A More Perfect Union

Photo of George Orwell from his 1933 press card

Sasha Issenberg has written a three-part article that appears in MIT Technology Review.  The title of the article is also the title of this post, but here’s the subtitle:

How President Obama’s Campaign Used Big Data to Rally Individual Voters

If you look at the title of the directory in which the Web content for the third article is contained (hotlink above), you see this title:

obamas-data-techniques-will-rule-future-elections/

Mr. Issenberg’s story is about how the Democratic Party uses data mining techniques to predict the voting behavior of Americans.  This is the money quote:

The campaign didn’t just know who you were; it knew exactly how it could turn you into the type of person it wanted you to be.

The article (h/t Instapundit) describes the Democratic Party’s EIPs (experiment-informed programs) that “measure how effective different types of political messages were at moving public opinion.”  One technique was to sequence direct mail to individual voters and then follow-up with survey calls to isolate the particular piece of direct mail that changed voter opinion the most.

The article describes EIP testing done in July of 2012 that focused on equal-pay and health issues for women.  The idea was to pull women to Obama based on a specific message.

It all sounds very academic and innocuous.  That is, until you see one of the ads involved.

In EVERY case, the advertisements depict Mitt Romney as a bad person.  (See my Rope-a-Dope post for a partial listing.)  These are the ads that characterize Mr. Romney as a liar, a person who wants to hurt the middle class, someone who wants you to lose your job, and a rich person out of touch with reality.

The ads were tested with the EIP methodology, and they achieved the necessary outcome.

The MIT article makes no mention of the ramifications of the political techniques being employed.  It simply features the article as a technological extension of focus-group techniques.

If you are a Republican, you might want to focus on the ramifications.  The Democratic Party is using information about voters to manipulate voting preferences.  The Party is honing its negative advertising to create a sense of fear about a certain class of people so that Americans will keep them out of government stewardship.

To think this is not worth noting is a mistake.  Republicans should be concerned that they are being politically “played.”  A couple of instances from current events come to mind…

Republicans are concerned about the “fiscal cliff” and its consequences on the American people, but the Democratic Party has no such concerns.  It simply wants to ensure Republicans come out of the encounter labeled as “uncompromising zealots.”

Republicans are concerned about school safety and practical measures to thwart school shootings, but the Democratic Party simply wants to ensure Americans see Republicans as “violent extremists.”

Watch it unfold on Twitter.

The clear and present danger is that if Republicans continue to focus on policy issues and not political issues, there will be no Republican Party to focus on any issue.

UPDATE 12/20/2012:

Was Mitt Romney the first Republican to be Electro-Borked?

The death of Robert Bork reminds us of character assassination by Senate hearing.  The Democratic Party has now "progressed" to the arena of consumer electronics.  Who will be the next Republican to be Electro-Borked?

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Cultural Staging

The graphic above is a cultural view of candidates from America’s two main political parties.

From left to right, the pictures are from an Obama speech in Hatfield, Pennsylvania on 11/30/2012 (photo by Jason Reed of Reuters), a Huffington Post article from 11/20/2012, and an Obama speech in Redford, Michigan on 12/10/2012 (photo by Romain Blanquart of the Detroit Free Press).

Two of the pictures feature adoring Americans.

The picture on the left shows Americans hugging president Obama after he spoke about raising taxes on the rich.  The picture on the right shows Americans cheering president Obama after he spoke about right-to-work laws being unfair.

The middle picture is described by The Huffington Post as “A Humbled Mitt Romney Caught Pumping Gas.”

Our culture seems to present pictures of Republicans and Democrats in a slightly different context.

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The Death of the White Male Republican Presidential Candidate

President Obama and Mitt Romney in the Oval Office after their 11/29/2012 lunch (Photo by Pete Souza).

Here is a thought experiment:

Would the Holocaust have endured for a longer period if Germany’s National Socialist Party had restricted its victims to just white males?  When women and children became a part of the extermination, the world’s sensibilities changed.  Is it possible that death camps for white males would not have been that big of a deal on the world stage?

OK, that first paragraph is an “attention step.”  I want to jar readers into some unconventional thinking.

Stick with me on this.

