It is amazing to watch republicans and democrats speaking to the American people and to see that democrats seem not to be able to talk about and to defend what the Obama administration has accomplished in the last 3 ½ years while republicans, using code words, lies, and distortions, are making even democrats to begin to believe these distortions and to hesitate to defend their candidate, President Obama.
I watched the Pollsters and Strategists for both parties on CSPAN and it was very clear that the republican, Ed Goeas, had his code words, lies, and distortions ready, while the democrat, Michael Bocian, was like an amateur who did not know what the fight is all about, and did not understand the impact of every word he used.
On the economy, the republican used the talking points that ALL republicans have been coached to use, to wit, that President Obama is doing a bad job on the economy because he does not know how to create jobs, which is why Americans are not going to vote for him. The democrat, on the other hand, spoke like he was there not for a political fight, but just to agree with his opponent; first, he used "negative" statements describing what his candidate has done. "Yes", he said, "the economy is not doing great"... He even chided at times his own party or he put himself in the middle with his comments to the point that, a lady who called on the phone, defended Obama better than this democratic pollster and strategist...
How do the democrats expect to win the election if they are acting like they did when John Kerry ran against George W. Bush? This is a fight, not a play. The republicans use code words like "class warfare", "bad", "worse" "does not know", to attack Obama while they have agreed on one single sentence to use when talking about Romney: "he knows how to create jobs." The republicans have NO evidence to back up these statements. But they know ONE thing: voters take these words that are repeated consistently, continuously, and loudly and make them their "beliefs", make them their own "truths" regardless of the lack of facts or lack of evidence to back them up. The democrats, on the other hand, are all over the place with their campaign and with their statements. They present themselves negatively, they use negative terms when it comes to President Obama, as if using these negative terms will endear them to the American public.
It is like that standard question that is asked during job interviews when the candidate is asked to speak about their weaknesses. The republican is saying, "my weakness is that I want to create jobs, jobs, jobs for American people", while the democrat is saying "my weakness is that I am not doing well in creating jobs for Americans". Who do you think is going to get the job?
Don't democrats have minds that are capable of summing up the enormous amount of the great accomplishments of the Obama administration in a few words or short sentences? Can't democrats come up with single words to describe Mitt Romney and the Republicans?
It is time that the democrats wake up and begin to attack and to properly LABEL Mitt Romney and the republicans.
Truly America is better in 2012 than it was in 2008 when Obama won the presidency. Whatever that is left to be done, it has to be portrayed in the positive fashion of continued growth, continued building, continued fixing what republicans destroyed BEFORE Obama took over in 2008. In talking about this, democrats cannot use the republican play book of using negative terms to talk about the positive work democrats have done. Unless democrats understand this, they will lose this election in the fashion John Kerry lost his.
Why? Because, everything taken together, this election SHOULD NOT BE CLOSE. Mitt Romney has NO training or experience, or else baggage that can stand up and compete with what Obama has accomplished in all areas, from national to foreign policy. So it is up to democrats to make American people appreciate these accomplishments instead of these democrats being intimidated into NOT talking about the great accomplishments of Obama.
So the democrats need to remember that republicans fight dirty. After the election, no one says, let us cancel the results because one side fought dirty. All that matters, at the end, is WHO WON.
As the French are in the habit of warning, "Ã bon entendeur, salut!"
Professor Yaa-Lengi Ngemi
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