Category: Politics and Grassroots

Holding higher education accountable (but some schools more than others)

~ Jim Eltringham ~ Leave a comment

Two stories that have been floating around in the last week haven’t really been connected in most media coverage, but they should have been.

The first is the US Department of Education’s website designed to “increase transparency” by providing prospective students with information on college costs – including tuition and fees and rates of increases over the past few years.  Education Secretary Arne Duncan says the hope is to keep students from being “saddled with unmanageable debt.”

Another story is the ongoing effort to exterminate for-profit colleges – the Strayers and Phoenixes of the world.  Last month the Obama Administration promised new rules on for-profits; earlier this week several Democrat Senators pounded their chests and released a statement condemning schools that exploited GI Bill benefits after they saw a story it on PBS.  (Of course, now that a statement has been released, the problem is sure to be cleared up.)

As a sidebar: When did seeing something on TV become a reason to make a statement?  Shouldn’t there be more study and consideration that goes into an official statement?

The Senators’ statement comes a few weeks after the Obama Administration promised to regulate for-profit colleges.  These so-called educational institutions, it seems, receive large amounts of federal funding through student aid programs and other grants but often leave students with student loan payments and questionable career prospects.

If that sounds familiar, it should, because that’s how just about every other institution of higher learning operates.

Tuitions and fees at saintly non-profit colleges have skyrocketed in the past several decades precisely because the cost of education has been so subsidized – from easy student loan programs to Pell grants to federal work study programs that pay two thirds of a student worker’s wage.  (Another sidebar: It just dawned on me that, due to the Federal Work Study program I once ran a snack bar with federal aid.  That means federal tax dollars went toward making sure people in Coolidge Hall at UMass got exceptional grilled cheese sandwiches served to them.  Suddenly, the existence crippling deficit makes a little bit more sense.)

How much have tuition rates risen?  Enough to motivate the Department of Education to launch a website so that students could keep score and avoid overpriced schools.  It’s a good thing those schools aren’t making money, too, or they’d be facing new regulations, too.

 

 

AARP grows up. Sort of.

~ Jim Eltringham ~ Leave a comment

I’m 32, but I’ve been getting AARP prospect mailings for several months now.  (As one might expect, my young trophy wife gets a kick out of that.)  Up until last week, joining would have been unthinkable even if I was of eligible age: for all the discounts, for all the membership benefits, the fact remains that AARP’s dabbling in politics more often than not resulted in advocacy for positions I disagreed with – specifically, their support for Ponzi schemes like Social Security.

Why would I pay my hard-earned money to people who wanted to separate me from my hard earned money?

AARP, though, has gone Romney on Social Security.  Last week, America’s voice for (some) seniors said it would be open to cuts, a position it has since waffled a bit on.

If AARP decides to take a firm stand, the facts and popular opinion are on their side.  Social Security is untenable as it exists now, and people understand that completely retiring at 65 is a pipe dream – unless, of course, they have taken the steps necessary in their youth to prepare for that.  A recent study that AARP commissioned showed that four of five Baby Boomers expect to delay retirement for five years, one in seven doesn’t believe they will be able to retire.

People are starting to get how dumb the idea of government-sponsored retirement starting in what is now middle age is.

I’m not running out to join AARP anytime soon – after all, they are still complaining about other entitlement programs – but their flip on Social Security is significant.  On the surface, it looks like the group realized just how bad the program’s situation is right now.  Supporting Social Security and perpetuating the Ponzi scheme does nothing for me and the other folks in their 30’s already getting AARP mailers.

Incidentally, this is a great opportunity for an offensive from the supporters of small government.  Private and public thank you notes to AARP might help their flip go mainstream and show other people just how dangerous rampant entitlement spending can be.

After all, if AARP can be convinced, maybe there’s hope for the population at large?

 

 

 

GOP nabs headlines, OFA nabs volunteers

~ Jim Eltringham ~ Leave a comment

While the Republican contenders and pretenders debated in the Granite State, the Obama Campaign quietly kicked off what it hopes will be a “summer of team building” with an online volunteer briefing.  Organizing for America’s Mitch Stewart led the largely unsurprising session, sketching out the campaign’s overall plan for recruiting volunteers and getting out the vote.  There were, however, some tactical points that were worth noting.

