Jon at GOP BLOGGERS makes a case I’ve made [1] often enough of late:
I can’t avoid the conclusion that this should be a fantastic political environment for Republicans. Before you think this sounds crazy, read on.
Only 22% of Americans approve of the job Congress is doing [2], which makes President Bush’s ratings seem stratospheric. Furthermore, only 14% of Americans express a great deal or quite a lot of confidence in Congress [3], which puts it dead last in Gallup’s poll on this topic (even below HMOs). In this context, shouldn’t it be easy to run against expanding government and, in fact, in favor of limiting government? After all, whether the issue is entitlements, health care or education, all supposedly strong Democratic issues, shouldn’t Republicans do well by simply ask voters “whom do you trust?”
Well, given the responses to recent polling of the democrats about the president, specifically that the republicans knew that the world trade center was going to be hit , etc., I wouldn’t put much of anything past te Democrats right now. Still, in terms of common sense, this argument seems to have a lot of weight behind it.
In the end, the message should be all about trust and empowerment. In this day and age, asking voters whether they trust a bunch of political hacks more than they trust themselves should yield an obvious answer. And it should be a winner to tell Americans that we want to empower them to take control and responsibility for their own lives, with government assitstance for those less priviledged directed towards individuals to use in the free market instead of towards bloated monopolistic bureacracies. In 2008, we need crisp differentiation from socialist-leaning Democrats rather than strategies aimed at confusing the public about those distinctions (see Schip [4]). I believe it’s a winning message, especially in a time in which politicians are viewed so negatively.
Indeed; and that’s precisely why I’ve gotten behind Fred Thompson, even before he declared. Those are precisely the noises he’s been making for some time, now. Frankly, he’s been making the case for exactly that kind of a campaign for himself, far more convincingly than anybody else on the campaign trail it the moment. which, in turn, is precisely why he’s been such a dominant force even before he was running. He’s already in control of the republican primary narrative just on the strength of those issues alone. And I think Jon is right; it’s an idea that will sell very easily with the American people.