Courage of Conviction

I woke up this morning to learn that the D’s had another presidential candidates’ event.  I had no clue, nor did I care.  I would guess that atleast 99% of the population doesn’t care either.  It’s definately not because I don’t care about policy, politics, etc.  I’m a political junkie.  How many debates have their been so far, something line a dozen between the D’s and the R’s.   Guess how many I’ve seen - zero.  I couldn’t care less what the candidates have to say at this point for one good reason - it’s way too early.  People want a break from the endless cycle of politics and so do I.  I think people are tired of politics and campaigning.  I think people don’t like stepping out of the voting booth and being immediately innundated with campaigning.  That’s what our political system has become.  It reminds me very much of Christmas.  It’s getting ridiculous.  The Christmas decorations are going up before Halloween in some stores.  I’m already sick of Christmas before we even get to Thanksgiving.  The same goes for political campaigns lately. 

I’ll start to care about the presidential race once we start to see people drop out of the race and the serious contenders actually start saying things the come close to mattering.  Even then, it may be a stretch for me to say that I’ll care yet. 

Here’s the big reason I haven’t had an interest in presidential debates - they aren’t debates.  They are one 30-second sound bite after another.  How can you possibly debate anything between 10 people when each person gets about a minute to answer a question about immigration, social security, war, etc.  These are serious issues and to give someone a minute or two to discuss what they would do about it is insulting to the viewers.  We’ve spent how many decades and trillions of dollars on the war on poverty, why would we expect anyone to come up with an answer to poverty in 1 minute. 

The second reason I haven’t had a lick of interest in the debates is that there are too many.  When you have too much of your favorite flavor of ice cream, do you want any more of it when someone brings it to you - no.  That’s exactly what is happening with these debates.  There are so many, that they are no longer special or meaningful. 

The reason I haven’t posted anything for the last 10 days is because I haven’t felt there was anything worth posting.  Nothing has inspired me to write a post on the blog.  We are in the summer months, so nothing unusual or exciting is happening that is worth my commenting on.

Yeah, yeah, the PA budget battle is going on.  Beyond these few words - who cares - what more do I need to write.  Voters don’t trust any of the legislators, so they think they are going to get screwed no matter how the budget comes out.  I can’t blame them much frankly.

Yeah, yeah, a new presidential poll is out.  Again, who cares.  These polls are out so far that they don’t even matter - not even close.  These are polls for PA.  I suspect we will know who our nominee will be by the time PA has a chance to make its voice heard in a primary.  So based on that, who cares who leads who?  I’ve already seen the spin on the chat pages and that’s all it is - spin.  Two days from now, the spinners will be spinning something new that could be in a complete contradiction of what they just wrote today. 

A friend of mine sent me a video of Al Gore’s criticism of the Bush’s administration policies towards Iraq. 

Once you’ve seen it, you’ll probably say that I’ve mislead you - that’s ok, and understandable.  Oh how a good 15 years changes someone’s opinion about a country and what it’s leadership does to its people. 

One week ago I posed a question that picqued my interest - What is a mandate?  It was inspired by Publius, a regular reader of this blog.  There weren’t many responses to this, to be perfectly honest, but I think that is because it’s a difficult question.  Here’s the responses I did recieve:

Alex Charyna of PA Water Cooler wrote:

I think the definition of mandate only extends to the executive branch. It doesn’t make sense in terms of legislature, only because a 90-10 win is as strong as a 50.1 to 49.9 win.

Did Bush have a mandate in 2004? I think so… he had more voters than anyone in American history. Does he still have a mandate? Definately not.

Above Average Jane took a stab at the question also:

A flippant answer would be a mandate is when everyone in my house agrees on what we should have for dinner. A more political explanation is probably what Matt had in mind.

The Webster’s dictionary we have at home lists a number of definitions for mandate. The most applicable one is “an authorization to act given to a representative.” We tend to think of it as something indicated by a lopsided electoral vote. There is no understanding on what that percentage is. Pres. Bush claimed he had a mandate with a bare majority (if that). I would tend to think you would have to have somewhere close to 70% to say you have a mandate. You could probably get a 70% agreement on the need for immigration reform, health care reform, and the need to end the war in Iraq. Where things get sticky is now the what but the HOW. How should we change health care? How should be get out of Iraq? How should we change our immigration laws? The devil is in the details.