Just like the 2008 incarnation of the Obama campaign – and, really, any organization worth its salt – Obama/Biden ’12 seems rightly obsessed with amassing volunteers and securing firm commitments to action.  The central effort seemed to be a push to ask volunteers to host house parties, recruiting After Stewart’s overview of the basics, the webinar asked participants whether they could either host or attend a house party (along with inviting others to attend as well).

The neatest part came at the end, when participants were invited to turn on their webcams.  A collage of the real-time feeds allowed participants to see and even wave to each other:

This is another early preview of what figures to be a consistent theme for Obama ’12.  Remember that the announcement video for the re-election effort did not feature the candidate, instead focusing on campaign surrogates and volunteers.   Other faces – including, wherever possible, those of grassroots supporters – will allow the Obama campaign to create a wall of separation between the candidate and the dirty business of politics.

The result? Obama looks Presidential while his subordinates ramp up the country’s first billion-dollar campaign.

Cross-posted at PunditLeague.us.

Gingrich and his “campaign on ideas”

~ Jim Eltringham ~ Leave a comment

Newt Gingrich’s assertion that he and his consultants had a “strategic difference” over the colour and the shape of his Presidential campaign called to mind a slogan from years gone by: “In your heart, you know he’s right.”

Gingrich’s stated goal is admirable: a campaign based on ideas and “solutions” rather than… well, rather than whatever it is that campaigns are based on.  Depending on whose chatter you believe, his consultants felt that the campaign should have been more oriented toward grassroots retail politics that feature the candidate spending lots of time in Iowa, attending campaign events, and engaging in the type of retail politics that end with him asking voters for their support.

There’s a reason that many consultants like that approach: it leads to victories, and consultants are paid to win.  When Gingrich reached the apex of his power in 1995, the “consultant mindset” on political races was very different: political pros were high on television ads, which were expensive and profitable.  Especially in the last ten years, there has been a better appreciation of the grassroots ground game – starting with Democratic efforts in 2000 and cemented into the DNA of both parties by the 2004 Bush/Cheney campaign.

For Gingrich to criticize the “consultant culture” now is less powerful than it would have been 15 years ago.

Ideas cannot survive without tactics which convey those ideas to the voters; tactics that reach the voters without ideas will not win elections.  The two sides represent a ying and yang of campaign politics that Gingrich appears ready to ignore.

In 1964, supporters of Barry Goldwater understood that their candidate had all the right ideas.  The fact that we was defeated so soundly led many to realize that isn’t enough to win an elections.

Elections are fought for ideas, not with ideas.  Gingrich’s words and the campaign exodus suggest he is pursuing the latter.  If his actions match his words over the next few months, he might as well not even participate in the Republican primary.

Sarah Palin needs James Carville

~ Jim Eltringham ~ Leave a comment

Here’s the headline from Sarah Palin’s Facebook post yesterday: “Another ‘WTF’ Obama Foreign Policy Moment.”  The content of Palin’s post, by and large, is actually quite interesting stuff about how many secrets we are simply giving away to the Russians.  That’s a pretty intelligent topic, and Palin does grasp it.  But even in discussing an issue over which she has mastery, Palin leans on blunt-force and simplistic messaging.  “WTF” is, of course, shorthand for “what the f—.”

It’s vulgar and coarse and unfitting a President.  And as long as Palin continues to look unpresidential, she will only be considered a Presidential contender by a cadre of Ron Paul-esque followers and the “lamestream” media she claims to abhor but who gives her more attention than she currently deserves.  She will win nothing.

A Presidential adviser might be able to get away with such language, and perhaps Palin needs a James Carville.  Bill Clinton could never have dismissed allegations of his extramarital affairs as the product of dragging a $100 bill through a trailer park.  Carville did, and in doing so he said what many people were thinking but afraid to say.   He acted as the lightning rod for criticism, but he got his boss’s message out there.

Instead, Palin tries to be both the candidate and the firebrand.  She too often talks down to an electorate that is really looking for someone who can talk up to them.

This is part of the challenge Palin and other outsiders face in political campaigns; the inability to surround themselves with media-savvy professionals leads to clumsy, overly populist messaging.  Sure, a few will take it seriously, but most will either dismiss it out of hand or respond with a quizzical “WTF?”

 

Time for T-Paw to re-think video strategy?