Republicans are exhibiting a monumental sense of sadness these days, and it is easy to say, “You lost.  Get over it!”  But the sadness is not associated with a one-time election loss.  It is bigger than that.  America has just experienced the end of all future white male Republican presidential candidates.

They will be no more.

Oh to be sure, there will be some political egotist who will make a run for office, but it will fail.  White male Republican candidates for POTUS are the walking dead.  The Democratic Party will ensure that result. 

In an odd twist of fate, Mitt Romney’s candidacy will be Barack Obama’s legacy.  President Obama’s primary achievement in his first term will be the elevation of the art of political character assassination to its pinnacle.  The Democratic Party is forever emboldened.

While that is good for the Democratic Party, it is not so good for the millions of Americans who are classified in that demographic of “White Male Republicans.”  These people have seen the opportunity of serving their country at the highest level foreclosed.

Imagine telling your offspring, “If you wish to be President of the United States, you won’t be able to do that.  You are a white male Republican.”

It almost seems un-American.

Maureen Dowd is particularly good at highlighting the extent of this transformation.  In her column from November 10, 2012, she tells us that white male Republicans are in a “delusional death spiral” and she provides the following quotes about Mitt Romney: 

Romney was an unpalatable candidate.

Romney and Tea Party loonies dismissed half the country as chattel and moochers who did not belong in their “traditional” America.

Romney was still running in an illusory country where husbands told wives how to vote, and the wives who worked had better get home in time to cook dinner.

 

These remarks indicate a certain level of partisanship, and are to be expected from Ms. Dowd.  But why is she so “in your face?”  Where does Ms. Dowd get the “green light” to let it all hang out?

Maureen Dowd watched the 2012 elections and now believes the Democratic Party will stop any white male Republican from ever attaining the Presidency.  She has the triumphalism of a political insider’s understanding of the placement of the trump cards.

Maybe you see where I’m going here, but look at a more recent article from Ms. Dowd.  This one is from November 27, 2012 and is about Senator Susan Collins taking exception to the conduct of U. N. Ambassador Susan Rice.  Here are some quotes from that column: 

Collins drew up a list of questions to ask Rice at their one-on-one hourlong meeting slated for Wednesday. She wants Rice to explain how she could promote a story “with such certitude” about a spontaneous demonstration over the anti-Muslim video that was so at odds with the classified information to which the ambassador had access.

Collins said that before she would support Rice for secretary of state, she needs to ascertain what was really going on. “Did they think admitting that it was an Al Qaeda attack would destroy the narrative of Libya being a big success story?” Collins asked.

Collins is curious why Rice is not angrier, if, as she insists, she was repeating what she was told. “I’d be furious at the White House and F.B.I. and intelligence community for destroying my credibility,” the senator said.

 

Do you see the style difference?  The comments about Mitt Romney are simple declarative sentences.  The comments about Susan Rice are reportorial in nature.

Why the difference in style?  Here’s a clue: Mitt Romney is a white male Republican.  Susan Rice is a black female Democrat.

When running a story about Ms. Rice, Maureen Dowd becomes a reporter.  When running a story about a white male Republican, Ms. Dowd is an opinion journalist.  (Not that there’s anything wrong with that.)

Maureen Dowd is one of many journalists at work for the Democratic Party.  She has a strong influence on our American culture, and we can expect her opinion of white male Republicans to remain steadfast.

This puts Republicans at a cultural disadvantage, but there is a glimmer of hope.  While any attempt to run a white male candidate will fail, we have other Republicans who can step up.

Condi and Marco, are you taking note?  Now is your time.

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Well, EXCUSE Me!

 

This is not a post about Steve Martin (pictured above).  It is about a political strategy for Republicans to follow in the coming years.

Where to begin?

Republicans lost the presidential election of 2012 because the Democratic Party had a stronger message.  That message was simply a continuous reinforcing of the Democratic Party’s main theme: Republicans are Bad People.

That is impactful.  The Democratic Party helped Americans understand that Republicans have sinister intent and it resonated.

What was the Republican response?  Something like, “We are not actually bad people…”

That’s weak, and reminds one of the Christine O’Donnell campaign.  Republicans have to stop this behavior.

How to do it?  Employ “Themes of the Republican Party” in the same fashion as the Democratic Party employs its themes.

