That’s the Democrats’ Strategy For 2010?
Salena Zito’s Sunday column contains some quotes from Democratic strategists that simply boggle the mind. Here’s one of the quotes:
Says a Democratic insider who was intimately part of the 2006 and 2008 national gains for his party: “I think the overarching message needs to be populist in nature and reaffirm to voters experiencing the greatest economic anxiety (that) ‘We hear you, and we aren’t going to let corporate America”, such as big banks or credit-card companies, “exploit consumers after we just bailed them out.’”
WE HEAR YOU??? That’s gonna be their message after ignoring the American people during the health care debate? That’s gonna be their message after passing the stimulus bill without reading it and over the objections of the American people? That’s insulting the American people, which will only dig a deeper hole for Democrats.
“To paraphrase Mark Twain, reports of the 2010 death of the Democratic Party are greatly exaggerated,” says Phil Singer, a Democratic political consultant and former spokesman for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee in the 2006 midterm coup.
Phil Singer can quote Twain if he likes but I’d argue that Bachmann-Turner Overdrive offers the more appropriate quote: You ain’t seen nothing yet. If Democrats think that they’re encountering resistance to their governance, they ain’t seen nothing yet.
In November and December, Democrats kept House and Senate members away from their constituents so they could threaten, bribe and intimidate them into voting for their health care legislation. They got accomplished what they wanted to accomplish. This fall, the 60+ percent of the American people that the Democrats ignored will have their say. It won’t be pretty. That’s what Byron Dorgan saw happening before deciding he’d retire.
I’d also quote Richard Trumka’s statement from this morning:
In a speech before the National Press Club (and comments beforehand), AFL-CIO president Richard Trumka insisted that Democrats are “inviting a repeat” of the 1994 midterm elections by instituting a tax on high-end insurance plans as part of their final health care compromise, among other things.
“It could well be” a recipe for disaster in 2010, Trumka told a group of reporters. “I just came back from southern California. I was in five or six places out there…it is amazing the number of people that come up to you unsolicited and say, ‘I’m really worried about this health care bill.’”
Asked if he thought union and non-union workers will stay at home if health care reform (as outlined by the Senate) is passed into law, Trumka replied: “That could very well happen. A bad bill could have that effect…an [election] where people sit home. It could suppress votes…Look at what happened in ‘94.”
Big Labor doesn’t have to sit at home to destroy the Democrats. They simply have to be less than enthusiastic in their financial support for Democrats that vote for taxing the unions’ Cadillac health care plans. That would hurt Democrats already running into a stiff wind.
Whichever way you slice it, the Democrats are in trouble this cycle. Having competent strategists wouldn’t have helped save them from tough election but having incompetent strategists might lose them a couple extra seats.
Technorati Tags: Unions, Richard Trumka, Health Care, Cadillac Plans, Tax Increases, Democrats, Election 2010
Cross-posted at LetFreedomRingBlog
January 12th, 2010 at 9:23 am
You’d think that the over-sized sound-catchers attached to the likes of the titular head of the jackass party would be able to hear the screams of anguish and anger from “his adoring public,” but NOOOO, that would never do for an Ivy League intellectual-wannabee. After all, if an arrogant, narcissistic elitist like him doesn’t know what’s best for the great unwashed, who could?
January 14th, 2010 at 3:33 pm
I think we can see in Massachusetts what the tactics will be this fall;
when you cant defend anything, throw mud, if that doesnt work, throw more mud, if all else fails, throw a lot more mud.
The worrisome thing is, it will probably work with that 30 to 40 percent that never seem to get it.