The late Lee Atwater used to say that “issues win campaigns”, and he was exactly right. While on the face of it, that may not seem like the most brilliant political wisdom ever uttered, they are simple, profound and accurate. And much of the Republican leadership seems to have either forgotten them or just refuse to pay heed.
From Senate races all around the country comes word of Republican incumbents in tight races, with several of them in danger of losing their seats this fall. And nationally, the President has been doing good to bump up against a 40% job approval rating, depending on the poll in question.
So how do we win in this political environment? You do it by changing the environment. While we can and should do all the get-out-the-vote hocus pocus we can, in the end it takes issues. And just what are the central GOP issues this year? Those of us who are familiar with the inside baseball of politics can pretty much quote the laundry list we would (and should) hear in response to that question. National security, Iraq, “values” issues, such as abortion and gay marriage, and judges. But what is the general public actually seeing and associating with the Republican party?
Sure, we have had a few votes on bills dealing with important social issues, but almost all of them go down to defeat. All we get are token votes that can be highlighted in the fall, but nothing that has truly excited the party base, much less the general public.
In fact, the issue that’s drawn the most attention in Congress and the highest public profile, immigration, has been one where the GOP isn’t unified and where the base is adamantly opposed to half of what is being proposed.
The problem is that we haven’t had a galvanizing and unifying fight lately, and on most issues the Democrats have wisely avoided such public political brawls. They are all too happy to let things coast as they are now on through November.
For our part, we can’t simply sit back and try to run out the clock. For that to work, you’ve got to be ahead in the game. And we can’t win by playing defense either. You don’t score points that way. We have to go on offense and take the initiative away from the other side.
Simply put, we cannot afford the status quo. We need a fight. And if the Democrats don’t want to give us one, we have to go and pick one with them on an issue they can’t afford to ignore. And we have to pick an issue that presents us with favorable terms of debate and that fires up our troops.
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