Keep in mind that the Democratic Party has six separate themes.  Republicans need only these three:

--The Democratic Party has become a Political-Religious Movement.

--The Democratic Party promotes Authoritarianism.

--The Democratic Party’s prime directive is Power and Authority.

Here are examples of how the themes can be employed:

Last month, United Nations Ambassador Susan Rice came under attack for promoting a false narrative in the furtherance of the Benghazi cover up.  While the Republican Party played up the idea that Ms. Rice was being used as a tool by the Democratic Party, the stronger point is that she is promoting Authoritarianism.

When Ms. Rice is eventually required to provide testimony under oath, she should answer questions on who directed her to deliver the anti-Islamic film narrative, which of the Benghazi classified briefings she received, and who directed her to change her narrative to acknowledge the terrorist attack.  In analyzing the timeline and the players involved, we will see a clear instance of Authoritarianism in operation:  A particular narrative is promoted as being unimpeachable, and then “evolves” to conform to political expediency.  The people involved were never wrong and never at fault.  Authoritarianism!

Americans should understand that Authoritarianism does not serve their interests well.

Another example is the recent voting patterns of people in Philadelphia and Chicago.  In Philadelphia, 59 voting divisions had no votes for Mitt Romney.  The same is true for 37 voting precincts in Chicago.  While Republicans suggest that voter fraud might be a factor, the stronger point is that this is evidence of a Political-Religious Movement.

Here in Colorado, Douglas County leans strongly toward the Republican Party.  Even so, in the 2012 election, no Republican received more than 75% of the vote.  When we see Americans voting 100% for a particular candidate, we should be suspicious.  (If you asked 100 people to mark a particular block on a piece of paper, a few of them would mistakenly mark the wrong block, simply because human beings are not perfect.  When you see “perfect” results from an imperfect group of participants, you’ve got to wonder what’s going on.)

What’s going on is that the Democratic Party has taken on the characteristics of a Political-Religious Movement in certain parts of the country, where people never dream of acting in a way counter to the interests of the Party.  This kind of “group-think” mentality tends to erode basic freedoms, and typically doesn’t work out well for those being governed.

A third example is the recent proclamation of racism by Representative James Clyburn (D-SC).  Congressman Clyburn finds Republicans are racists and driven to use “racial code words.”  Interestingly, he finds that no Democrats are racists, and that the role of the Democratic Party in the U.S. Civil War, the segregationist activities of the South, and the sponsorship of the Ku Klux Klan is not of concern.

Republicans should use this event to showcase the power and authority of the Democratic Party.  Congressman Clyburn is using race as a political weapon.  He knows that many Americans will be drawn to the Democratic Party to avoid being characterized as racists.

Do Americans understand that hatred for one another does not serve their interests well?  What did the “Hatfields & McCoys” teach us?

Here’s a final example that comes from The Denver Post this past weekend.  In an article reprinted from the 11/18/2012 edition of the Los Angeles Times, Paul VanDevelder delivers a rather snarky piece titled, “One nation, (maybe-not-so) indivisible.”  It is meant to mock those people involved in gathering signatures for secession petitions in Colorado, Texas, Georgia, and across the country.

With authoritarian panache, Mr. VanDevelder characterizes the people in “red states” as being incapable of appreciating America’s national monuments and parks.  Rather, we idolize the Osmonds and love Larry the Cable Guy.

He ends his article with a reference to the Civil War, saying “A lot of historians have argued that we would have been a whole lot better off going our separate ways in 1861.”

And then he delivers the money quote: “Sure, Abe Lincoln was a Republican then, but today he’d be as blue as the ocean.”

Mr. VanDevelder lets us know that Abe Lincoln was not a racist, and that today Mr. Lincoln would have nothing to do with those racist Republicans.

Mr. VanDevelder publishes these words as fact!  He knows without question that today’s Republicans are racists.

That’s a real problem for Republicans.  America is being transformed by the Democratic Party.  The Democratic Party legitimized slavery in the 1860s, legitimized the KKK in the 1950s, legitimized racial segregation in the 1960s, and is now legitimizing its conversion to a Political-Religious Movement in the 21^st century.

This should not be brushed aside.  It matters!

We should NOT spend time asking people like Rep. Clyburn, “Why are you attracted to organizations that consider me a racist?”  Instead, we should be pointing out the cultural transformation that is reshaping America.

