"Doorway pt 1" is
here.Atrios: "[Politics] is a contest to put people in power so they can enact a particular agenda."
But the vicious "rub" to that statement is that campaign contests are not
determined by competing "agendas". Generally speaking, people don't vote for a candidate based on a candidate's agenda, or even their intuitive feel for a candidate's agenda.
It would be lovely if all the participants in our democracy functioned this way, but they don't. And when I see smart policy lovers giving the following
campaign advice, I have to shake my head:
The Edwards campaign seems to be going nowhere and part of the reason is that he is turning to really dumb sound bite messages rather than hammering away on the real issues. While the Obama campaign seems to be doing well for whatever reason, his camp would do well to drop these stupid sound bite messages and start focusing on specific problems and his proposed policy solutions. --Angry Bear:
Focusing on "proposed policy solutions"? Are you kidding me? Edwards is the candidate who has (appeared) to have focused
the most on "policy" so far, yet he's made no progress in the polls. Wonky Hillary ran third in Iowa and was about to lose New Hampshire until she showed emotion-- now she's the frontrunner.
I mean, my gracious,
did you see the absurd MSNBC Dem debate the other night? Did you notice how absurd it was? It was a debate about the campaigns and candidates. True "policy" concerns were almost an afterthought. Do you think "policy" is a winner in such a forum? Do you think the media is geared to focus on, and overhype
policy differences? [Insert Jim Mora
"Playoffs?!" voice:] "Are you kidding me?
Policy?! Policy?!! Don't talk about
Policy!"
Too often progressives think that winning campaigns are decided by a candidate's fervent advocacy of a particular set of policies. Campaign narratives, image, framing and "theme" are too often ignored. Quite simply: a good policy in a bad frame will often lose to bad policy in a good frame. And this in fact keeps happening, time and time again, yet progressives choose to blame the candidate's policies and ignore other decisive factors in a campaign. Too often Dems and progressives will invent soothing stories about how things could have been different "if only the candidate hadn't compromised on policy".
But, oyster, I like a candidate who stands up for policies I believe in.Well, congratulations. But there's an absurd game that candidates must play before he or she can militate for your favored policies. And, unfortunately, it takes much more than "good policy" to win that game.
But, oyster, I don't like that game.Then let's change it. Such a vast project will take years, though. In the meantime, why not try to play it better, rather than wait and complain about it every four years?
NYT's David Bobo, of all people, gets it more than half right in today's column titled "How voters think". (And getting it "more than half right" is a lot better than getting it "almost completely wrong", as many progressives have done.)
People in my line of work try to answer certain questions. Why did Hillary surge after misting up in New Hampshire? Why have primary victories produced no momentum for the victors? Why did John McCain win among Republicans who oppose the Iraq war in both New Hampshire and Michigan, but lose among voters who support it?
The truth is that many of the theories we come up with are bogus. They are based on the assumption that voters make cold, rational decisions about who to vote for and can tell us why they decided as they did. This is false.
In reality, we voters — all of us — make emotional, intuitive decisions about who we prefer, and then come up with post-hoc rationalizations to explain the choices that were already made beneath conscious awareness. “People often act without knowing why they do what they do,” Daniel Kahneman, a Nobel Prize winner, noted in an e-mail message to me this week. “The fashion of political writing this year is to suggest that people choose their candidate by their stand on the issues, but this strikes me as highly implausible.”
Read the whole thing.
Labels: Dems, Elections and Campaigns, Hillary, John Edwards, McCain, Obama
20 Comments:
More later but two immediate questions come to mind:
1) If (in the abstract sense) politics is a never-ending nebulous ad-campaign of artfully (or accidentally) hitting upon "frames" and "themes" in order to someday enact a policy agenda how, then, does one determine what policy might or might not match the salesmanship? Or is it supposed to match-up at all since you seem to be implying that the two are unrelated.
2) Isn't a Party Primary about more than this anyway? Isn't the primary season the time when party has an open discussion about what it represents and which candidate is best qualifies to carry that standard? Or is it instead the time to "rally around" and "trust" the best salesman of the party's agenda... whatever it might be imagined to consist of since it isn't being discussed.
Don't need to read Brooks to know that many voters don't vote with their heads but rather their emotions.
I don't see why the two need to be mutually exclusive.
Clinton did a great job appealing both to heads and hearts.
