House of Eratosthenes

There’s been a slight turn in Obama’s favor as of last week. The hardcore left-wingers are predictably playing this up as hard as they can in hopes of producing a bandwagon effect to put The Chosen One over the top.

The blip isn’t as interesting to me as its perceived cause:

The change from a month ago may correlate with the perception among likely voters that the McCain campaign has been the more negative. Overall, 44% say McCain’s campaign has been the more negative, compared to 31% who say the same about Obama’s campaign. Among self-described political independents, 48% said they think McCain’s campaign has been more negative.

Are these likely voters watching the same guy I am? Ask Chosen One what he plans to do about people not getting enough Riboflavin in their diets…he’ll make it about ten words before he is forced to use the name “Bush.” And that’s being charitable. Ask him about hurricanes, he’ll make it to global warming before the first “uh,” and under-regulated greedy corporations before the second one. And use that word “Bush” probably two or three more times.

Maybe it’s that word “hope.” People have this mental weakness — they see the H-word floating past your lips, they don’t wait for substantiation. They just presume this is what you’re all about. It is a deeply engrossing word. You say “we have to have hope…and therefore I’ll be tying a hundred girl scouts to wooden stakes on my front lawn and setting ’em ablaze while they scream like banshees, and when they’re good and roasted I’ll ripe the entrails out of the bellies while they squirm some more.” All people will remember is the “hope.” Well…maybe it’s not that bad…but you get the idea. People don’t hold your feet to the fire to say something hopeful. Just throwing the syllable out there, is enough for ’em.

How do you fight this if you’re McCain? It’s a delicate question. Putting Hitler’s picture up on the television screen, captioned with “You know who ELSE was all about hope and change?” would make a compelling point, besides of a meritorious point, and on top of that would be historically accurate. But obviously this would be one step forward and three steps back. What we have here is a double standard — Obama can campaign “negatively” to the point of toxicity; McCain can’t even offer up the notion that he’s superior to the competition, let alone explore the reasons why.

Symbiosis, John. It’ll set you free. Put out three or four thirty-second spots tied to this theme, and you might as well start rehearsing your inauguration speech and vetting people for cabinet posts right there & then.

The liberal says, enact my proposal and we’ll enter into a symbiotic relationship. Next week, the liberal will have another proposal, and offer the same pitch — he won’t admit the last proposal failed to get us into this symbiotic relationship. He won’t offer to roll back this previous failed proposal. To our discredit, nobody will call on him to do so…

The conservative says we’re already in the symbiotic relationship. You are good for me. I am good for you. We can all go on doing exactly what we’re doing. The only thing we should really change is to get those damn liberals to stop voting.

The tax thing is a fantastic example of this. Obama has a plan that would call for a net increase of our taxes…and his defense is that while he would raise taxes on the evil rich, some 95% of households (or 80%, depending on your source) would see a tax cut — with those evil rich making up the difference, plus some. Therefore, depending on your point of view, it is valid to say —

1. Sum Of Parts: Obama’s plan increases the tax burden on us.

2. Vote By Tax: Obama’s plan cuts the tax burden for us.

And here come all these allegedly balanced and centrist fact-checkers, taking the second of those two points-of-view, without so much as a glance in the rear view mirror, without a scintilla of scrutiny or question. They’re saying the McCain campaign is telling lies…even though Obama would raise the overall tax liability. Truly, this is an abomination in the eyes of The Lord.

McCain, in response to this, could adopt the Morgan K. Freeberg platform of true conservatism:

Conservatives insist that taxes…exist for the purpose of raising revenue, not to punish any particular person or class of person.
:
Anyone who thinks people should be punished for having too much money or for making too much money, via taxes or by some other means, is invited by all good conservatives to leave the country and go live in another. (When I Start Running This Place, Item 42.) The planet is covered with envy-inspired socialist enclaves that will be most eager to accommodate…provided they let your miserable pinko communist ass in.

Well okay, he could leave that last part out. But you get the idea.

Like the frog sitting in a pot of water gradually working up to a boil, we’ve somehow been indoctrinated to the notion that “nice” people want a tax policy that takes things away from people who are having too good of a time of it, without much regard to where the collected revenues are supposed to go or how badly they are needed. In other words, “nice” people want tax policies that destroy other people. “Mean” people, on the other hand, are the ones who say there could be something wrong with this — maybe we shouldn’t be trying to destroy other people just because they have more money than most. Part of the reason this idea has taken hold, is that it hasn’t been challenged. Try challenging it.

You’ve got to try. The situation is so bad, the prevailing viewpoint so badly diseased, that the democrat party is popularly thought to be tirelessly fighting against interclass conflict. This, when nobody who’s been paying attention can name any two classes that the democrat party thinks should already be living in harmony together! Every time they run the show, all these privileged entitlement classes end up squabbling over who has the bigger and better claim to aggrieved status, so the other entitlement classes can be denied the alms, annointments, appointments and general ass-kissing.

