Republican House Majority Whip Steve Scalise
Republicans, who won big in last November’s elections, have already trotted out extreme positions, statements and behavior for the new year. If this trend of GOP extremism continues, it could be one of the biggest issues of 2015.
President Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama bring toys to support U.S. Marine Corps Toys For Tots
Take note of December 2014 as the high-water mark for President Barack Obama, the Democrats in Congress, and the United States itself. Starting in January 2015, when Republicans take over the U.S. Senate, life in America could get much worse.
CRomnibus opponent Sen. Elizabeth Warren
Conservatives and Liberals finally agree on one thing: they hate the $1.1 trillion continuing resolution of the omnibus federal spending bill (nicknamed “CRomnibus”) designed to fund the U.S. federal government through September 2015. However, conservatives and liberals oppose the bill for different reasons. Strolling through the Twitter hashtag #CRominbus, as well as reading and hearing statements from various quarters, is quite revealing.
Rally for Immigration Reform, Ann Arbor, Michigan, 2010
Americans might be calling President Barack Obama the Comeback Kid. After historic mid-term election losses for his Democratic Party just over two weeks ago, President Obama, with a 15-minute announcement last night, has now maneuvered himself into the position of (a) going on offense by taking action on immigration reform; (b) igniting the hopes and the hearts of millions of Latino Americans, who comprise one of the fasting growing voting blocs in the U.S.; and (c) making the Republicans look both lazy and mean at the same time.
U.S. Supreme Court
Last Wednesday’s U.S. Supreme Court ruling in McCutcheon v. Federal Election Commission left many Democrats and progressives dejected. The ruling from the Republican-dominated Supreme Court essentially removed any limits on aggregate political contributions by individuals, meaning that Republican billionaires like the Koch Brothers and Sheldon Adelson now can buy even more members of Congress and more elections by pumping more money into false TV attack ads against Democrats. So it’s the end of the world for Democrats, right? We say “wrong!” While Democrats of course should work to reverse McCutcheon and its predecessor Citizens United, here’s how Democrats can win elections in the meantime despite the Republicans’ dark money advantages:
President George W. Bush announced his Medicare Part D prescription drug plan in his May 6, 2006 weekly radio address. In implementing Medicare Part D, the Republican Congress was all for extending deadlines for health insurance programs until President Barack Obama extended the March 31, 2014 Affordable Care Act signup deadline. But what was perhaps more striking about Bush’s announcement was its almost childlike simplicity of the language and delivery:
The average premium that seniors pay is a third less than had been expected, just $25 per month instead of $37 per month.
Thanks to this new coverage, America’s seniors are now getting the modern medicine they need at prices they can afford.
During George W. Bush’s presidency, Democrats made plenty of fun of Bush’s “Bartles and Jaymes” simplicity of speech. Before that, Democrats mocked the simplicity of presidential candidate and then President Ronald Reagan. But such simplicity often works. Indeed, Reagan became known as “The Great Communicator.” For these reasons, we now list Messaging Maxim #6: Keep it Stupidly Simple.
Judy Oerly gathers food she will be taking home from the Central Pantry in Columbia, Mo., on 10/4/13.
Perhaps it’s not a surprise that Fox “News” attacks the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (“SNAP”), which Fox and the Republicans refer to by its old-fashioned and perhaps derisive name “food stamps.” Perhaps it’s also not a surprise that Fox “News” attacks almost all things in the great Blue State California, from “liberal Hollywood” to progressive policies such as green energy (which, by the way, is responsible for many good California jobs.) But what might be surprising is that Fox found a way to attack both SNAP and California at the same time, via its “Food Stamp Surfer” story.
This past Tuesday, Michelangelo Signorile, liberal activist and host of the “Michelangelo Signorile Show” on the Sirius XM Progress channel, obliterated a hateful conservative caller from Texas. Mike did such a masterful job that we asked him to make the audio of the call available, and he graciously obliged (see above). Here’s how the call went, with our breakdown of the juicy parts:
Pig at the barrel, Via Flora, West Palm Beach, FL
Here in a little corner of Southeast Florida, it’s Republican Land. You’ve got your gun-clinging rednecks, your Bible thumpers, and your One Percenters. The last group is something to behold. Their car of choice this year is the $200,000 Bentley convertible. Their home of choice is the Spanish style mansion behind the gates guarded by security personnel in starched uniforms. And their expression of choice is “I hate Obama.”
How do you plant a political message and watch it grow into an expression on the tip of everyone’s tongue? If you’re the Republican Party, you take a term like “class warfare”, get your leaders and like-minded pundits to say it over and over, and, within a couple of days, it’s stuck in voters’ brains like a successful television commercial jingle.
It doesn’t even matter that you’re fighting a real plan with a mere label. Your phrase becomes the basis for the debate. Then, President Obama has to come back first by denying that he’s guilty of the label being applied to him, and then embracing the label as a badge of honor.
Either way, it’s much better when your side controls the frame and the labels that get applied to you and your opponents.
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