Memo to the GOP Retreat

[Valin]

Hugh Hewitt:

Hugh Hewitt

1/17/13

 

Dear GOP Members:

 

This new article from The Hill suggests that you will lose the majority if you fight for entitlement reform in the course of the debt ceiling hike battle.

 

It also seems to suggest that you can keep the majority by not fighting with the president.

 

Tom Cole and Tom Davis are messaging you, not the public, that your jobs are endangered --or at least the fundraising pull, the staff and the offices that go with the majority-- are at risk if the backbenches don't quietly get behind whatever it is the Speaker wants to do.

 

Note that the entire piece is empty of policy prescription. This is the problem.

 

(Snip)

 

You'd also be having a debate about what to do, not about how disorganized and leaderless you are. The president never talks about process. He talks about his proposals. And as terrible as those proposals might be --no matter how disconnected they are from reality-- they appear to be more serious than your Conference because your Conference doesn't talk about anything. The leadership never appears on air.

 

[Valin]

Transcript: Ari Fleischer on the GOP's communciations problem

Thursday, January 17, 2013

 

HH: As House Republicans leave the Beltway headed to Williamsburg to have a retreat on how to communicate with the American people and the agenda, I thought I would check in with some of the *best communicators on the GOP side. And perhaps leading in that rank is Ari Fleischer, longtime press secretary to George W. Bush when he was president, you see him now on CNN all the time. Ari Fleischer, welcome to the Hugh Hewitt Show, great to have you on.

 

(snip)

 

HH: Now you and I fundamentally disagree on that, but that’s okay. If they just announced what their policy was, and did it again and again, I would be in favor of that. But they’re making you and me guess what they’re doing. How long can that go on?

 

AF: Well, that’s because they are genuinely split. There’s a real divide inside the House Republican caucus about whether or not they should push default. There are some people who think that it’s exaggerated, that the risks of default are exaggerated, the government will be able to figure out a way to pay its bills anyway. And I just think that’s too big a risk to take.

 

HH: And again, that’s good, and I understand there’s that division. But in terms of communicating what they’re arguing about, should they do that publicly? Because what I am very frustrated with is you can’t find a Republican to talk about, in the leadership. You’ll find people like Congressman John Campbell who comes on the program a lot, we had Joe Wilson on yesterday, we have lots of guys who will come on who are not in the leadership to talk about…Greg Walden was on yesterday, and he was pretty blunt. But in terms of hash it out, let people hear what the debate’s about, I think that would be helpful, Ari.

 

(Snip)

 

* Not sure I would call him one of the best...if memory serves.

[Valin]

The Republicans, Risk Aversion, And The Limits Of Rhetorical Outreach

January 18, 2013

Pete Spiliakos

 

Robert Costa and Andrew Stiles have written an interesting and mostly heartening article about the House Republican retreat. The House Republicans seem to be asking a lot of the right questions. One section pulled me up a little short:

 

Minority outreach is a priority. Greg Walden, who is also chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee, acknowledged the obvious at his press conference: Republicans have done a poor job of reaching out to Hispanics and other minority groups. But he predicted that House Republicans would make improvements in the run-up to the 2014 election. “We just have bad communications in many cases,” Walden said. On Friday, the topic will be explored at length in a morning session featuring Ana Navarro, a Hispanic political strategist.

 

Communication is big part of the problem, but it can’t be separated from the policy and intracoalitional tensions within the Republican party. Take the health care issue. A wide majority of Hispanics approved of Obamacare. So did a http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503544_162-57404342-503544/poll-47-disapprove-of-obama-health-care-law/] of young voters. This even though Obamacare actually shifts health care costs upon the young.

 

Rhetoric explains some of what went wrong in the above polls. Most Republican presidential candidates couldn’t make a case against Obamacare Romneycare to Republican primary voters never mind to nonwhites and ideologically uncommitted younger whites. But the problem isn’t just how Republicans criticized Obamacare. It is also how Republicans have approached health care policy generally.