Bookworm Room Designs the GOP’s 2012 Campaign
Charles Martel on Jul 13 2011 at 3:26 pm | Filed under: Barack Obama, Elections, Presidential elections
We’ve skirted this topic before in Bookworm Room, but never really plunged into it: If you could plan the GOP’s 2012 campaign against Obama, what themes and visuals would you bring into it? This assumes you have a big war chest and carte blanche regarding the many embarrassing and critical things you can bring up about The One. The only restriction is that you cannot attack the man’s person or family, only his actions and policies. (Well, OK, Michelle’s hi-calorie scarf fests are fair game.)
- What would be a great slogan (or series of slogans) that quickly defines the approach the GOP should take to unseating Obama?
- What groups or voting blocs should the GOP especially aim at, and what would be the specific message(s) directed at them?
- What are some photos or videos that you would fold into the campaign?
- How much humor would you inject, and what would be some examples of that humor?
- What would be your preferred media? TV? Newspapers? Radio? Social networks? (Speaking of social networking, how would you use Twitter and Facebook to dismantle the Cult of Obama?)
- A related question: How would you handle the expected refusal of the mainstream media to accommodate some—or even many—of your ads? How would you get around them?
It may be, given the range of good minds here, that we could come up with some ideas worth passing on to the GOP. And just to hedge our bets, given the GOP’s almost reflexive cowardice, we could also pass them on to the Tea Party and conservative 527s.
Related posts:
- The Bookworm Turns — an e-book with collected posts from the Bookworm Room
- Helping Renee Ellmers
- No one at Bookworm Room is surprised that Obama doubled-down on health care
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13 Responses to “Bookworm Room Designs the GOP’s 2012 Campaign”
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Good topic. Maybe I can start with a generic comment. America is a country of moderates. Mostly moderate conservatives, as jj’s poll results (funny how we cite to polls when we like them and talk about how faulty they are when we don’t) demonstrate. But still moderates. The candidate that always wins is the one that manages the delicate balancing act of appealing to the most moderates without at the same time alienating his/her more extreme liberal or conservative base. jj is right that the conservative base is already unusually activated and more demanding than usual. Still, it would be a gross error, resulting in certain defeat, to appeal to the base to the exclusion of the moderate majority of American voters. The active demands of the conservative base make walking the tightrope more difficult, but it still must be walked.
I’ll start with one slogan that will win over the Jewish vote: “Enough, Already!”
A Leader, For a Change (it worked for Jimmah in 1976).
We can appeal to the ‘green movement’ – we’re recycling slogans.
I would focus on Obama’s vague pledges for change – maybe a few clips of him promising “change” – followed by a list of all of the negative changes that have occurred since he took office: stimulus $$s spent, increase in unemployment, increase in debt, increase in gas prices, increases in food prices, increase in government intrusion into business (auto & wall street bailouts), etc.
In another “change” ad I would focus on how Obama is changing the role of the executive branch via unaccountable czars, war in Libya w/out Congress’ approval, EPA overreach in regulating carbon emissions, Holder declaring he will not defend DOMA, Salazar illegally stifling offshore drilling (even after court order), ATF gunrunner scandal, Sebelius strong-arming health insurance companies & granting 1300+ waivers, NLRB action against Boeing, etc.
You want a slogan? As I said – indirectly, granted – do we need slogans? All we have to do is point out all the “in-place” anti-Obama slogans – gas price signs at gas stations; foreclosure signs on neighborhood homes; every month’s unemployment numbers; every month’s economic numbers; the price of food – these are all anti-Obama slogans and they’re all free. No imagination required. All Republicans have to do is point to the news, and say: “it doesn’t have to be this way.” You shouldn’t really need a whole hell of a lot more than that, should you? Maybe that’s your slogan: “It doesn’t have to be this way.” I don’t see why much more is necessary.
..to hedge our bets, given the GOP’s almost reflexive cowardice, we could also pass them on to the Tea Party and conservative 527s.
