I’ve been surprised by the weakness of the conservative grassroots push for social security reform. Here’s some illumination from The Note:
When the President first enunciated his Social Security principles, business groups, prodded by the White House, said they’d spend millions to influence public opinion. That was predicated on the Administration’s announcing its support for a precise proposal early.
“We haven’t done it because Bush doesn’t have a plan yet,” said the Free Enterprise Fund’s Steve Moore. “It’s hard for anyone to mobilize conservative activists and conservative money until we all know that it’s a plan that’s worth mobilizing for.”
But, as I understand it, Bush doesn’t have a precise plan because he needs the ability to negotiate with Democrats in order to get a bill through Congress. That’s why he keeps saying that “everything’s on the table.” I think this may have been a huge mistake. First, by not endorsing a specific plan, you allow the opposition to play the vagueness to their advantage and to impute an unattractive plan to the administration, around which they can rally resistance. Second, you leave yourself and your advocates unable to defend your plan against the opposition. All you can say is: “That’s not the plan I have in mind.” Third, your grassroots support has nothing to rally around, and so keeps the money in the bank, as the AARP, Big Labor, etc., run riot. The public’s attention span for the issue may be short. So it’s a big loss to lose out in the first few rounds of the PR battle.
All this has to weighed against the bargaining advantages of public open-endedness about policy. But if you lose the public opinion war too badly, in part because of the strategy of vagueness, then the bargaining advantages of vagueness start to dissipate.
I hope that the adminstration’s doing some kind of rope-a-dope, and letting the anti-reform forces start to feel complacently self-congratulatory before wheeling out the big guns, and mobilizing the massive grassroots PR assault. I mean, that could happen, right?
Well, what if most conservatives have just figured that government will never solve their retirement problems, and therefore have taken it upon themselves to plan for retirement independent of any government-sanctioned scheme?
You said yourself that people will loose interest. If the administration controls the agenda, it’s in its best interest to postpone the negotiation with the opposition until the opposition won’t be able to mobilize the public due to its apathy towards the issue.
Any propaganda might be best after the fact, in a way to reassure people that what’s been done are good measures, whatever they turn out to be.
In certain countries, like Romania, up to a few months ago, all branches of government were held by the same party, which turned into a sort of “voting machine”, passing laws regardless of any opposition or public dissent. All in all, you’re better off.
I think the problem is that people see Bush as a liar. I doubt even the people who voted for him believe what he says. It’s no big deal lying about Iraq, it ain’t but a few poor Americans and a bunch of foriegners dying because of the lies.
But when he talks about Social Security, Bushes lies could actually hurt.
Bush is very good at rope-a-dope. It’s a favorite move of his.
Any plan he proposes will suffer bitter, cornered-rat hostility from his political opponents. So he’ll get them to tire themselves out chasing and barking at trial balloons before he sends his real plan into the arena.
After the anti-Bush pundits and pols have vented all the knee-jerk spleen they can vent, he’ll know their strong and weak points. The general public, meanwhile, tires of such wonky drivel and ceases to pay attention. Hell, I wearied of Social Security debates the minute I heard one.
But I think Bush has a mind to do something about it, so I’m sure something will get done.
Whether it’ll be an improvement…eh…who knows? I, for one, don’t care enough to worry about it.
Could be rope-a-dope (a more fitting description of the last election I can’t think of), McClain.
Or perhaps Bush trying to push his plan to loot SS might be like Michael Jordon trying to play baseball. The people he bought off with the trinkets and beads of God n Guns might actualy be paying attention now that his hand is reaching into their wallets…
Um, you seem to assume there’s some stash to loot, which seems doubtful.
And also to imply that Michael Jordan was defeated at baseball by opponents who were angry about his basketball career. More doubtful still.
The God’n'Guns reference is…well, I really don’t know what that’s supposed to mean. You disapprove of God? Or guns? OK, so…how d’you feel about devils’n'roses, then?
Well, what if most conservatives have just figured that government will never solve their retirement problems, and therefore have taken it upon themselves to plan for retirement independent of any government-sanctioned scheme?
You said yourself that people will loose interest. If the administration controls the agenda, it’s in its best interest to postpone the negotiation with the opposition until the opposition won’t be able to mobilize the public due to its apathy towards the issue.
Any propaganda might be best after the fact, in a way to reassure people that what’s been done are good measures, whatever they turn out to be.
In certain countries, like Romania, up to a few months ago, all branches of government were held by the same party, which turned into a sort of “voting machine”, passing laws regardless of any opposition or public dissent. All in all, you’re better off.
I think the problem is that people see Bush as a liar. I doubt even the people who voted for him believe what he says. It’s no big deal lying about Iraq, it ain’t but a few poor Americans and a bunch of foriegners dying because of the lies.
But when he talks about Social Security, Bushes lies could actually hurt.
Bush is very good at rope-a-dope. It’s a favorite move of his.
Any plan he proposes will suffer bitter, cornered-rat hostility from his political opponents. So he’ll get them to tire themselves out chasing and barking at trial balloons before he sends his real plan into the arena.
After the anti-Bush pundits and pols have vented all the knee-jerk spleen they can vent, he’ll know their strong and weak points. The general public, meanwhile, tires of such wonky drivel and ceases to pay attention. Hell, I wearied of Social Security debates the minute I heard one.
But I think Bush has a mind to do something about it, so I’m sure something will get done.
Whether it’ll be an improvement…eh…who knows? I, for one, don’t care enough to worry about it.
Could be rope-a-dope (a more fitting description of the last election I can’t think of), McClain.
Or perhaps Bush trying to push his plan to loot SS might be like Michael Jordon trying to play baseball. The people he bought off with the trinkets and beads of God n Guns might actualy be paying attention now that his hand is reaching into their wallets…
Um, you seem to assume there’s some stash to loot, which seems doubtful.
And also to imply that Michael Jordan was defeated at baseball by opponents who were angry about his basketball career. More doubtful still.
The God’n'Guns reference is…well, I really don’t know what that’s supposed to mean. You disapprove of God? Or guns? OK, so…how d’you feel about devils’n'roses, then?