For decades the Democratic Party has succeeded by convincing people to believe things that are not true. Their strategy for 2012 is to continue the same strategy, only they will increase the volume. However, no matter how loud it gets, they are still telling lies. If the Republicans stand up to those lies, instead of trying to tip toe quietly out of sight, they will run the table in 2012. However, if the Republicans follow their prior practice of using the prevent defense, they could easily lose the next round of elections.
Democrats are, once again, trying to win an election by scaring senior citizens into thinking Republicans will cut Social Security and Medicare. But this time, Republicans can turn that around. Barack Obama, not a Republican, was the first President who did not approve a cost-of-living increase in Social Security. Barack Obama, not a Republican, is the President who proposed cutting billions of dollars in Medicare spending. The Republicans need to fight back and fight back hard. The argument should be that Barack Obama is more interested in making sure that the government handles your health care benefits than in making sure there are health care benefits to handle. It is mismanagement by the government that has resulted in skyrocketing medical costs.
Republicans need to point out that government programs don’t cut costs, they increase costs. As Ronald Reagan observed, government doesn’t solve problems, government is the problem? If we don’t get the corrupt, arrogant, incompetent, greedy fingers of the federal government out of our health care system, we are all going to have a problem obtaining affordable health care treatment in the future.
We need someone with the courage to ask Americans: Who do you trust: the federal government or private industry competing on a level playing field in a free market?
It is easy to explain this in terms everyone can understand. Just a few years ago a flat panel television cost several thousand dollars. Today that same television can be bought for a fraction of the original price. Was that the result of government regulation, or industry innovation?
It should be obvious that the highest regulated industries in this country have the highest costs. The lowest regulated industries have the lowest costs. That is why televisions are cheap and cars are expensive. There is a desperate need to eliminate unnecessary regulations, focus on what really matters and stop clogging the gears of commerce with needless and sometimes harmful regulations.
If Republicans can explain these issues, without apologizing, in terms people can understand, the Democrats are doomed. As FDR once said, the only thing the Republicans need to fear is fear itself. The good news is that we have a new breed of Republicans who appear ready willing and able to challenge the status quo.
I would not underestimate Sarah Palin for several reasons. One is that the Democrats have already shot their wad at her and she is still standing. If they haven’t found a smoking gun by now, there is no smoking gun. A lot of people, including Republicans, thought she was down for the count. They were wrong. Another is that these vicious attacks have done her an enormous favor. When you have been painted as naïve, inexperienced and stupid, it doesn’t take much to prove that analysis wrong. Those people who have formed their opinion of Sarah Palin from the biased reporting of the main stream media are in for a shock. She is very bright. She is extremely quick and she has been doing her homework. This is a far cry from the deer in the headlight creature presented by the main stream media during the 2008 election. Finally, she has become very skilled at campaigning in an internet world. She frequently shakes up the political universe with 144 character “tweets.” No one else is remotely capable of doing that. Obama spends 45 minutes giving a boring speech staring at a TelePrompter, reading a speech written by someone else, and Sarah Palin skewers him with one paragraph written with one hand while the other is cooking dinner.
Sarah Palin had a documentary produced with the goal of providing a more balanced point of view about her term as Governor of Alaska. No other candidate has launched a campaign with this type of approach. I do not know if it will work, but it would be wise to pay close attention, since Sarah Palin has often be way ahead of the trends and people ignore her to their peril. The other problem is that whether one loves Sarah Palin or hates Sarah Palin, they still can’t resist looking at her.
TDM