September 15, 2004
WHY CAN'T YOU FILTHY COMMONERS SEE WHAT I DO?:
Kerry must 'reframe' Bush -- and fast (Robert Kuttner, September 15, 2004, Boston Globe)
JOHN KERRY is in trouble because the Bush campaign has seized control of what psychologists call the "frame" of this year's presidential contest. Bush, Karl Rove, Dick Cheney, and company have framed the election starkly: Bush will keep us safe in a time of terror. He will put money in people's pockets by cutting our taxes, and somehow that will also be good for the economy.Bush and Cheney have also framed Kerry. He is inconstant, an effete elitist who lives in a lah-de-dah neighborhood, speaks a foreign language, keeps changing his mind on everything from Vietnam to Iraq. This signals that Kerry is culturally different from ordinary folks (like Bush) and that if he wavers on everything else, you can't trust him to be resolute on terrorists.
If this imagery hardens, Kerry is toast. Experts who study how public issues become framed in people's minds, like Susan Bales of the FrameWorks Institute, say that you can't change views merely with evidence. You have to change the frame.
For Kerry and for Democrats, the frustrating reality is that everything important about George Bush and his presidency is a lie.
So Mr. Kuttner's new frame is: "you're all a bunch of stupid dupes!" And they wonder why they're the 40% party now? Posted by Orrin Judd at September 15, 2004 10:39 AM
Yet another article showing that the left does not accept that people follow the GOP/conservatives because they agree with them. It is because they are being duped and if they were smarter they would be supporting the Dems.
Posted by: AWW at September 15, 2004 11:07 AMEverything about George Bush is a lie. Hmm, let me guess, he's actually Hitler ? That explains the MoveOn ads, I suppose.
Posted by: Peter at September 15, 2004 11:16 AM"If this imagery hardens?"
Posted by: Twn at September 15, 2004 11:24 AMoj, this is exactly what you said that the Bush team would attempt to do, first define Kerry, then promote Bush, and you said it six months before Robert Kuttner.
Now, why didn't Kerry's six-figure advisors see that, and if they did, why didn't they counter ?
Posted by: Michael Herdegen at September 15, 2004 11:33 AMMichael:
They all know who John Kerry is, how could you not?
Posted by: oj at September 15, 2004 11:38 AMThe Vanguard are increasingly testy. That 40% may be their zenith.
Posted by: luciferous at September 15, 2004 11:43 AMIf Evan Thomas is right about the MSM's impact on the race, Kerry's natural level of support is in the 27% - 32% range.
Posted by: Jeff at September 15, 2004 11:45 AMOf course, Bush has been helped greatly by Kerry's inability to talk sports.
I've just put up a longish post at my place talking about this very problem.
Posted by: H.D. Miller at September 15, 2004 11:59 AMOJ: I don't think John Kerry nows who John Kerry is, let alone his advisors. What kind of advice do you give a weathervane?
Posted by: Mikey at September 15, 2004 12:30 PMrust headed due West.
Posted by: oj at September 15, 2004 12:41 PM"He will put money in people's pockets by cutting our taxes, and somehow that will also be good for the economy."
Somehow?
Posted by: Ed Driscoll at September 15, 2004 2:11 PMloosely apropos to the discussion (deranged lefty 'economists'):
I saw Robert Reich on the NewsHour last night and at one point he disapprovingly mentioned the large growth of non-defense spending in GWB's term...
and a few minutes he was spouting about how wonderful Kerry's plan would be to 'invest' in education, health care , blah,blah
jeez Reich, are we spending too much or not enough?
Posted by: JonofAtlanta at September 15, 2004 3:01 PMI repeat my post from March:
Its worse than I thought. I quit reading MoDo a couple of years ago after Bush Derangement Syndrome crippled her. But (Hat tip to Andrew Sullivan) today's column contains a gem of a quote:
It's not often that you get a presidential candidate to recite poetry to you, especially in a year when W. and J.F.K. are going macho a macho.
But there was Mr. Kerry flying from Boston to New Orleans on Friday, sipping tea for his hoarse throat and reeling off T. S. Eliot's "Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock."
"There are so many great lines in it," he said. " `Do I dare to eat a peach?' `Should I wear my trousers rolled?' `Let us go, through certain half-deserted streets/The muttering retreats/Of restless nights in one-night cheap hotels/And sawdust restaurants with oyster-shells."
Then he started on "Gunga Din" and " 'talk o' gin and beer.'"
I am prediciting mass suicides by Kerry campaign staffers and press embeds. Posted by: Robert Schwartz at March 7, 2004 05:06 PM
Was I right or was I right?
The answer is that Kerry is a doufuss.
The correct Elliot poem is the Hollow Men:
We are the hollow men
We are the stuffed men
Leaning together
Headpiece filled with straw. Alas!
Our dried voices, when
We whisper together
Are quiet and meaningless
As wind in dry grass
Or rats' feet over broken glass
In our dry cellar
Shape without form, shade without colour,
Paralysed force, gesture without motion
Posted by: Mike Earl at March 8, 2004 11:17 AM
It was all forseen we are just working out the details.
Posted by: Robert Schwartz at September 15, 2004 5:46 PM