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From me:
“Maybe he was so good at counter-punching in his political assent” should be ascent
“Thinking specifically about Iceland and Greece.” More specifically I was thinking about Iceland and IRELAND. You know, Ireland could be translated as ANGRY-land. To be fair, they often have really good reasons to be angry.
Chris–what examples of Obama being “productized” can you produce? I can’t think of any.
I like to think of myself as part Irish although its not true at all–but Ireland refers to one of its three founding Goddesses. Nothing angry about it.
Beautiful land too if you ever get a chance to visit.–any and every part will give you a new appreciation of “green” even if you have been to the Amazon, Congo, Prince Edward Island, and New Zealand. Yes, a very special kind of green.
#82 Ire = Anger… I obviously don’t think that is literally\historically true, just a play on words.
As to Obama being “productized,” yeah I can think of a lot of examples. First, let me say that it’s a slightly BS word. Second, I see you slipping back into the word police role. Happy to indulge though.
The Obama campaign was operating on a lot of levels that Dems usually don’t too well on. Remember the profusion of Women-for, Republicans-for, Independents-for signs. This was a lot more varied than Dems usually do, both to show Obama noticed\valued the groups in question as well as showing he was universally applicable to all groups.
Obama & Wife were also very eager to associate themselves with the image of JFK. Obama most obviously did this by playing his youth, style, promise, attractiveness while using Teddy Sorensen’s words. Michelle was actively styling herself as Jackie at the same time. Ted Kennedy added the official family seal of approval. Every Democratic candidate relates themselves to the party heroes, but this was a direct appropriation of the Kennedy mantle.
Obama’s message discipline was outstanding. He picked the appropriate branding concept to fit the times, and never strayed too far from that. There was a lot of joking that from the Democratic convention in ’04 until being elected that he gave exactly one speech, just switching out the backdrops.
Obama was never a guy with some timely ideas, he was more… a symbol, an idea, an essential element in the historical continuum… a product.
#80, Even in that case you still end up hosing the rich. I can live with that. Income\wealth inequality has increased dramatically since the 1980′s, due largely to GOP led tax policy. Before you disagree, please tell me which income quartile benefits almost EXCLUSIVELY from the change in capital gains rates.
I’ve been looking through the posts The Voice made wrt the effective tax rates. He’s right if not off a percentage or two. It doesn’t matter.
One thing I posted shows the rich are currently responsible for twice their “fair share” of taxes, percentage-wise. Is that not enough?
That being said, I am not sure what difference it makes in how you restructure the taxes. The fact of the matter is we’ve spent ourselves into a hole. Any bankruptcy lawyer will tell you that it is time to cut back and restructure your debt (as you pointed out).
The politicians we elect are not keeping a tidy house. They can’t appoint anyone who might actually know what they are doing due to the political wrangling that goes on just to get them appointed. In the end, whichever of the two major parties is in charge is going to make their own decisions anyway, based on what is going to get them re-elected.
#80, I was thinking more in the sense of a public veto. Yeah, CA proves that needing public acquiescence to originate policy is a VERY BAD idea. Listening to massive public outrage to stop policy move *might* be a good idea.
I think this same thing could be accomplished simply by repealing the 17th amendment.
The Senators were originally tasked with watching out for State’s Rights. Now they are just a longer term version of the House of Representatives.
One was responsible for listening to the mob. The other was supposed to be a check to ensure the federal government didn’t get too greedy.
Now they both listen to the mob.
From The Federalist No. 62
[The Senate] is recommended by the double advantage of favoring a select appointment, and of giving to the State governments such an agency in the formation of the federal government as must secure the authority of the former, and may form a convenient link between the two systems.
[...]
Another advantage accruing from this ingredient in the constitution of the Senate is, the additional impediment it must prove against improper acts of legislation. No law or resolution can now be passed without the concurrence, first, of a majority of the people, and then, of a majority of the States.
He then goes on to explain why it is bad to have a “continual change of opinions” controlling the legislature. Too much to quote.
Why bother to create a third branch of the government when we already have the means to prevent faulty legislation from being passed in the first place?
#80/#84, When I wrote, “It doesn’t matter,” I meant changing the tax code doesn’t matter based on what The Voice wrote.
#83–chris==yes, always the word police, in the nature that we all should be.
The examples you give do not display the attribute of being productized which you characterized as being “He was presented like Gold Bond medical powder. Got any kind of problem with government\modern society\general boredom? Just sprinkle some Obama on it!”
You present a totally different issue.
You continue the empty rhetoric with: “Obama was never a guy with some timely ideas, he was more… a symbol, an idea, an essential element in the historical continuum… a product.” ///
Timely ideas is exactly what Obama presented ((note the conflict with the apposite notion he is the cure for everything?????)): Stop the War in Iraq when everyone else was for it. Sounded good to me.
Reform Healthcare. Sounded good to me.
