears.

Political Bear Stop Motion!

haha. my first attempt at stop motion. I think it is pretty good if I do say so myself.

Political Bear Donation Gifts!

They are here! Pictures of the Bears will be on the website shortly. (hopefully tomorrow)

Short Response to Senator Obama's VFW Speech

new video!

Wall Street Journal Op-ed response: GOP Tax Dilemma

Friday's op-ed "GOP Tax Dilemma" (GTD) by Stephen Moore (great guy) is right on. In GTD Stephen Moore makes the point that the GOP's message of tax cuts does not poll well with voters.

Of course the message doesn't poll well with voters. Republicans have done nothing to reign in the fiscal purse strings. If they would have......then my guess is that the polling would be completely different*. Yes they cut taxes, yes the economy grew, but they also spent, let other programs grow, and created one of the biggest entitlement programs of all time.

Moore finishes his article with a great point. He uses part of a quote from Sen. Kyl who "says that if Republicans are going to win in 2008 they have to persuade voters that Democratic tax hikes 'will make things worse' for the economy and their own personal finances. Fortunately, this message has added attraction that it's not just pollster-driven spin. It's the truth."

*While I like Rove as a tactician, I think he ruined the tax message as well. He turned the base socially conservative. The base, I could be wrong on this, has historically been fiscal conservatives and the social part was only a faction of that base (a big faction-but only a faction). What Rove saw is that social conservatives vote. They vote in large percentages. Oh well. When that fails...which it will. We will get back our fiscal party again.

Guiliani will vote for McCain, who would everyone else vote?

I posted this video a few days ago. It is my bid. to get into the Republican Presidential debates. I is low quality and a softball of a question, but I don't know what they will answer...do you?

The Art of Conversation Part 4

How do you counter an effective messaging campaign?

1. Attack. Attack. Attack.
2. Win the argument, and then win the vote.
3. Let them know you care, and then win them over.

Now let's use the same pieces as described in The Art of Conversation Part 3 to organize this a little better.

Attack, attack, attack should be the baseline. This might be what Oprah would describe as the secret. I am a little more primal than that. Attack, attack, attack, is an easy way to get what you want in life. The first person to rest, loses. Therefore, this idea is going to be the baseline of both how we beat a messaging campaign and how we perform one. (amazing how simple it is)

For the day to day arguments, I like to let people know that I care and then win them over. The day to day arguments are less important, but the audience (voters, friends, passers by) could care less about the argument if they don't think that you really care.

Finally, win the argument. Do what it takes to take down the top argument. This is the one that will hurt the most to lose. Beat it into the ground. Take no prisoners. Most importantly, don't think about anything else at this point. Just win.

After the win, then win the vote, or the support of the audience, crowd, or listeners.

Examples:

Baseline: no real examples here, but wake up early and go to bed late. Spend every waking moment figuring out how to win.

Day-to-day: SCHIP is the most current debate, so we can use the debate over SCHIP. Democrats are saying the Republicans don't support poor kids (sounds simple, but read a couple of articles-that might be a direct quote). Of course this is false, so now we to prove it. The plan: show them we care and then win. Statements need to be made about the original bill (republican), why these kids need coverage, how important it is that kids have access to health care, what a tragedy it is that our health care system is so expensive (this is also a preparation for an attack), and just look how sad they are.

After you have laid out why you care about the issue, then you have to win the argument. I like a two-fold approach to win an argument. First, why is their idea wrong? In this case, the SCHIP expansion taxes the poor for middle class benefits, bypasses the poor with an expansion, and actually decreases access (if it succeeds the way they say it will). Second, why is our idea right? We need to serve the kids the bill was originally intended for and government is an inefficient provider. There are more.

Top level argument: Beat'em up on this one. A loss here is bad. I don't think either side has done a good job on top level messages regarding the SCHIP debate. The loser is going to have a harder time with the Universal Care debate that we are moving towards, but other than that this is really just a day-to-day battle. If I were in charge of the Republicans I would be putting a lot more on this SCHIP debate though. If they win this battle the Universal Care debate is a lot easier. If I was a Democrat I would be trotting kids in front of TVs and talking about how bad the health care system is (oh wait they are doing that).

More like this will be on my website under my home page Political Bear

The Art of Conversation Part 3

This could actually be around part 37, but sometimes lessons need to be learned.

Messaging.

Messaging is done through .....drum roll please.....messages. Effective messaging is done through catchy messages (I think of jingles- almost everybody knows the ingredients of a big mac). I call messages talking points, a lot of others do to, but for the sake of definition that needs to be clear.

I believe that an effective messaging campaign has several layers.....more like the atmosphere than like an onion. Fast cold moving top layers, thick stickier bottom layers, and dirt to let everyone know where the sky starts.

First, you have a base line message, the dirt, this is who you are.....no one is really a republican or democrat they just have more baseline beliefs that fit in one party of the other. This is a book unto itself.

Second, the day-to-day rhetoric, or sticky bottom layer, is the trench warfare of messaging. These messages are the ones that we read about in the Wall Street Journal every day, or hear about in the news every day.

Third, the top level rhetoric, of fast cold moving top layer, these are the long term sound bites used by the parties.