We saw it when Obama and Hillary got down-and-dirty fighting over the democrat party nomination. Absolutely no discussion of policy disagreements at all. None. Zero. Just…whose turn is it? The blacks, or the gals? Whose feelings are gonna be hurt? And a bunch of “superdelegates” looking on, wishing they weren’t put in the postion of choosing which coveted entitlement class would be told to go stick it where the sun don’t shine.

That’s the point — they are not the change we have been seeking, because they can only put one entitlement class on the throne at a time, and the country’s way too big for their worldview. They do not believe in symbiosis and they certainly don’t believe in “diversity.” The democrat party view is that when two classes of people are different…especially if they are cosmetically different…it’s an inevitability that they have to be sent into a cage-match somewhere, and only one can come out alive. So explain why you’re different. Talk about why you picked Sarah Palin. Point out what really interests conservatives socially: Your motto, “America first,” means an end to the hyphen. We’re all just-plain Americans, and we’re all invested in how the economy does together, including the rich people. Point out that there aren’t any rich people hoping the market tanks. Point out there aren’t any men among McCain’s supporters, now expressing reluctance to go out and vote because of his DUMB OL’ GIRL running mate.

Remind us what the word “everyone” really means. Come up with some examples — there are a lot more than a few — of how the democrat party uses that word, when “some of us” is a lot closer to what they have in mind. Start out with the above-mentioned tax policy. Obama’s plan is supposed to work for all of us, and here he is defending it saying don’t worry, it only sticks it to five percent of taxpayers, the other ninety-five are sitting pretty.

Tell us that all democrat party plans are like that. That with the democrat party in charge, every little problem that comes along has a Snidely Whiplash due for a come-uppins’, even in cases where it’s inappropriate and irrelevant. Because it’s true. If anyone doubts you, talk about the Pelosi Congress. Two years in power, they’ve solved very little…but found lots of people to blame for things.

In view of that, it is quite absurd to seriously entertain the possibility Obama can bring us the “hope” or “change” anyone has in mind…let alone start debating it.

And if that doesn’t work, then Obama’s the Commander-in-Chief we deserve. Because that would mean our minds are already made up. Some young-handsome-guy comes along and uses buzzwords, presents himself as a uniter while he’s dividing people, an agent of change while naming a lifetime beltway fixture as his running mate, tax policies that work for “everyone” while making a big show out of sacrificing a tiny subset of the most productive taxpayers — and we just scarf it down. What’s the point of trying to discuss anything with an electorate like that? That’s like your kid telling you he isn’t stealing the cookies…mumbling around a mouthful of cookie. And you believing him.

Cross-posted at Right Wing News.

Another thing he could do to win over the electorate is inform us of how we can take some ownership in our bailouts.

Government is spending $85B to buy out AIG? Great. Then the government now owns $85B worth of AIG stock, carved out of the stock owned by the company itself and the board of directors who took it south. But it doesn’t STAY with the government. We take that $85B worth of AIG stock and distribute it to the taxpayers by the percentage of the total tax haul they put in last year. At $4 / share (being generous right now), that’s 21,250,000,000 shares of AIG that we need to divvy up amongst Americans. I don’t know the exact dollar amount of taxes collected for 2007, but the IRS does. They also know how much each person contributed. So, each person gets a percentage of those AIG shares equal to the percentage of the total tax revenue they contributed involuntarily.

GET something for the tax money spent on the bailout. REWARD the higher taxed people. People who paid no tax get no stock.

How’s THAT for an economic recovery plan McCain could get behind? With taxpaying Americans getting ownership in the companies we’re bailing out, people would FIND a way to make sure those companies become profitable.
- muttley | 09/21/2008 @ 14:19
As to McCain being more negative then Obama, it comes back to the Yin Yang divide between the parties. Republicans, being more Yin, will talk down their candidate in public, and pin for the candidate they really wanted. The Democrats, Yang to the core, are much better about “staying on message”. So the Democrats are always going to win the sound bite war.
- Robert Mitchell Jr. | 09/21/2008 @ 15:35
McCain isn’t comfortable with the way his campaign is being run, if you believe the latest meme being circulated by the punditcracy. Having not spoken with the Senator myself… I tend to believe this line of thought, nevertheless. I believe McCain went too negative of late. I personally think he should do a lil housecleaning in the top tier of his campaign. They’ve screwed the pooch, Big Time, and there best be a change in tone coming in McCain’s ads. Otherwise? The One will be the CinC. Aiiieee.
- Buck | 09/21/2008 @ 16:04

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McCain More Negative Than Obama?Sunday, September 21st, 2008

McCain More Negative Than Obama?
Sunday, September 21st, 2008