Beyond Elections 2010: The Republican’s Fact-Free Campaign

A current NBC New/Wall Street Journal poll found that 58% of respondents believe that the Republicans if they take over congress will bring “different ideas” in to shape economic policy—only 34% believe they will return to Bush-era economic policies. That means that only 34% of the respondents have been listening to the Republicans themselves.

For the most part, the Republican economic strategy is 1: extend the Bush-era tax cuts for everyone, including the wealthiest 2% of Americans; 2: repeal regulations designed to prevent the kind of economic and environmental catastrophes we have seen before Obama’s reforms were put in place, and 3: Hope for the best. [Unlike most of my assertions, I do not have a link for this one, but I defy a conservative to find a Republican candidate with a bona fide, new idea (old cant stuff like cutting the department of education does not count. This is not a meaningful economic strategy.)]

More recently the Republicans have been proudly brandishing their real plan for the next two years. In the words of Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell, "The single most important thing we want to achieve is for President Obama to be a one-term president."

This blatantly partisan goal aught to horrify anyone concerned with the country’s economy and government. Why would anyone vote for a party dedicated to putting partisan politics ahead of the needs of the country? Because they are not listening!

This is just one of the latest examples of a political season in which reason, logic, or facts have seemed particularly irrelevant. From Tea Party protestors waving signs declaring they were “Taxed Enough Already” while denouncing a President who had just cut their taxes; thru Republican Congressmen “worrying” that the health reform bill they helped write would allow the government to “Pull the Plug” on grandma (although they knew better); to Republican Congressmen declaring that the massive Bush tax cuts that helped wipe out the budget surplus left by President Clinton would pay for themselves despite all evidence to the contrary—nonsense seems to have ruled the day.

It is this willingness to believe the unbelievable, to profess demonstrably false beliefs (e.g. the existence of “Death Panels” in the Health Reform legislation), and support legislation that undercuts their supposed major goals (e.g. supporting extending the Bush Tax cuts for the wealthy while making a reduction in the Federal Deficit their number one priority) that led to much confusion over the “real” goals of the Tea Party organizations.

“Are they racists?” was one of the more common questions asked in trying to understand the Tea Partiers, who could not be taken at face value since their actions, concerns and anger did not seem to add up. “Yes and No,” would be my answer.

One has to distinguish between the hidden organizers, the rally attendees, and the politicians who have aligned themselves with the Tea Party concept. With the exception of a few outliers like Dale Robertson (owner of the Teaparty.org domain, who is regularly dis-invited from more mainstream Tea Party events because of his overt racism) and a few representatives of white power organizations (found at some rallies looking for recruits), none of the major players are overtly raciest.

One can never be certain when trying to look into the dark heart of someone like Dick Armey, chairman of FreedomWorks, which has helped develop the Tea Party. But it is doubtful that he or the corporate interests that funded Tea Party Nation, which like FreedomWorks helped grow the Tea Party movement, are largly motivated by racism. They are more interested in using the power of the Tea Party to further their own ends (the nature of which will require a separate post at a later date).

Similarly, one would have to look at each “Tea Party” candidate, (many of whom like Sharron Angle and Christine O’Donnell are simply right-wing political opportunists) one by one to discover whether they have racist tendencies. However, some generalizations can be made about the rally attendees, the grassroots everyman voter who, along with the run-of-the-mill Republican, gives the Tea Party its electoral power.

From all accounts, few of these people are overt racists. Few would use the N-word to label President Obama, but their cause is tinged by a less open form of racism. Was President Obama white, the Tea Party would be a smaller, less cohesive group.

President Obama’s race makes him stand out as different a little more and makes him a little more frightening. And it is a combination of generalized fear at the changes in our society and fear of the different that gives the Tea Party its cohesion and peculiar fact-free anger and intensity.

Back in July, Joe Keohane wrote “How Facts Backfire” which summarizes the social science research on why voter’s opinions don’t change when the voter is shown contradictory facts like those presented by Politfact. Among the findings is research indicating that people who are feeling less secure or more threatened are less likely to change their opinions when presented with contradictory facts.

I would submit that this describes many of those in the Republican Party and the Tea Party in particular. Many of these people seem to exhibit a textbook example of the “I know I’m right,” syndrome. In which it appears that misinformed people often have some of the strongest political opinions, and actual knowledge varies inversely with actual knowledge. Those with the least actual knowledge are often the most confident in their knowledge and therefore the least susceptible to change. Sound like anyone we know?

That these tendencies are accentuated by today’s internet “information” glut, which makes confirmatory opinions for even the wildest political fictions readily available (if you think sasquatch is running for Senator as a Democrat in Florida, a Google search will find a dozen sites that agree with you), does not seem to bode well for American Democracy, which needs to run on facts and informed opinion. There is however reason to help.

As a corollary of the research sited above, those voters less certain of their rightness are more open to contradictory facts, and those may be the “independent” voters who are growing in number. Which means the Democrats may be able to swing these voters back Democratic by 2012.

Whether by studied intent or instinct, Republican politicians have been highly successful in employing tactics—such as assertiveness, repetition and consistency—that are apt to produce opinion change (see http://changingminds.org/techniques/general/general.htm for basic information on the techniques of persuasion). These techniques are not secret or underhanded. They are available to Democrats too.

My hope is that President Obama will recognize that the 2012 campaign starts tomorrow, and act accordingly. For example, his slipping his tax cut into everyone’s withholding taxes may have been the best for the economy (although the Republicans deny that), but it denied him the political capital his tax cut might have otherwise earned him. For the next two years, he has to be focused on what is politically most advantageous.