Right, nightprowlkitty. Clinton was a consummate "wonk", but he knew he had to connect before doing his policy laundry lists. If people trusted that he understood their problems and issues, then they would be that much more receptive to the subsequent solutions he proposed.
Jeffrey: policy and salesmanship aren't totally "unrelated"-- ideally, they're supposed to match up perfectly. Informed, objective voters should
1) evaluate candidates claims based on their record, their votes, their explanations, their truthiness... etc.
The problem is that voters are lazy, emotional, and intuitive. They like stories. There's a wide variety of policy proposals you can put in a good story. Witness Huckabee's "fair tax", for example.
2) in theory, it should be a discussion. In reality it's something like competing pep rallies.
"Quite simply: a good policy in a bad frame will often lose to bad policy in a good frame."
100% dead on correct.
"Then let's change it. Such a vast project will take years, though. In the meantime, why not try to play it better, rather than wait and complain about it every four years?"
Absolutely. We need to change the game (or at least work towards it) but until we do we are foolish if we think we can operate outside the game and still win. I am not going to win at chess by playing monopoly over and over again.
Personally, I like to research my canididates. I will not rush to support someone. I sat down for thirty minutes and enjoyed listening to Joe Biden discuss what to do in Iraq on CSPAN one day. However I realize that I am an anomoly. And unfortunately, even though he had it 100% right, most voters would get bored 1 minute into it and want to switch to something else. And since he was unable to frame his argument well, he has since dropped out of the election.
"I don't see why the two need to be mutually exclusive."
Kitty,
Not much of a Star Trek fan are ya?
Jeffery: Just look at Bobby Jindal. Campaign 1 for Governor: Policy Wonk = loss. Campaign 2 for Governor: Ethics/Family/Faith = win. He told the voters what they wanted to hear and not what they needed to hear.
The bottom line is that elections is about selling the candidate and not the issues, so the primaries have turned into (or always have been) determining who is the best salesman.
But, oyster, I don't like that game!
Seriously though, is it possible that the voters respond in an emotional and superficial way because the campaigns run that way? I suspect that voters might respond more thoughtfully if the campaigns were thoughtful, but candidates make emotional and superficial appeals in an attempt to gain every advantage they can.
None of which contradicts any of your assertions.
You described this as the "amoral campaign universe" when we were at a party recently, and I think that's an apt descriptor. But I do worry about what such close observation of that universe might do to your immortal soul.
I think the worst part is that after the election the "winners" then pull out the "losers" policies and attribute their loss to their policy statements - which, as you correctly state, had NOTHING to do with why they lost.
It's like winning a beauty pagent then claiming your the smartest person in the world.
editor b: No, I really don't think the voters react that way because the campaigns are run that way and not the other way around.
"I suspect that voters might respond more thoughtfully if the campaigns were thoughtful, but candidates make emotional and superficial appeals in an attempt to gain every advantage they can."
I used to think that. I thought that as long as I presented a thoughtful and logical argument to solve some of the problems of the day that I would be able to convince the voters to vote for me. I was absolutely wrong.
The downfall of democracy is the stupidity of the electorate.
Editor B asks:
"Seriously though, is it possible that the voters respond in an emotional and superficial way because the campaigns run that way?"
I would say sometimes yes... but the effect is more of a symbiotic inanity that also has a lot to do with how the campaigns are covered in the news media... which has to do with who owns the media... and the campaigns for that matter.
daniel z., I'm not sure that Bobby J's campaign in 2003 vs his campaign in 2007 is a very good example. He didn't change his style very much. The state changed significantly, and our weak-ass Democratic party pretty much decided to "sit it out".
That doesn't mean I don't find Oyster's argument compelling here. I don't see much of an answer to the second question His Yellowness posed in his first comment, though. Are primaries supposed to be where we pick our best salesperson, or is where we decide what our Party believes in?
Don't like the game? Tough. It's the game that has to be played, precisely because (channeling Jeffrey's misanthropy) people can be very petty. If the game is absurd, it is because WE are absurd.
There are just too many policy issues. If you are very specific about everything, you will just piss everyone off. And people remember what pisses them off. People want their candidate to be REALLY, not just sorta, for their preferred policy preferences. But if they are, they are pissing someone else off. And there's something else where they disagree, and piss YOU off.
Because the negative lingers longer in our minds than the positive, and thus affects more votes, candidates have to concentrate on not pissing people off.
