The Country Isn't Stupid or Delusional - They Just Want Results

[stopbush]

Voters are like a baseball coach who goes to his bullpen. You put a pitcher in because you know what he can do in a certain situation. If he fails, you pull him and go to the next guy.

That's what happened in 2008, and that's what happened in 2010.

The fact is that many in the country believe that Obama didn't get results. The fact is that he did.

So who's fault is it that the country didn't know this? Well, it's Team Obama's fault, that's who.

First rule of marketing - if your message isn't getting out, it's not the fault of the customer. It's your fault.

Effective messaging and effective marketing is based on 1. your message conveying what can be conceived as being a beneficial truism, and 2. repetition.

The Rs were more effective in delivering a message that Obama didn't do anything helpful, and that everything he did do was actually harmful. Team Obama should have looked at every one of those pronouncements from the Rs as an opportunity to seize the moment and deliver the message of change and accomplishment. By not doing so, they allowed the Rs to set the message that played to the electorate: ie: you need to change pitchers, cause this guy ain't throwing strikes.

And I'm afraid that they're allowing the Rs to continue in this mode. One would hope they had learned their lesson. Looks like maybe they haven't.

[babylonsister]

1. Baloney. Then explain this:

if this isn't stupid, I don't know what is.

"Usually, far-right Republicans get elected and then become criminals..."
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x9467092

[bobbolink]

19. You've been calling them "stupid" for years now. How is that working out for you?

[mcar]

2. They want results so they put the pitcher who failed back in?

Sorry,the analogy doesn't make sense. I live in FL and I can tell you that people are stupid and delusional - they've just elected a known crook to the governor's office. It wasn't hidden information; it was out there in all the media and the crook was asked about it time and time again. He still got elected. I saw one post on a local TV news station that said "because he'll protect the unborn."

That's stupid and delusional. Florida will not see results. Florida will see devastation - in our economy, our environment and our education system. Because stupid and delusional idiots voted into office a criminal.

[stopbush]

22. You fail to realize that the public doesn't see those tea party candidates

as Republican candidates. They see them as a "new guy" who deserves a shot.

This much is clear - the public realizes that the Rs are a bunch of self-centered, self-serving jerks, but at least they have the firmness of their convictions. The public doesn't expect much from the Rs, but maybe some of the self-serving attitude with fall my way. They are more than happy when they get a little from the Rs. It's like getting a small discount from Disneyland (who seldom give discounts)as opposed to getting a large discount every day from WalMart (where prices are always reduced). Most people will talk about the "unbelievable discount" they got from Disneyland, simply because it never happens, while the WalMart discount is expected and no big deal.

The public expects the Ds to do things. Lots of things. They realize that the Ds are responsible for all of the good social programs in this country. So when they put the Ds in charge, they expect BIG things to happen. And, they expect to feel good about the big things that happened.

But they aren't going to feel good about it if they think that nothing happened. So, it's back to the bullpen.

[Uzybone]

3. wrong. They are dumb as rocks. No excuses for them.

[stopbush]

11. You let Team Obama off the hook for their own failure to communicate.

The point is that they DID deliver the goods, but the country thinks they didn't.

That's what happens when you don't make it clear that the bank bailout was a bush program, and you get saddled with an albatross around your neck that someone else created. That's what happens when you bury $300-billion in stimulus spending in a tax cut that nobody knows they received. It may have been craven and wasteful when bushco sent out a letter telling Americans they were getting a tax refund (at the cost of $35M for a "refund" that was actually an advance against your expected tax return), but people remember that they "got a tax cut from bush" while they don't even know they got one from Obama. The difference? bushco knew how to market their tax cut.

Look, I currently work in the non-profit world where people are always making the erroneous assumption that whatever marketing effort we can afford to make is good enough. That, "if people didn't read our flier there's something wrong with them." You delude yourself when you think "we did everything we could have" to get your message across if your message is obviously not getting across.

There's a reason that big box companies advertise over multiple platforms like TV, radio, newspapers, websites and billboards at the same time. They know that different people encounter different media, and that multiple media reinforces here what someone already saw there.

When are the Ds going to learn that effective marketing is as simple as the old "ABC" method made famous in Glengarry/Glenross - "Always be Closing," as in, always be closing the deal. To close the deal, you need to sell the deal. The selling never stops, at least it doesn't if you're an effective salesman.