I appreciate the responses, but as you can see, it’s a difficult question to answer. 

I promised I would take a stab at it as well - so here goes.  I could answer that a mandate is an overwhelming majority that agrees with a candidate about a policy issue, as measured through the vote totals.  What does overwhelming majority mean - great question.  I could say when a candidate fares better than he/she was projected to do by 5%.  Of course, 5% is a number I pulled out of thin out, why not make it 4% or 10%?  Herein lies the problem - there is no standard for what a mandate it. 

Which leads us to what I feel is a better answer to the question of what is a mandate?  A mandate is difficult to define, but there are certain characteristics that all candidates who have mandates have - they won elections, sometimes by what many consider landslide proportions, sometimes because they did better than they were supposed to.  Mandates typically apply to candidates with a specific message - maybe its on one policy that was the highlight of the campaign, or maybe the broader theme of the campaign.  Mandates have requirements from what I can tell - action to carry out the mandate is expected in a reasonable quick timeframe.  Once the window of opportunity closes, the voters feel betrayed.  How long is that window of opportunity, another great question with a answer for every person out there.

The real answer to the question of what is a mandate is this - just like Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart said in a 1964 ruling on pornography: “I know it when I see it.”  I think that’s the best answer to the question.  In fact, I’d go one step further - What’s a manadate?  I know it when a bunch of other people see it with me.  Mandates are just one of those things that aren’t measurable, but more of a gut feeling.  

US Rep. Todd Platts, R-19, has been actively in the news recently.  First as a supporter of the Stem Cell bill and second for his bill to increase the CAFE standards.  Back in January I saw an article about his thoughts about the Dem controlled House. 

There have been plenty of rumors going around - just read Grassrootspa’s comment sections for those. 

Here’s a guy who is typically pretty quiet when it comes to the media.  He doesn’t usually say much, and when he does it is usually about a recent trip to Iraq to visit the troops - all nice stuff to use in the next campaign. 

I would suspect the reason he stays quiet is because his voting record doesn’t correspond too well with the district.  This is one of the most conservative districts in the country and as one person put it, Platts votes like Specter.  I wouldn’t say he’s as far to the left as Specter, but with a Democrat controlled House, he certainly is showing that he is a moderate. 

Platts is a big supporter of Campaign Finance Reform and Sen. McCain.  He supported the Stem Cell bill. He’s a supporter of government mandates CAFE standards.  When he was in the State House he was not pro-life.  He garners the support of teachers unions each election. 

There’s more, but the real point of this post is simply to ask the question - what’s up with Platts garnering attention?  It’s very unlike him and his style - atleast the type of attention he is used to - all happy non-divisive press. 

Maybe he got word of a strong candidate running against him next year. Maybe he is gearing up for a run for Specter’s seat.  Or maybe he’s attempting to be important since the US House is so closely divided.  He can be a moderate vote and get a few things he wants.  I’m not really sure, but I am sure we’ll find out soon enough. 

In a recent comment section on my blog, Publius commented on my post about the GOP Sandbox - in particular the whole idea of what a mandate means.  Here’s what Publius wrote:

The only caveat that seems appropriate here is how much of a margin exemplifies a “mandate”? Did Arlen Specter have a mandate when he beat Pat Toomey 51-49? How about Will Gabig when he beat Frank Rankin 55-45? Or George Bush, when he won by the largest number of votes ever in history, only to sink to a 35 percent approval rating?

Mandates are only as good as the fallout and while everyone is excited about the possibility of a new face for the county committee, progress needs to be made. No one is thrilled about making hasty decisions, but the longer things go, the less interest people have.

Publius brings up a some great questions - what is a mandate, how do you know when you have a mandate, and is a mandate only as good as the results you make of that mandate.  I’d love to hear your thoughts on the matter.  Please share here, or e-mail me - mattbest@pa.net.  I’ll post your thoughts on the matter and then add my own.  I’ll give you all one week to leave comments.  Thanks.