Close Gitmo. Didn’t really care.
Lets stop acting like cowboys on the world stage. Sounded good to me.=====etc.
All candidates become a symbol or an idea. Nothing new/different there.
“an essential element in the historical continuum…”–empty rhetoric.
Well you got communication skills. Spiff up your substance and you will go far. Or not. Depends on the substance. Ha. ha.
#87
You’re conflating two different things I said, in effect trying to make me defend a connection YOU make.
I compared the way Obama was oversold to Gold Bond in #76 and called him productized in #79. Those are two different things even though they go to towards the same theme. The first deals with the content of the message, and the second deals with stuff that goes into making the image.
The sales machine surrounding Bush II was also very polished. His operatives were wonderful at setting the stage. Then W would get up and obviously lack basic command of both language and issues.
“All candidates become a symbol or an idea. Nothing new/different there.”
That’s true, but the relationship of the essential qualities of the candidate and the sales machine are going to vary from case to case.
In spite of excellent branding, we got to know Bush II(communication deficit) and Palin(intelligence deficit) very quickly. Clinton was entirely too undisciplined to create a proper brand, although his mind\heart seemed to be in the right place(not going to mention the other bits). People found him personally endearing or infuriating, depending, but always from the personal perspective.
Chris–”in fairness” it is YOU who have conflated the two. You defended the first point by making the second. Deft, but observable.
Clinton established himself very early as compassionate: “I feel your pain.” and later as a workaholic, triangulator, and slippery.
If YOU have not conflated the two, then tell me again (ie–once, the “first time”) how Obama was “oversold” as the solution to all problems? Just like Gold Bond or otherwise?
# 89
“”in fairness” it is YOU who have conflated the two. You defended the first point by making the second. Deft, but observable.”
Nope, they were different points entirely. You accused me of cribbing a nice zinger from some other source and I denied intentionally having done that( although leaving open the possibility I might have done it unconsciously). End of issue one.
Then you seized on the use of a single word: productized. For political candidates I would define it as the use of symbolism, message discipline and individually targeting the pitch to different groups. The end result is an easily comprehensible and salable product. Maybe branding is a better word for it, but I like choosing my own words even if I do so imperfectly. It still looks obvious in the original context, and in the longer explanation I provided in response to your challenge. Let me make it clear, again, that an advanced marketing campaign that tells people BOTH how to THINK and FEEL about a product doesn’t have anything to do with the content of the claims being made or the truthfulness of those claims. End of issue two.
And now to the content of Obama’s claims. I’d dispute your notion was an ideas man, Hillary was much more detailed in her policy proposals. Obama’s tone through both the primary and general was that he was the calm adult in a room of squabbling children. This appealed mightily to the core of his base in the early primaries: college kids. The best example of that tone was doing the Jay-Z style brushing off of his shoulder in one of the primary debates. Rather than respond to an attack it was acceptable enough to just look cool.
The specific method to appear ready to confront problems was to describe them in detail. This suggested that current pols were too dense or busy fighting to understand the policy landscape, something that is absolutely not the case.
The media played their part, as well. I’m not sure if the reason for that was true belief, happiness at the ad buys, or assurances that Obama was no actual threat. Maybe all of the above.
Simply looking at approval polls will show a dramatic shift in perception in Obama’s first year. He lost 20% approval by December of ’09, and it has been largely static since.
chris–at #78 I said: “Chris–its obvious you are thinking of something that statement is derived from, but meaningless rhetoric should be avoided.” I don’t see any accusation of “cribing” there–read just what it says. When what you post doesn’t make any sense or does not seem supported, it may still have some valid root idea that it is proxy for and just got garbled/confused in traslating “idea” to words.
You might have cribbed, but I was thinking you had an idea all your own that just wasn’t getting out. But our discussion is now lost in words. Better to give it a fresh start on another thread.
The truth “normally” will out itself. Or not, if you get captured by dogma.
“But our discussion is now lost in words.”
You do that, not me. You pick one word out of pages of material and harp on that. If you’ve got a better formulation I’m happy to hear it. In the absence of that I don’t want to hear that my ideas are malformed in an unspecified way.
I don’t always have the time or energy to post on DU, but I do read it fairly often even if I’m not actively involved. Recently I’ve noticed that you are being more direct with people and taking on their ideas head-on. That’s all to the good.
As to the way candidates are positioned on issues and presented to the pubic… it does go back to real stuff that I’ve seen. Politics is the local industry where I live and work. People would be really surprised how much agreement there is among the ideological extremes, except for the occasional fanatic. You might only get to that over a Single Malt or Straight Kentucky Bourbon, and then there is usually an element of sadness that commonalities just won’t sell.
On my end I should be looking earlier at what kinds of things I can source easily enough and what is nearly impossible to source. Then I can just acknowledge something as a disagreement and step off.
It takes two to harp-and I was quite specific.
Keep posting, you have a fresh voice.