I was thinking about something today, and, although I fear that I may be stating the obvious, the Republicans are so full of shit when it comes to how they talk about issues. And it pretty much comes down to one rhetorical trick that they are very good at and we suck at.
They set up false dichotomies.
Like tax policy. They call what they want to do tax relief for middle income Americans (even though it isn't) and force us to come out against said tax cut. They can then say, "Well, is appears that the Democrats don't think that the American people deserve to keep more of their own money. Apparently they want to keep your money and give it to lazy welfare mothers and special interests" or something to that effect. At this point we can't even talk about how we want to make the tax code fairer anymore because our candidates are too busy answering asinine questions from pathetic morons like Judy Woodruff about why we oppose "tax relief for the middle class."
Same thing with the war. They say that invading Iraq is vital to the security of the American people, and then when a Democrat steps up to oppose it we can't even begin to explain why we think that it is bad for national security because stupid Judy Woodruff is back again asking us why we don't care about the security of America.
Which brings me back to my original point. Howard Dean has come out for the "re-regulation" of big business. Good for him. However, there are some that would say ("moderate"* Democrats, usually) "Oh, no! Don't say that! It will offend centrist swing voters that need to believe we are just like the Republicans if we are going to win!" And at this point I vomit.
Back to Howard Dean. This is good because at least one person on our side is taking the initiative in framing the debate on an issue. Don't you see the genius of this? And I must give props here. Vets 4 Dean first had this idea. Dean comes out for this in this way and causes a controversy. His opponents bitch and whine about what a disaster he would be. Maybe Holy Joe would come out of hiding and talk about how this would lead Democrats into the political wilderness if he could get anybody to listen to him anymore. Then the media goes to Dean for a reaction to the aforementioned bitching and whining by the other candidates. He then says that it was poorly worded and re-frames it in a much more centrist way, and in the process keeps the attention on himself. Fucking brilliant.
This is the sort of thing that we can learn from the Republicans.
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*By moderate, I mean too chickenshit to call themselves Republicans but support Republican legislation anyway.
