By Karen Tumulty and Paul Kane Washington Post Staff Writers, Saturday, July 17, 2010
Sometime after Labor Day, House Minority Leader John A. Boehner plans to unveil a blueprint of what Republicans will do if they take back control of the chamber. He promises it will be a full plate of policy proposals that will give voters a clear sense of how they would govern.
But will Republicans actually want to run on those ideas -- or any ideas? Behind the scenes, many are being urged to ignore the leaders and do just the opposite: avoid issues at all costs.
Some of the party's most influential political consultants are quietly counseling their clients to stay on the offensive for the November midterm elections and steer clear of taking stands on substance that might give Democratic opponents material for a counterattack.
"The smart political approach would be to make the election about the Democrats," said Neil Newhouse of the powerhouse Republican polling firm Public Opinion Strategies, which is advising more than 50 House and Senate candidates.
In terms of our individual campaigns, I don't think it does a great deal of good" to engage in a debate over the Republicans' own agenda.
Others are skeptical that any Republican policy proposals will have much of an impact. "They really still have to have a sharp contrast with the Democrats," said John McLaughlin, another leading Republican pollster whose firm counts both the House and Senate campaign committees among its clients.
They really need to drive that home before people will be willing to listen to what Republicans stand for.
It's not that Boehner (Ohio) is arguing for a cease-fire. The debate among Republicans comes down to this: The speaker-in-waiting, for all his love of political combat, thinks that voters will not trust GOP candidates if their attacks don't also provide at least some substance.
The consultants argue that public anger, if properly stoked, alone can carry the party over the finish line. In their view, getting bogged down in the issues is a distraction and even a potential liability.
One who begs to differ is the architect of the last GOP takeover of the House. "Consultants, in my opinion, are stupid," former speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.) said in an interview. "The least idea-oriented, most mindless campaign of simplistic slogans is a mindless idea."
The working title for Boehner's promised agenda is "Commitment to America." It is an unmistakable echo of the fabled 10-point "Contract with America" that Gingrich and his battalion of long-shot candidates signed on the steps on the Capitol in 1994, six weeks before they stunned the political world and won the House.
Yet the strategist who Republicans are studying most closely this year isn't Gingrich: It's Rahm Emanuel, the former Democratic congressman from Chicago and current White House chief of staff.
Emanuel led the 2006 campaign that put the House back in Democratic hands 12 years after Gingrich's Republican Revolution.
One clue to the balance Boehner is trying to strike between heat and light: House Republican leaders are passing around an old Time magazine story about Emanuel's 2006 election strategy. His formula was for candidates to spend 80 percent of their time on the attack and 20 percent on the issues.
Republicans in the Senate, with dimmer prospects of gaining control, are plotting a much simpler course. Their platform, to the degree they have one, is to offer themselves as an even bigger roadblock to the Democrats than they are now.
See the complete article at http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/07/16/AR2010071606245.html?hpid=topnews
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But will Republicans actually want to run on those ideas -- or any ideas? Behind the scenes, many are being urged to ignore the leaders and do just the opposite: avoid issues at all costs.
Some of the party's most influential political consultants are quietly counseling their clients to stay on the offensive for the November midterm elections and steer clear of taking stands on substance that might give Democratic opponents material for a counterattack.
"The smart political approach would be to make the election about the Democrats," said Neil Newhouse of the powerhouse Republican polling firm Public Opinion Strategies, which is advising more than 50 House and Senate candidates.
In terms of our individual campaigns, I don't think it does a great deal of good" to engage in a debate over the Republicans' own agenda.
Others are skeptical that any Republican policy proposals will have much of an impact. "They really still have to have a sharp contrast with the Democrats," said John McLaughlin, another leading Republican pollster whose firm counts both the House and Senate campaign committees among its clients.
They really need to drive that home before people will be willing to listen to what Republicans stand for.
It's not that Boehner (Ohio) is arguing for a cease-fire. The debate among Republicans comes down to this: The speaker-in-waiting, for all his love of political combat, thinks that voters will not trust GOP candidates if their attacks don't also provide at least some substance.
The consultants argue that public anger, if properly stoked, alone can carry the party over the finish line. In their view, getting bogged down in the issues is a distraction and even a potential liability.
One who begs to differ is the architect of the last GOP takeover of the House. "Consultants, in my opinion, are stupid," former speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.) said in an interview. "The least idea-oriented, most mindless campaign of simplistic slogans is a mindless idea."
The working title for Boehner's promised agenda is "Commitment to America." It is an unmistakable echo of the fabled 10-point "Contract with America" that Gingrich and his battalion of long-shot candidates signed on the steps on the Capitol in 1994, six weeks before they stunned the political world and won the House.
Yet the strategist who Republicans are studying most closely this year isn't Gingrich: It's Rahm Emanuel, the former Democratic congressman from Chicago and current White House chief of staff.
Emanuel led the 2006 campaign that put the House back in Democratic hands 12 years after Gingrich's Republican Revolution.
One clue to the balance Boehner is trying to strike between heat and light: House Republican leaders are passing around an old Time magazine story about Emanuel's 2006 election strategy. His formula was for candidates to spend 80 percent of their time on the attack and 20 percent on the issues.
Republicans in the Senate, with dimmer prospects of gaining control, are plotting a much simpler course. Their platform, to the degree they have one, is to offer themselves as an even bigger roadblock to the Democrats than they are now.
See the complete article at http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/07/16/AR2010071606245.html?hpid=topnews
Subscribe to the Rightardia feed: feeds.feedburner.com/blogspot/IGiu
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