~ Jim Eltringham ~ Leave a comment

For the most part, Tim Pawlenty has done a good job of using YouTube.  His team clearly understand the online video medium as a unique communications vehicle, rather than as a place to warehouse TV ads.  Pawlenty and Co. use video often, and the videos are stylistically consistent.

But this video, entitled “Behind-the-scenes at Gov. Tim Pawlenty’s announcement in Des Moines, IA” and posted last week, is a bit disappointing:

That’s not a “Behind the Scenes” video.  Those are actual scenes.  There are clips of the speech and clips from the media coverage of Pawlenty’s announcement, but no candid moments from the candidate.  The best part of the video is a mere ten-second stretch featuring Pawlenty supporters explaining their support.

Now imagine this as the “behind-the-scenes” video” instead:  60 seconds of people in the Pawlenty crowd talking about why they came out to support T-Paw, cut with pictures of homemade signs, and maybe even ten seconds of the candidate talking with supporters in a handshake line.  There would be no music and no voice-overs.

Tim Pawlenty is going to spend the next few months juxtaposed against two incredibly polished professional politicians in Mitt Romney and Barack Obama.  He will need to be able to contrast himself from both.  His videos are not bad, but standing alone they will give the impression that Pawlenty is trying to out-Romney Romney or out-Obama Obama.  If he tries to be someone he is not, Pawlenty will lose his fight for the nomination.

In a campaign where he constantly reiterates the need for honesty and sincerity, Pawlenty would be wise to let some of that come out – and let his videos create a mood rather than a separation between him and the voters.

Own it! (Unless it’s your health or retirement)

~ Jim Eltringham ~ Leave a comment

The Obama campaign launched a neat fundraising program this week to get going on their way to America’s first $1 billion marketing campaign for a political candidate.  The program matches first time donors with previous donors who agreed to participate it a matching program.

Cool stuff, but the rationale behind the need for such aggressive fundraising was just as eye-catching:

Taking ownership of the campaign is an essential part of the experience, right alongside making phone calls, knocking on doors, and taking responsibility for getting your network of friends, colleagues, and neighbors to join us.

Relying on each other to own this campaign isn’t just the most viable way we can grow a truly grassroots organization — it’s also the right way to do politics. Taking money from Washington lobbyists or special-interest PACs is the easy path — and every single one of our prospective opponents is racing down it.

Taking giant pools of money from political interests?  Not a chance.  The right way to do things is for individuals – not institutions – to each do their part and take responsibility to do things on their own.  Anything else would be a shortcut, doomed to create unintended consequences and fail.

At least, that’s how it works for political campaigns.  If it’s something like health care, retirement, or taking care of the less fortunate then, by all means, surrender control to centralized political entities.

Even better if they are run by special interests.

T-Paw’s impeccable timing

~ Jim Eltringham ~ Leave a comment

He may not win the GOP nomination, but Tim Pawlenty has his timing down pat.

From the carefully timed announcement of his exploratory committee – before any other major contender, but not too early – to his Johnny-on-the-spot criticisms of the current administration, Pawlenty has been quick on the draw at just the right moment.

It happened again today, with Pawlenty’s official announcement of his Presidential bid.

The big story over the weekend was Mitch Daniels bowing out of the race.  The stories about the “weak” Republican field were already written: you saw them after Mike Huckabee’s exit earlier this month, and even after Donald Trump’s withdrawal before that.  Each time that story gets rewritten, it’s bad news for Tim Pawlenty; it makes the Republican field sound like Mitt Romney and the Seven Dwarfs, with him as one of the dwarfs.  (Possibly Bashful.)

By announcing just two days after Daniels’s deferral, Pawlenty answers those stories without whining that he’s being overlooked.  He keeps his donors and activists engaged, and he keeps his campaign moving forward.

And that’s all he has to do right now.  With Daniels stepping aside, the path for Pawlenty to the nomination becomes clearer:  has a sporting shot at winning the Iowa caucuses, and after he’s a very plausible contender in South Carolina and possibly Florida.  Coming out of the early states within striking distance of Romney would make Pawlenty a viable alternative for conservative activists who can’t get excited about Romney’s policy baggage (i.e. health care).

Slow and steady may not sound like the way to win a presidential race, but at this point who’s going to argue with Pawlenty’s timing?