And if (when) someone accuses you of being “mean spirited,” simply reply (with thanks to Steve Martin), “Well, EXCUSE me!”

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Creepy

The New York Times ran a story in its Health section on Monday. The title of the story was “Academic ‘Dream Team’ Helped Obama’s Effort.” It tells about psychologists and social scientists working to help re-elect president Obama.

A panel made up of a “consortium of behavioral scientists” provided the Obama campaign with ideas on how to mobilize voters. The Analyst Institute, “a Washington voter research group established in 2007 by union officials and their allies to help Democratic candidates” was consulted, along with Dr. Craig Fox from Los Angeles, Dr. Susan T. Fiske of Princeton, Samuel L. Popkin of U.C. San Diego, Robert Cialdini of A.S.U., Richard H. Thaler of the University of Chicago, and Michael Morris of Columbia.

Dr. Fox described the group as “a kind of dream team” that proposed ideas to help modify the voting behavior of Americans. The group signed nondisclosure agreements with the campaign, so could talk only in general terms about its work. The Obama campaign would neither confirm nor deny a relationship with the group.

Behavior modification of American voters! Is this getting close to political indoctrination?

Karl Rove, in his WSJ piece today, notes that “the Democratic campaign ground game was more effective in communicating negative information.” He also points out that “Mr. Romney’s character and record were undermined by early, relentless personal attacks.”

I had an earlier post on Mr. Romney’s “rope-a-dope” tactic which did nothing to repulse the negative characterization of him by his political opponents. What’s going on here?

The problem is that the Democratic Party is getting really good at character assassination. With its psychologists and behavioral scientists at work, it is comfortable advancing a “Mitt Romney kills cancer-stricken women” narrative as a campaign message. When the message receives criticism, it simply turns down the rhetoric a notch and presses on.

Is that a little creepy? If the Democratic Party can impugn the character of Mitt Romney, the rest of us are easy pickings. Mollie Hemingway thinks something is going on, but America (so far) enjoys a breezy detachment.

Maybe we should watch “Conspiracy” again to understand how character assassination of a political group becomes “simply business” and then leads to something else altogether.

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Maureen Dowd

New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd (photo by Fred R. Conrad)

Maureen Dowd puts me in my place.

I live in a “fake world.” I voted for an “unpalatable candidate.” I am “clueless.”

If the death threats on Twitter were not enough, Ms. Dowd helps me better understand our anti-Republican culture.

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Election Recap

Republicans just lost the election of 2012 and today we are seeing pundits pose the question, “Why?”

The answer (quite simply) is because the power and authority of the Democratic Party is AWESOME!

That’s an analysis you won’t see anywhere, but it has the unique quality of being true.

The impact of our anti-Republican culture was on display this Tuesday, and it wasn’t a pretty sight.  Colorado went “Blue,” and throughout America the power of the Democratic Party was intensified and solidified.

In our federal government, only the House of Representatives and the Supreme Court have any discernible Republican influence, and that will be gone by the 2016 election.

What is happening?

The Republican Party tries to set public policy.  It tries to put forward good ideas.  The Democratic Party simply tries to increase the power and authority of the Democratic Party.

Republicans are all about domestic and foreign policy issues.  The Democratic Party maintains its single goal.

Guess who is going to win this political contest?

Perhaps a metaphorical context will help answer the question.  Think of our country as an airplane or as a train.

Republicans want to guide an “exceptional” plane named America, spreading goodwill, avoiding storms, and delivering passengers safely at the end of their journey.

The Democratic Party is on a train.  Ben Bernanke has set the throttle and the train is hurtling down the track.  The train’s destination and route are not important.  The Democratic Party simply keeps all the cars together on the train.

The first car is full of people with Hispanic ethnicity.  They are told they will receive special treatment.  The second car is full of unmarried women.  They will get free contraceptive services.  The third car is full of people with dark skin tone.  They are told the Democratic Party cares about them.

Republicans worry about the train.  They are concerned about the train’s itinerary and the fate of the people on board.  The Democratic Party knows these issues are not important.  The train will stay on the track (for the time being).  There is only one principle and only one goal: The power and authority of the Democratic Party.

