democrats

So here we are, the final week for the health care reform push. It’s going to be interesting to see what happens today. I got a feeling the signals will be mixed all the way up to the final vote this weekend. From one minute to the next we will hear “they have the votes”, “they don’t have the votes”.

A lot of Democrats in the House have a problem with trusting the Senate to do the right thing later on, and I can’t blame them one bit. On the other hand, a lot of the pro-life Democrats who were going to vote against the bill seem to be switching now. That really adds to the complication of the whip count.

So what do you think the final outcome will be? I really have no idea at this point.

I’ve been tied up for the past 3 days rebuilding one of my servers and haven’t had time to really look at any thing news wise, which totally sucks, so I was really surprised to see this bit of news today:

On a local TV interview show on Friday Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV) basically said it's the plan, that they will use 'reconciliation', and that they'll finish within the next 60 days

Josh isn’t too optimistic on the public option happening, but given the growing tsunami of Democrats coming out in strong support of it in the Senate, there is a good chance something could happen. I also think the recent news of insurance companies jacking up rates by enormous amounts in a bunch of states could give this a real nudge in the right direction.

So hold on, this week could be really interesting.

At the annual Democratic Party meeting there should be a mandatory seminar on communication. Not properly communicating has cost the Democrats dearly. It was a big nail in the coffin on health care. People couldn’t understand things like “health exchanges” or “public option”. Even the one simple word left a bad feeling with voters - “mandates”. Democrats tried to make mandates sound like a good thing, but you can’t change how people feel when hearing that word.

Now we are seeing the failures of communication spread beyond healthcare:

Nearly three out of four Americans think that at least half of the money spent in the federal stimulus plan has been wasted, according to a new national poll.

A CNN/Opinion Research Corporation survey released Monday morning also indicates that 63 percent of the public feels that projects in the plan were included for purely political reasons and will have no economic benefit, with 36 percent saying those projects will benefit the economy.

Twenty-one percent of people questioned in the poll say nearly all the money in the stimulus has been wasted, with 24 percent feeling that most money has been wasted and another 29 percent saying that about half has been wasted. Twenty-one percent say that only a little has been wasted and 4 percent feel that no stimulus dollars have been wasted.

Again the Republicans took advantage here. They used key phrases like “government welfare” and that strikes anger in voters, while Democrats go out and get to technical trying to defend the stimulus.

American’s understand catch phrases better than anything. Look at “death panels”. It was a flat out lie, but because it was such a small and catchy phrase, it ended up causing damage.

It really isn’t a lesson, but more of a reminder. Democrats suck at politics. To the Democrats out there acting shocked over the Brown win, all I can say is “wake up!”

We don’t need to turn back the pages of history more than a few months to remind us how bad Democrats are at politics. Last August they sat shell shocked as the tea bagger movement erupted. During the entire health care debate they were crap. They started negotiations low and just kept going lower. When someone like Lieberman threw a monkey wrench in the plans the leadership just blinked.

For the Democrats to remain a majority party they have to become the party people want, not the party that people resort to as the ‘they are better than the alternative” candidates. They need to remember what promises brought them to power in 2008 and deliver on them. Stop it with the dream of “bi-partisanship”. It isn’t going to happen. We are not going to pull this highly polarized country together over night. Hell we probably won’t be able to until some massive national disaster happens again, and a near depression wasn’t even enough for that.

Democrats also need to learn a thing called message control. This is something the Republicans excel at, while the Democrats fail every time. Health care is a perfect example of this. The Republicans had “death panels”, while the Democrats counter argument was “health exchanges”. Average Joe voter has no idea what a “health exchange” is and Democrats sure as hell didn’t try to explain it.

Yes we really need Sarah Palin to run in 2012. Just check this out:

A new CBS News poll finds that a large majority of Americans say they do not want former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin to run for president.

Specifically, 71 percent say they do not want the former Republican vice presidential nominee to run for president, while 21 percent say they do want her to run.

When the results are split out by party, 56 percent of Republicans say they do not want her to seek the office and 30 percent do. Meanwhile, 88 percent of Democrats do not want her to run. Among independents, 65 percent do not want her to run and 25 percent do.

She would be cancer to the Republican chances in 2012.

A new mailer has surfaced in the Massachusetts Senate race:

This is absolutely brutal: Massachusetts Dems have dropped a mail piece accusing GOP Senate candidate Scott Brown of wanting hospitals to turn away “all” rape victims.

The mail piece — sent over by the Brown campaign — shows pictures of women who are supposed to have been raped, one of them in a wheelchair bent over with her head in her hands. It says: “1,736 WOMEN WERE RAPED IN MASSACHUSETTS IN 2008. SCOTT BROWN WANTS HOSPITALS TO TURN THEM ALL AWAY.”

Greg Sargent has all the details and explains why this is nothing but a false attack ad. I really don’t want to see Brown win on Tuesday, but if he does then the Democrats have only themselves to blame. The American people have rejected these kinds of tactics and it appears the Massachusetts Democrats didn’t learn a damn thing in 2008.

Chris Cillizza just tweeted the following:

Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee buying time in Massachusetts Senate special election....developing...more soon on Fix...

It spells trouble for Democrats to have to keep dumping money into a race that should be solid Democrats. Even more troubling is that they are having to do it during a special election, when the mid-term election is less than 11 months away.

Think Progress is reporting that there are now 16 tea partiers that are challenging GOP incumbents and recruits. Most of the races appear to be in the House, so this is great news for Democrats. Last week it was reported that the NRCC is facing some serious troubles raising cash for the elections, and if they have primary battles to worry about then it will drain the already depleted coffers. I bet there is some bit panic going on now in the inner GOP circles.