Question Authority

TvM has added Pat Shortridge to their already-imposing lineup of writers – and he comes out of the gate swinging with a great post on some poor assumptions that the conservative Presidential candidates are making – in this case, trying to court conservative voters by going through big conservative groups:

First, it’s incredibly stupid to try and reach conservative voters by talking to them through a group of folks in Washington, DC – or Arlington, VA in the DC suburbs.  The liberals found this out in 1980 when all the union bosses were lined up behind Carter and yet Reagan did incredibly well among union members by talking to them directly.

Thompson, and any other candidate of the center-right, will do well or poorly with conservatives depending on how well they speak to and deliver on our issues, not by how many endorsements they line up from group heads or party officials.  I can tell you first hand, the issues that top the list of concerns of conservative voters in America are often very different from the agenda of people who purport to speak for them in Washington.
Look at the polling data from ’06 if you want to see that in painful detail. There were a heck of a lot of pro-life, pro-marriage, socially conservative voters across America who pulled the lever for some extremely liberal candidates.

That is a huge point.  For people whose prime motivation in politics is not political idealism – like, 90-odd percent of the American voting public – group affiliations and the pronouncements of one consortium or another are pretty meaningless.  Especially among conservatives, who – outside the pro-life movement – really aren’t school fish.

To paraphrase Bill Clinton, it’s the vision, stupid.

Speaking of vision, Shortridge also remembers the GOP’s last successful big one  – the Contract with America, whose tenth anniversary was yesterday.  Shortridge was working for Dick Armey; my triviageekitude compels me to point out that Rep. Armey and I are both graduates of the same college

One thought on “Question Authority

  1. “”unlike those days in the past when I said “light” and I went on to crank out eight posts during the day – I mean it!””

    ONE! *laughing*

    Flash

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