If the Democratic Party encounters a natural disaster along the route, it is simply an opportunity to photograph Democratic Party leadership “in command.”  If a war is being fought, it becomes an opportunity to enact a “kill list” and issue veiled threats to adversaries.  A “fiscal cliff” is really an opportunity to avoid messy things like budgets and rules.

Emergency actions must be taken!

Republicans simply cannot understand this political construct.  While Republicans keep busy “trying to do the right thing,” the Democratic Party works to ensure Americans perceive Republicans as “bad people.”

AND IT’S WORKING!

The election on Tuesday showed that a majority of American voters don’t like Republicans.  The Democratic Party knows the necessary groups to energize with hatred, and it does it very well.  It is now warming up an outrageous “Republicans are perverts” theme, with the social issues of abortion and gay marriage being used to drive home the message.

Republicans may protest that they are NOT perverts, but that’s not the point.  The point is that this new anti-Republican campaign will increase the power and authority of the Democratic Party.

We will see a perfect example unfold when Mitt Romney accepts the President’s “conciliatory” offer to sit down and share views.  Republicans believe that president Obama is interested in what Mr. Romney thinks.

The Democratic Party intent is completely different.  It will cast Mr. Romney as a defeated warrior paying homage to the victor.  The event will (as intended) increase the power and authority of the Democratic Party.

The 2012 election should have focused our attention on the cultivation of anti-Republican sentiment by the Democratic Party.  It didn’t, but here’s something that could happen:

Suppose Mitt Romney tells the President that he cannot attend the meeting with him at the White House, but instead invites Mr. Obama to one of his homes for the visit.  Mr. Romney takes the opportunity to use the visit as the subject of a documentary, where he takes the President by way of a devastated home on Long Island to show the problems of government response to Hurricane Sandy. 

He then goes by the home of one of the Americans killed in the Benghazi attack to show the President where government failed in its protection of civil servants.

In his neighborhood, he takes the President by the home of a Catholic parishioner who is concerned about the overreach of government and the protection of the First Amendment.

Mr. Romney ends at his own home, where he shows the President a compilation of clips from various anti-Romney ads portraying Mr. Romney as a felon, a bully, a racist, a woman-hater, a person who wants to harm the middle class, etc.

The resulting documentary would set the occasion of a presidential conference not as something like a “beer summit,” but as a representation of America’s culture being used to portray Republicans as bad people.

The documentary probably wouldn’t get much attention from our popular press, but that’s the type of battle that must be engaged.

Until Republicans begin to understand the Rules of Engagement in this war with the Democratic Party, they will fail in their attempts at influencing public policy.

Let me take this in a slightly different direction:

John Boehner has said he will negotiate with the Democratic Party to avoid a fiscal calamity in the coming months.  In his negotiations, he might offer to keep Republicans from spending any money on the Congressional elections of 2014 and to bring about the retirement of two conservative justices on the Supreme Court.  In return, the Democrats would accept whatever fiscal policy prescription Mr. Boehner provides.

Do you see what is happening in this hypothetical?  Mr. Boehner offers to increase the power and authority of the Democratic Party in exchange for getting America’s fiscal policy “right.”

That’s what Republicans have been doing all along.  Does it feel good?  Does it make political sense?

Would there be any hesitation on the part of Democrats to take the deal?  When the Democratic Party controls the judiciary, executive, and legislative branches of our federal government, it will have the power to change the Constitution and institute Authoritarianism.  Why care what a particular fiscal policy entails when you’ve got your eye on the prize!

Mr. Boehner would probably not make such a deal, but note what is at stake.

Until Republicans better understand what is going on in our culture, we will continue our (inadvertent) enhancement of the power and authority of the Democratic Party.

UPDATE 12/29/2012:
Yahoo! News features an AP column by Julie Pace and Steve Peoples on the lunch between Mr. Romney and president Obama.  Here's the headline:

Victor and vanquished: Obama has Romney to lunch

 The article closes with this analysis:

Romney has virtually disappeared from politics following his election loss. He's spent the past three weeks largely in seclusion at his family's Southern California home. He has made no public appearances, drawing media attention after being photographed at Disneyland in addition to stops at the movies and the gym with his wife, Ann.

(At least the headline didn't say "Obama has Romney for lunch.")

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