You ever have that "ah ha" moment? When someone says something and it just hits you like hot nails through cold steel, and you just can't get it out of your head? That happened to me today. I read Jeffrey Feldman's piece and thought "that's what's missing from this campaign. THAT's what I've been worried about but not able to put into words."
Americans want to feel good. We vote for the party that paints a rosy picture of yester-tomorrow. Even if they lie. Even if we don't quite understand what their policies are. We want someone who will tell us that it will all be OK, that picket fences and BBQ and little old ladies with anti-macassars are still with us. Bad guys get caught. Good guys win. Opie catches fish. That longing is analyzed in Jeffrey Feldman's diary posted here this morning at Kos.
I didn't find his diary this morning; instead I caught his story at the Huffington Post, had my ah ha moment, but before running off half-cocked I did a diary search like we all are supposed to. I found that he'd posted the same HuffPo story here this morning, but it only got 17 comments. I think he is SO RIGHT ON, I'm pimping his diary and adding my worthless $.02.
I've gotta meet this guy and shake his hand and have a few. I'm so with him: The more the Dems focus on what's wrong, what's the matter, what needs to be FIXED, the less traction we'll get.
I have a confession. It was tough for me to watch the speeches at the DNC. I said to DH, ohmigosh, if this was my only exposure to the Dems, I'd say they're at a party I don't want to go to. Downers! Despair. Treachery. Messiness. Weaknesses.
Here are some snippets from downer speeches (not attributed; did not want to call out any one speaker, but transcripts of all speeches can be found at www.demconvention.com and I'm happy to share the names of the speakers if so asked). I'm not sayin all speeches were dreary, but here is a random sameple of a few speeches with themes that were carried throughout the convention--
we [now] face a great new challenge, a world energy crisis that threatens our economy, our security, our climate and our way of life. And until we address that energy crisis, our problems will only get worse. For eight long years, the White House has led us in the wrong direction. And now Senator McCain wants four more years of the same.
They’re worried because they have a child in Iraq, risking life and limb in a war that has taken too many lives, cost too much money and injured too many families. And when their child returns to America, they worry that their child might have to leave their hometown again to find a job.
Millions of Americans have lost their jobs, their homes, their health care, their pensions. Trillions of dollars for an unnecessary war paid with borrowed money. Tens of billions of dollars in cash and weapons disappeared into thin air, at the cost of the lives of our troops and innocent Iraqis, while all the president’s oilmen are maneuvering to grab Iraq’s oil.
Now, it's not that I don't believe what these speeches say. It's that I believe that they don't message well. The tone of the speeches stand in contrast to what I believe has been Obama's winning message. Not CHANGE, but HOPE. A brighter future. A future where we are sure problems can be fixed. A future where Americans can find common ground. A future where we can claim a place in the global world because of our courage.
Like Feldman, I'm afraid that forward-thinking, positive, upbeat message is getting lost. It's a message that, as Feldman puts it, needs to be
Yes!!! What Americans want to hear -- what we need to hear -- from Obama in this election is not the details of policy or the familiar rhetoric of 'issues.' All that is available on the campaign website in painstaking detail. The question to answer to get started is not, 'What are the issues?' but 'What is happiness?' and 'How do we get there -- again?' We want to hear the big story of what 'happiness' means in America. That is not just any big story -- it is the American way of explaining who we are and how we should get there.
I fear the "change" meme is morphing into a backward, grudge-holding "let's get rid of those bad guys who have ruined everything" instead of the upbeat, winning "change that will allow us to move ahead together" undercurrent of Obama's campaign.
What I'd like to see is a television campaign under the rubric "This is Our America." Featuring snapshots of Americans of all walks of life going about their daily business in contexts that show what that future looks like. Working in high-tech factories. Commuting on clean light rail. Rebuilding existing infrastructure. Riding bikes on newly-designated bike lanes. Driving hybrids. Going to school in classrooms with low student/teacher ratios. People visting happy healthy hospitals and doctors clinics. Well baby care. Etc. Etc.