Matt Miller of the Patriot News also did an article on the Keep the Team effort to change the Cumberland County Republican Committee. 

The biggest thing I take away from this article is the change in tone that GOP Chair Vic Stabile has in this article:

“The fact that a group of people is energized and has become part of the democratic process is good for us,” he said. “I could do without the attacks and the angst, but in the larger sense, it’s good.”

That’s a complete 360 degree turn from previous statements mad eby Stabile.  Either figured out that the writing is on the wall and that his head will be rolling, or someone told him that his candidate lost, or something happened that brought about a change of heart. 

The kids playing in the Cumberland County Republican Committee sandbox are whining because they aren’t getting their way.  That’s what all the fuss that Chairman Stabile is raising reminds me of.  My 4 and 2 year olds have better manners.

The Sentinel did an article on the changes that Commissioners Barclay and Eichelberger, along with the Keep the Team Committee, are going to be pushing.  Here’s the thing, when you win an election, or as John Hilton of the Sentinel so eloquently put it, “trounce” your opposition, it means you have a mandate from the people.  That mandate means the Republican voters are sick of the way the Committee leadership is doing it’s job and they want a change. 

This is no different than what the voters told the legislature following the pay raise fiasco.  The legislature still doesn’t get it and they will continue to pay the price until significant changes are made.  The committee will pay the price in this case, by being rendered completely irrelevent to the election process - or worse, start losing big races. 

Here’s the other thing I take away from the article - Stabile’s words: 

“It’s not the first time we’ve had to deal with opposition or with people who disagree with us,” says Stabile, chairman since 2000.

That should be a good sign that there are big problems with the leadership of the committee.  In 2001, Denny Lebo beat the endorsed candidate for County Cleark of Courts.  In 2002, Stabile was called on to resign by State Rep. Will Gabig during a congressional primary race.  That’s only two years after Stabile took over.  That disagreement subsided.  Then the committee showed how weak and worthless it was in 2005 in the Carlisle DJ race, losing to a Democrat by 2 votes.  Of course one could argue that the county committee doesn’t get involved in local races, but still, if they did a little work, they could have won - the Democrat committee got involved, worked hard and it paid off.  Now the 2007 primary trouncing in the commissioners’ race. 

Just to be fair, I should let everyone one that I was involved in the last three of these races mentioned above, so yes, I’ve been a thorn in the side of the committee leadership for several years now.  Or as I like to point out, I’ve been talking about the problems with the Committee leadership for several years now.  I’m thrilled that others are starting to see the problems.

US House Minority Leader John Boehner, R-OH gets a big thumbs up from me today.  He’s gathering a group of Reps and confidants together to work on rebranding the GOP.  This is long overdue and I commend Rep. Boehner for his efforts.  To many people this is a wasteful exercise.  What Boehner is doing though is no different than what any successful business does - get focused, develop their brand and work out a plan to sell the brand.  Rep. Boehner is taking a business approach to politics. 

Don’t expect immediate results though - branding takes time.  There are two ways to sell something.  You can sell a large quantity of something and recognize that next year you could be selling something different.  This produces short term gains and you have to hope that the next short term gain is significant.  A lot of businesses build themselves on this model.

The other way to build a business is by developing and building a brand.  This takes a lot longer.  When you begin your brand development, you don’t get much response or much success.  But once people identify with the brand, they become loyal customers who come back for more.  This is very much a long term strategy. 

What Boehner is doing is going for the long term strategy.  Don’t expect to see results of this rebranding effort during the next election cycle or even the cyle after that - which means that if everyone who drives the GOP gets on board with the branding method and sticks with it through the difficult times, we can start to see some results of their efforts in time for the 2012 election cycle.  Alot of that depends on the presidential election too though.  If Democrats win in 2008, then the GOP can continue in its efforts to rebrand.  If the GOP wins the White House in 08, then Republicans will have thier brand as determined by the President.