Tuesday, March 13, 2012

HITTING THE WRONG TARGET

Well, we aimed at Rush Limbaugh, in part because we wanted to undermine the entire panty-sniffing Republican Party, and, yes, we got Limbaugh:

Radio-Info.com reports that Premiere Networks, which syndicates the Rush Limbaugh show, told its affiliate radio stations that they are suspending national advertising for two weeks.... These spots are how Premiere makes its money off of Rush Limbaugh and other shows it syndicates....

But the Republican Party got away:

... At a time of rising gas prices, heightened talk of war with Iran and setbacks in Afghanistan, Mr. Obama's approval rating dropped substantially in recent weeks, the [New York Times/CBS] poll found, with 41 percent of respondents expressing approval of the job he is doing and 47 percent saying they disapprove....

In a hypothetical matchup against his most likely Republican opponent, Mitt Romney, Mr. Obama had a 47 percent to 44 percent advantage, a statistical dead heat given the poll’s margin of sampling error of 3 percentage points. Against Rick Santorum, the president drew 48 percent compared with 44 percent....


(And, of course, in the new ABC/Washington Post poll, which also shows a drop in Obama's approval, Romney is actually beating the president, and Santorum's just 3 points behind.)

The conventional wisdom is that the drop in Obama's numbers is all about gas prices, but no one's actually found a way to measure whether that's true -- the two things are happening simultaneously, so it's assumed there's a connection.

I suspect there might be a connection between Obama's numbers and the culture-war flareup. Thirty years of right-wing propaganda (eagerly retransmitted by mainstream-media centrists) have conditioned Americans to think liberalism is icky. Candidate Obama reinforced that message by running as a post-partisan in 2008, and by futilely trying to avoid partisan combat for most of his term. So now the White House and its allies are openly taking liberal positions. Eeeeeuuwwww! Icky liberals! And they're doing that when they should be drilling, baby, drilling, to get gas prices down! In the heartland, where there's nothing but right-wing talk and Jesus on the AM dial and the range of opinion extends from 57 varieties of extreme right wingery all the way to centrism and no further, I have to wonder whether that's the thinking. (And despite the Republican assault on reproductive rights, particularly in the states, I bet most of Heartland America thinks Democrats and liberals started this fight.)

And I'm not surprised that hitting Limbaugh doesn't even graze the Republican presidential candidates (not even Rick Santorum). Fox/talk-radio propaganda relentlessly informs right-wingers (and centrists) that liberalism and the "Democrat Party" are all one hydra-headed beast -- Barack Obama = Nancy Pelosi = Rosie O'Donnell = George Soros = the New Black Panthers = Sandra Fluke. Our side has never managed to make a similar case; we can't even seem to pull it off within the world of national politics, which means that Republican presidential candidates aren't even seen as being part of the same organization as the despised Republican members of Congress.

So congressional Republicans are despised, as is Limbaugh -- yet Romney and Santorum are competitive. There's no ripple effect from the anti-Limbaugh campaign. And there never will be until the Democratic/liberal message is that the Republican Party is the problem.

8 comments:

Tom Hilton said...

Agree that we need to do a better job of tying them all together (of course, we don't have a Fox News to do that, so...).

That said, I'm still skeptical of any polling at this stage showing Romney close to/even with/ahead of the President. I think for most people who aren't politics junkies, Romney is more "generic Republican" than, y'know, Romney. And "generic Republican" does better than any specific candidate out of this batch.

Not saying it won't take work, and there's always the possibility the economy will go to hell in the meantime, but at this point I would still put money on the President winning re-election.

Phil Freeman said...

I don't have a citation at hand but I seem to remember reading that at least one of these polls was much more heavily weighted toward Republican respondents than normal.

Raenelle said...

No. Take a bow for Limbaugh. There's always a deeper problem, IMO. The basic problem isn't the Republicans, it's a decadent plutocracy. No, it's capitalism itself. No, it's selfish desire that's at the root. Actually my favorite for the root problem is being trapped in a temporal dimension that only moves one way. But my point is that getting Limbaugh this badly should give us a little tingle of joy, even if it's fleeting.

Steve M. said...

Well, we haven't even gotten rid of Limbaugh yet. He's badly wounded, but he could very well pull through.

BH said...

We'll go through plenty of ups & downs before November, no doubt about it, but I'm with Tom - I'd still put a bet on re-election.

As to Limbaugh, he probably will limp (no pun intended) along at some level. As long as there's an audience for his crap and money to be made, he'll be on the air somewhere. But, by damn, we at least nailed him big-time once - which is ahead of where we were until now. More importantly, his hubris and consequent nailing (and the obvious craven fear of him displayed by Mitty, et al.) will tell mightily, come the fall.

Steve M. said...

I guess I more or less expect an Obama victory, but only because Romney will keep seeming un-have-a-beer-with-worthy in a Dukakis/Gore/Kerry way, and because he'll continue seeming like a clueless rich guy, not because Americans reject Republicanism. And even so, it'll be uncomfortably close.

Steve M. said...

By the way, I think Phil F. was thinking of this.

Erik A. Prince said...

The biggest danger of Obama losing in November, at least in my opinion, comes from Democratic apathy. If the vast bulk of voting Democrats comes out, I think Obama will win. However, if enough Dems feel like there's no real danger of a GOP win or they just lack enough enthusiasm to come out in large numbers . . . well, then we have a problem. I feel pretty confident that a good majority of Americans would choose Obama over any of the current GOP offerings, but it will all come down to who actually comes out to vote. That's what scares me a bit.