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Politics : American Presidential Politics and foreign affairs -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Peter Dierks who wrote (46671)	10/24/2010 1:14:08 PM
From: Peter Dierks	1 Recommendation Respond to of 71588

Note to Democrats: Blaming Voters Never Works Democrats: It's not Me, It's You By David Paul Kuhn October 20, 2010 It was nearly fourteen years ago. The presidential election was less than two weeks off. Bob Dole was desperate. "I wonder sometimes what people are thinking about, if people ?are thinking at all," Dole said at a Florida rally. "Something's wrong in America." Clinton's White House press secretary, Mike McCurry, responded: "In my time in politics, I think it's best not to accuse the American people of not thinking when you're trying to earn their support and trust." It never helps to blame the voter. It's like a business criticizing consumers for not buying its product. The consumer is always right in politics, like business. Yet here is President Obama, last weekend, at a Democratic fundraiser: "Part of the reason that our politics seems so tough right now and facts and science and argument does not seem to be winning the day all the time is because we're hardwired not to always think clearly when we're scared. And the country's scared." You see, amid the worst financial collapse since the Great Depression, voters were rational and informed when they voted Democrats into office. Two years later, as the public prepares to vote Democrats out of office, they're irrational and ignorant. Democrats have a problem with liberals as well. In late September, the White House sought to rally the base by scolding it. Obama told Rolling Stone magazine that progressive apathy was "inexcusable" and "irresponsible." Vice President Joe Biden said progressives should "stop whining." In Nevada, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has tried to make sense of voter disgust. Think of the recession like Christmas presents. Sometimes boys want more presents. "I was a very selfish little boy, and I was upset that my mother had to go through all this. Whose fault is this? And that's what people are going through. I didn't know who to blame but I wanted to blame somebody," Reid told the Reno Gazette-Journal. And, of course, cue John Kerry. Democrats' 2004 nominee told reporters in late September: "We have an electorate that doesn't always pay that much attention to what's going on so people are influenced by a simple slogan rather than the facts or the truth or what's happening." This is politics' self-defeating vice. It's condescending. And from Obama, it upholds the worst stereotypes of the prof-in-chief. It reminds folks of Obama's notorious gaffe in 2008. That small town America "cling[s] to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them" because they are "bitter" over their economic state. Blaming the voter signals weakness. Recall Jimmy Carter's malaise speech. "The erosion of our confidence in the future is threatening to destroy the social and the political fabric of America," Carter said. But the crisis of confidence was also in Carter. Three decades later, there is a crisis of confidence in Democrats. They are staring down a landslide. And they are digging in, in all the wrong ways. Democrats are failing to say the "buck stops here." They're passing the buck. And not often, but still too often, Democrats are now asking voters to take some of the blame. Presidents are expected to lead people out of the wilderness, not blame the public for being lost in the woods. Americans don't want to be lectured on how they got lost. They want a way out. Democrats want a way out as well. But it's not coming. The wave was visible late last year. The tide never turned. Eleventh hour panic has set in. And in their desperation, Democrats have become Dole. "You inspire by getting people to be excited about something they see happening, not telling them analytically about the condition they are currently in," Mike McCurry told me Tuesday. "When you engage in that kind of psycho analysis of the electorate you are bound to produce an unhappy outcome." In effect, Democrats are insinuating: It's not me; it's you. Americans are responding: No, it's you. Politics is like courtship. A guy asks a girl out. She says no. The guy tells the girl she's irrational, not thinking clearly. What happens? She walks away, more certain in her thinking. The public is sick of its suitor. They want to try the new guy. And Democrats will not win Americans back by demeaning why they walked away. David Paul Kuhn is the Chief Political Correspondent for RealClearPolitics and the author of The Neglected Voter: White Men and the Democratic Dilemma. He can be reached at david@realclearpolitics.com and his writing followed via RSS. realclearpolitics.com