The only way to "change the game," as it were, is to switch to a parliamentary system. I'm not holding my breath here.
Don't hate the player. Hate the game.
I'm completely with you on this one Oyster. I don't think Obama is perfect on policy, but he's close enough. It's been my position for some time that he represents the best hope, yes, hope, for the Dems to not only win the White House, but to make gains in the House and Senate. Is it unfair to others that he's simply more likable? That won't matter when he wipes the floor with Mitt Romney.
Oyster,
In reality, we voters — all of us — make emotional, intuitive decisions about who we prefer, and then come up with post-hoc rationalizations to explain the choices that were already made beneath conscious awareness.
I that's true, why be a 'small-d' democrat? Democracy is sham. Everyone makes inane, irrational decisions. Our leadership is determined arbitrarily.
I think a sizable chunk of the electorate makes decisions based on blind emotion or intuition, and everyone depends on emotion and intuition to at least some degree. However, to say that everyone, without exception, is voting exclusively with their emotions is just plain silly. Many people vote based almost purely on the issues, or a combination of electability and the issues (my preferred calculus).
The truth might be that the swing vote is more about more nebulous factors such as blind emotion, which of course has the greatest impact on electoral outcomes. That's a reality scary enough for the concept of democracy -- we don't need to presume that everyone is so flaky.
boyd,
The only way to "change the game," as it were, is to switch to a parliamentary system. I'm not holding my breath here.
No, a parliamentary system is not the only way. You could also simply eliminate primaries, and let party big-wigs choose the candidates. Or you could just change the voting system, allow runoffs or do instant runoff voting with ranking of candidates.
Of course, those options all have their own pitfalls. I'm not much of a critic of our own system versus the available alternatives.
Let's not overlook the fact that whenever a candidate does in some degree discuss some actual "proposed policy solution" it is then used a blunt instrument by whatever opposition to batter said candidate into a bloody pulp. This holds true for primaries where (at least in theory) everyone is on the same team.
Of course to make no mention of any "proposed policy solution" will result in the lack of detail being to batter said candidate into a bloody pulp i.e. "where's the beef?"
The trick is to run the knife edge of saying nothing substantial, while having it appear to be.
"The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter." - Winston Churchill
"It has been said that democracy is the worst form of government except all the others that have been tried." - Winston Churchill, again
This comment would have been appropriate for the first "doorway," but I was busy then. IMO, Obama's statement about Reagan is evidence of a pundit/think tank gap more than anything else -- don't expect politicians to take the lead in revising historical opinion. Before Repub pols criticized FDR, Heritage/Cato/AEI published critical books and pundits started attacking his rep. Even after that, Repubs (at least the big boys) are careful about attacking dead Dems. They're as likely to praise FDR or JFK for being more manly than today's Dems, as trash them. The latest Obama outrage strikes me as easy indignation. I agreed with the anger at Obama for making Repub talking points on SS, so I'm not an Obama supporter.
One thing that I think David-the-Likable (I still think he came up with the idea for his schtick by watching "Get Smart" reruns) missed is the extent to which those emotional reactions are negative. I tried to make a lengthy comment the other night, apparently lost due to carelessness on the login using a different computer than usual, about how Obama, more accurately his supporters, was playing to win -- a Pyrrhic victory. People who I didn't think would pay attention to presidential politics this soon noticed the Obama/Clinton ugliness, and the reaction I heard wasn't pretty.
Do white liberals ever talk to whites who will admit to some level of prejudice, but react ndignantly to accusations of out-and-out bigottry, i.e. the overwhelming majority of whites? One of the most popular (top 2 or 3) justifications for the degree of prejudice that they will admit to is what they see as unjustified cries of racism. I don't know what that excuses, but when something happens being a black person and a white person that would happen between two people, cies of racism do seem absurd. I said would, not possibly could -- think calling a lying bitch a bitch at a VCC meeting. That seems to have been the reaction to the Obama side of the Obama/Clinton dust-up, from a lot of center to center/right types who don't like Clinton.
I don't agree with the philosophical underpinnings of the reaction, but I certainly agree with some of the particulars. Hopefully, this link will go directly to a comment that I made at American Prospect. Figured it was time that I started being brusque with some non-New Orleans bloggers.
That should read,
". I don't know what that excuses, but when something happens between a black person and a white person that would happen between two people, cies of racism do seem absurd."
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