Isn’t this where the rubber meet the road. How many of us held our noses and voted for McCain. If Romney is on the ticket, will we carry clothespins again. What about Bachmann? Cain? Is there a viable ‘other’? Is it Rick Perry or Marco Rubio or some combination of others. I am not sure. What I am sure of is that 2012 is a two-part election for conservatives. The focus on viable senatorial candidates is a must do-must win to mitigate the possible reelection of Obama. We can survive a loss in the executive branch – we cannot survive one in the Senate. Two-thirds of a loaf is better than crumbs. If there is a slogan, we need one that bridges the difference between the GOP and the Tea Party for starters.
As to advertising and a market – it would have to be Obama n’ company chuckling that the ‘shovel ready project’ wasn’t as shovel ready as they thought. I’d have billboards in every inner city and highway across the land. Obama would be standing in front of a clunker, that’s parked in front of home that’s been foreclosed holding a shovel – tagline below photo: How deep of a hole do ya want? Don’t know about other states, but here is Pa. we have electronic billboards – you can see them day and night, which takes care of getting around the msm.
The other point to hammer in an ad campaign would be all of the Obama pledges/promises that expire – Jim Garraghty at NRO has a running list of all of these – closing Guantanamo, being able to keep your same health insurance w/Obamacare, etc. It would be important to not paint Obama as a liar (which voters could see as a personal attack) but that he has a habit of abandoning pledges when politically convenient. The slogan would be along the lines of “do you still hope Obama will follow through with his promises?” to compliment the “Change” ads.
I like the idea of ridicule a la this gem: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2748155/replies?c=32
“It doesn’t have to be this way.” jj, I think you’re on to something. Once this thread runs its course, I’m going to do a summary of the best slogans and suggestions and send them on to the RNC.
SADIE, maybe the billboards of “Shovel Ready” should have federal officials standing next to manure piles.
Again, a generic comment. If all we put forward is a negative message, I doubt it will work. “It doesn’t have to be this way” is a nice slogan, but it is no more substantive than “Hope and change.” (Okay, maybe I contradict myself, since “Hope and change” worked, but I don’t think such a contentless campaign will take down Obama with his billion dollar war chest, media support and inherent advantages of the sitting President.) Bush does at least share some of the blame for the shape we are in — in the public’s mind and in fact. What are the Republicans, and the Republican candidate, going to do different than the last two administrations that will make things better than they are?
Obama got the job because no questions were asked of him. Round II should be nothing but questions.
Need a job? Step 1 – Fire the President Money Tight? Ask Obama to donate his ’2012 war chest’
Gas TOO Expensive?
Lower the price with the GOP. We drill locally.
I think if there has ever been an election that could be – maybe even should be – run with negative underpinnings, this one will be it. Everybody would love something to vote for, but this campaign is going to be all about what people do not want to continue. Maybe in that sense it’ll be anomalous, but then this nothing-from-nowhere being in the White House in the first place is anomalous. He is an experiment, and it has failed. People will be voting against the experiment. Right now the generic polls have him losing to any Republican, and the margin isn’t particularly close. I agree with Sadie, this will be about him, and why anyone would want more of him. George Bush’s contribution is is now history, nobody buys that what has happened these last three years is his fault. Obama keeps trying to blame him, of course, and I imagine will continue to do so, but I don’t think even democrats buy it. And the things that people have to live and contend with, gas prices, food prices, etc., etc. are squarely Obama’s deal – not Bush’s.
I think you can very successfully enumerate these issues and point out that this isn’t the way it has to be – or should be – and there will be success there, I suspect. If that’s “negative campaigning” well, maybe it’s time. And more positively, it should not be forgotten nor go unmentioned that Bush spent 2008 trying to get some responsibility into Fannie and Freddie, the main engines of the problem.
Market segmentation. Virtually every American has interests (in both meanings of the word) that are threatened by Obamaism. The key is a structured and targeted campaign to point these things out. For example:
**Low-income people with kids in urban areas: focus on the public-school disaster and the failure of Democrats to either seriously address the problem or to permit development of realistic alternatives
**Homecrafters..a very large group of people, most of them female: point out what a debacle the Democrat-driven “Consumer-Product Safety Improvement Act” has been for small, home-based businesses
**Automotive enthusiasts…talk about the mandate for increased ethanol % in gasoline, implemented against the recommendations of manufactuerers, and the damage this is likely to do to engines
Etc