Current examples of top level rhetoric:

Get the troops out of Iraq, this is perfect because, duh, at some point they will come home and when they do the Democrats will claim responsibility

The cost of the war is ruining our budget: Another great long term talking point. This will be used when the economy falls apart because of the burdensome taxes and regulations that are being suggested and passed every day. In reality we are not anywhere near historic levels of defense spending and we are below projections. (WSJ Oct. 4, 2007)

I have several ways to combat this strategy, and I will get to them as this blog develops.

You can also see more like this by visiting my blog at Political Bear

Unions! The newest member of the ownership society.

One of the last groups that I would have believed would join in the party that is the ownership society, has now jumped in head first. The Unions are now in charge of there own health care.

It is an event that hasn't passed unnoticed, but the impact of the decision might be huge. UAW is taking on responsibility for its own retiree health care. (deep breath, deep breath) (give me a second) Wow. That is just great.

As a Wall Street Journal op-ed put it, "The UAW meets the ownership society." The article goes on to mention that the more "skin" people have in health care the more they pay attention to their own health and the costs.

Now that UAW has more at risk than just upsetting an impersonal large buisness, they might act differently about how health care funding is allocated. They might actually care. Before now there job was just to get as much money as they possibly could. They didn't care beyond that.

The more "skin" anyone has in any game the smarter their decisions become.

For more about ownership and health care check out Dr. Goodman's, the President of the National Center for Policy Analysis, blog here, NCPA


For more straight talk on hard issues visit my website: Political Bear

What is SCHIP and what is happening with it?

SCHIP= State Children's Health Insurance Program

Provides block grants to states to supply health insurance for kids, originally kids in poor families.

SCHIP was originally bi-partisan, and for that matter still has bi-partisan support. Yes even the republicans support the original intent of the law. However, since the legislation was signed into law, states have applied for and received waivers that allow them to cover "kids" at higher income levels. Even this would be alright, but it is still not the whole story.

These waivers allowed states to get the low hanging fruit, and since SCHIP is a block grant, the states are covering these "kids" at 50% of the real dollar expense. In other words, the truly hard kids to find and cover will now just never be covered. Instead, states have opted to not do the dirty work of finding the hard to cover kids that SCHIP was originally intended to cover.

The current debate on Capitol Hill is about raising the income limits even higher, and paying for the expansion by increasing taxes, more specifically tabacco taxes. There are multiple problems with this plan. First, the higher the income level is raised the more people are pushed out of the private sector and into public assistance. Second, tabacco taxes are one of the most regressive of taxes, meaning that lower income people pay a higher portion of the tax. Third and most importantly, it will do nothing to assure that the low income children that the bill was originally intended to cover will actually receive coverage.

This is the truth. Not what you will hear it anyplace else.
For more visit my website Political Bear

WWDD? What would the Democrats do?

Problem: High ticket prices for a children's concert.

Answer: I don't know, the artist can charge more money....she can do more shows....she can play in larger venues......she can leave people out....you pick.

Bad Answer: The Government steps in. (the article doesn't answer this way, but it feels like it does.)
`Hannah Montana' concert tix too hot10/01/2007 11:36 AM, AP

Forget The Police, Justin Timberlake or Bruce Springsteen. The undisputed hottest concert ticket of the year is for 14-year-old pop star Miley Cyrus, star of the Disney Channel's "Hannah Montana" TV show.........

......Fans are so desperate for seats to her 54-date tour, kicking off later this month, that venues have sold out in as little as four minutes and scalpers are getting four to five times the face value — creating a torrent of complaints from frustrated parents. .......

........"I feel like they are ripping off children," Nace said. "I'm sure there are parents out there would pay that much. But the rest of us shouldn't be penalized for that."

My real question.....why can't the venue charge more?

The rest of the article can be found here-Miley Cyrus

For more straightforward thinking visit Political Bear

Headlines, the GOP, and the Future

Bad news first: The Republicans are going to lose the next elections.

Good news: This is the best thing that could happen to the Republican party.

The new GOP has lost the vision. They have stopped the revolution, burnt the Contact with America, and even gone yellow. The only story on Capitol Hill is that they can't vote the way they should because of special interests.

To quote a teenager, "OMG!" (Oh my God)

To quote a Senator "A United States Senator has significant tools with which to wield power and influence.......Feigning helplessness is not one of those tools" (Sen. Pat Roberts)

In 1994 the Republicans that led the revolution were equipped with vision, vigor, and a strong belief of the need for reform. The leaders from those days have given up. They have cashed in their chips, and stopped even trying to message for the comeback. They are now happy to sit on their soapbox and talk about the good times. The Staff has gone, and the staffers that took their place do not understand how revolutionary everything was (I wasn't a part of it either). The rank and file member is so busy just trying to keep their job that they forgot they have one to do.

A loss in the next election, a big loss, I mean huge, will make the party remember. Hopefully, after a bad loss, like a cold shower, the party will wake up. For those of you Democrats who say, "I don't want the Republicans to wake up." It is not this party that will wake up. It is the party that wants change. That wants to put an end to government waste, corruption, and inefficiency. A party that cares more about how much the government spends on a door than what you do behind yours. A party that has the will to do what is right, not because it will get them elected, but because it is right. Not the party that is currently losing a generation of voters like me, the sons and daughters of hippies and Vietnam vets.

I hate saying that we need to lose. I hate losing, but in the next election vote libertarian. Send a message that we want the fiscal sense back that once existed, we want the fight back that once existed, we want the leadership back that once existed, we want the vision back that once existed, and send the message that we want the party back that once existed.