Jim Leyland of the Tigers Has a Real Strategy - Democrats use strategy of ambiguity on Iraq - No Plan - Just Criticism
This is the first honest thing said or written by a demlib in a long time. Jim Leyland has more intellectual honesty than a 25 man roster of demlibs. Why bother with facts and specifics when ambiguous innuendo filled criticism works. Sounds nazi like to me. Stir the pot. Criticize a plan while not having one. The demlibs are AFRAID to even say they have a strategy because they have NO ANSWERS if they would be asked questions. Chickenshits.
Republicans have taken a battering over Iraq, but it's not because voters believe Democrats have a clear strategy for ending the conflict and bringing American soldiers home.
"If you ask people out on the street what the message is, they wouldn't know," said Joan Lowery, a 60-year-old insurance company manager, at a recent Democratic fund-raiser in Cincinnati.
Lowery is not alone. Only a quarter of Americans think Democrats in the Congress have a clear plan for Iraq, far less than the 36 percent who believe the president has one, a USA Today/Gallup poll in mid-September found.
Ambiguity has been part of the Democratic strategy on Iraq all along and has worked quite well, they said.
"For a lot of Democrats it is a very successful strategy to simply mirror the voters' underlying discontent with the war, but not to offer specifics that make them a vulnerable target," said Matthew Woessner, an assistant professor of public policy at Pennsylvania State University.
He cited the Pennsylvania race for the U.S. Senate as an example. The Democratic challenger, Bob Casey, running against Republican incumbent Rick Santorum, has opposed the status quo but been vague about what to do about Iraq.
"For Casey it has been a very effective strategy, because Casey knows that he is in a position to capitalize on the president's weakness on Iraq, without giving Santorum specific targets to fire at," Woessner said.
When Democratic politicians like Rep. John Murtha of Pennsylvania offered detailed plans, they gave Republicans the opportunity to expose them to public scrutiny.
"It is when they become specific," Woessner said, "that they ... open themselves up to criticism."
"It is fear that keeps them from having a clear position," said Paulette Meier, 55, after a meeting of religious liberals in Cincinnati. "They are afraid of being seen as cut and run."
demlib chickens create policy
copywrite 2006 - Barry G.