Are you going to tell me that Team Obama was engaged in an ABC marketing job in selling their results and accomplishments? Don't think so.

[EFerrari]

4. People are out of work and losing their homes. Who is speaking to that? n/t

[nadinbrzezinski]

5. It is the economy stupid

this is what this is about.

[DrDan]

6. I agree with you - the first day of college I learned a lesson that has stuck with me since

it is not enough to be fair, you must appear to be fair.

Same applies here - it is not enough to deliver, you must appear to deliver. That is what this adminstration has not done - appear to have delivered. That is what the voters are saying.

[tammywammy]

15. Good post, I agree. n/t

[bobbolink]

21. But its much more fun to keep doing the same losing things and calling your opponents "stupid".

Its good for the blood pressure... or something...

[zbdent]

7. If a Democrat does something great, and the "liberally biased media" refuses to report it ...

did it really happen?

Yes ... but no media person wanted it to be known.

[stopbush]

20. At which point it's up to the D to make even more noise to get their message out.

Honestly, it's not like there are no channels available to get out the message. Start with MSNBC - KO & Rachel will put anyone on that you provide. You're getting a raw deal on NBC? Call MSNBC and offer to have Biden or Obama or anybody to do an interview. Build a narrative and a case and eventually that message WILL move beyond the echo chamber and into the mainstream. How do you think the Rs do it? They use Faux to get the message started, that's how.

The fact is that every "liberal media outlet" in the world can ignore your message for only so long IF you stick to that message. You refuse to talk about anything that you don't want to talk about. You CONTROL the message. Duh!

Acting like there is no way to get the truth out is just whining. Nothing more, nothing less.

[hendo]

8. Good Analysis.

Team Obama did a horrible job marketing itself as successful, because of that the tea party controlled the conversation.

[DefenseLawyer]

9. It's both. n/t

[Ron Green]

10. The country may want results, but they are stupid and delusional as well.

What, they want the government to do what the free market won't? To create living-wage jobs in this country?

[gkhouston]

12. Then they chose a piss-poor way to get them. n/t

[NNN0LHI]

13. You must have missed this then

http://www.nytimes.com/2001/09/24/us/a-nation-challenged-a-snapshot-gives-bush-90-approval.html

A NATION CHALLENGED; A Snapshot Gives Bush 90% Approval

Published: September 24, 2001

WASHINGTON, Sept. 23 — Ninety percent of Americans approve of the way President Bush is handling his job after the Sept. 11 terror attacks, the highest rating for a president ever recorded by the Gallup polling group, USA Today and CNN reported today.

The 90 percent rating, measured in a poll of 1,005 adults on Friday and Saturday, outranks the previous record, a rating of 89 percent garnered by Mr. Bush's father, former President George Bush, at the end of the Persian Gulf War in 1991.

The current poll had a margin of sampling error of plus or minus three percentage points, so the difference between the two approval ratings is statistically insignificant.

[arbusto_baboso]

14. By your analogy, they are like the baseball coach who has never seen a game.

[DainBramaged]

16. Doing the same thing over and over and getting the same result IS stupid

what a waste. Dems don't have a spine, period.

[PeaceNikki]

17. It is both.

They are not mutually exclusive.

[Name removed]

18. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[LiberalArkie]

23. I want the Democrats to give the Republicans EVERYTHING they want.

I want the Republicans to Take us so far that the Herbert Hoover days will seem like a Liberal haven. I want the cowboys to loose their food stamps and everything else that Rand Paul says the gov needs to stop doing.. Make it a Libertatian paradise. Then and only then will Progressives be be able to rebuild the nation to where it needs to be. And at the same time the "greed is good" idea will be destroyed. And the conservatives will be like the parties of the 18th century, just a passing fad.

[gulliver]

24. Absolutely

The people are the people. There is no use complaining about them. You have to communicate with them in a way that works and, as you say, do a lot of repetition. People are too busy to do the work necessary to discern fact from fiction, especially when the Republican side is doing their best to obfuscate.

The Obama people are failing at effective communication, plain and simple. They overestimate the willingness and ability of other people to understand them. They don't repeat themselves constantly. They don't use rhetoric. They avoid strong words when they are called for. To the outside, it can look like arrogance, sneakiness, haplessness, or self-doubt.

The Bush people were image masters. They made a president out of George W. Bush while he failed pitifully and maimed the country. You watch, they'll turn him into another beloved "Reagan" (like they did Reagan).