The Other McCain

"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

Repeal And Replace: Balancing Tactics And Strategy

Posted on | March 23, 2010 | 33 Comments

by Smitty

Smart Politics‘ claims the carnivorous conservative:

Being the party of pointing out problems, without solutions, or simply the party of No is not enough. The GOP has got to bring more to the table than that if they hope to win the health care debate.

Oh Boy,’ replies Ace of Spades:

The problem is offing up a replacement plan ensures the focus of the debate will shift to, Which plan is better for Americans? That’s an argument we might win but it’s a tougher one to have. The Democrats will run out their sob stories and we’ll be on the side of arguing cold, hard, theoretical numbers.

Keep in mind too that the mind of the electorate has been systematically crippled by the Left. Notions of history, economics, and ethics have to re-instilled. Whatever the final shape of ‘Repeal and Replace’, it has to attack evil seeds currently being planted.
Not only is health care not a fundamental right, the notions of ‘fundamental’ and ‘right’ need to be recovered. The Left evangelizes falsehood with religious zeal.
So, to repeal and replace I would add ‘reinforce’. The Left is impotent at debate with anything other than emotion. Ryan’s gentle, firm rebuke of Slaughter at the committee hearing must be replicated across a dozen topics. The American people not only need to understand that the Progressive agenda is false, but why it is false.

Comments

33 Responses to “Repeal And Replace: Balancing Tactics And Strategy”

  1. Joe
    March 23rd, 2010 @ 7:46 pm
  2. Joe
    March 23rd, 2010 @ 2:46 pm
  3. Roxeanne de Luca
    March 23rd, 2010 @ 8:25 pm

    Not only is health care not a fundamental right, the notions of ‘fundamental’ and ‘right’ need to be recovered. The Left evangelizes falsehood with religious zeal.

    Rights are negative rights: the right to do something without interference from other parties. Health care is a fundamental right, in that we are entitled to access it, to the best of our ability, without the government getting in our way (so long as we do not commit aggression – physical or economic – against other people in that quest).

    Health care may be a fundamental right, but it’s certainly not a civic right.

  4. Roxeanne de Luca
    March 23rd, 2010 @ 3:25 pm

    Not only is health care not a fundamental right, the notions of ‘fundamental’ and ‘right’ need to be recovered. The Left evangelizes falsehood with religious zeal.

    Rights are negative rights: the right to do something without interference from other parties. Health care is a fundamental right, in that we are entitled to access it, to the best of our ability, without the government getting in our way (so long as we do not commit aggression – physical or economic – against other people in that quest).

    Health care may be a fundamental right, but it’s certainly not a civic right.

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  6. Adobe Walls
    March 23rd, 2010 @ 10:06 pm

    BTOC- Day+2 Joe;
    Great link and if I’m not mistaken the conservatives have taken Jeff Goldstein’s words to heart or perhaps reached the same conclusions on their own. I would cite as evidence the fact that no one on the right, as opposed to FNC, has taken the “racist slur” charges leveled at the capital protesters on 3/21/10 as factual merely because a Congressman said so. Dana Loesch handled that issue quite well on O’Reilly last night. While not actually stating that in the absence of good evidence one should assume that the Social Democratic Congressmen were slandering the Tea Partiers. A year ago any Republican or remotely mainstream commenter would have been apologizing for and seeking distance from the protesters.
    On the general theme of effective use of the language Dennis Prager over at Townhall
    http://townhall.com/columnists/DennisPrager/2010/03/23/its_a_civil_war_what_we_do_now
    wrote in part that we should start to consistently refer to the dems as the Social Democrats as they are no longer distinguishable from the Socialist parties of Europe. That’s one of his points and the whole article is worth reading. Ace’s point is well taken particularly as getting the folks who aren’t insured isn’t that compelling a problem as far as I’m concerned and I suspect many others would agree. That unfortunately doesn’t make it a winning issue in our Sob Sister electorate.

  7. Adobe Walls
    March 23rd, 2010 @ 5:06 pm

    BTOC- Day+2 Joe;
    Great link and if I’m not mistaken the conservatives have taken Jeff Goldstein’s words to heart or perhaps reached the same conclusions on their own. I would cite as evidence the fact that no one on the right, as opposed to FNC, has taken the “racist slur” charges leveled at the capital protesters on 3/21/10 as factual merely because a Congressman said so. Dana Loesch handled that issue quite well on O’Reilly last night. While not actually stating that in the absence of good evidence one should assume that the Social Democratic Congressmen were slandering the Tea Partiers. A year ago any Republican or remotely mainstream commenter would have been apologizing for and seeking distance from the protesters.
    On the general theme of effective use of the language Dennis Prager over at Townhall
    http://townhall.com/columnists/DennisPrager/2010/03/23/its_a_civil_war_what_we_do_now
    wrote in part that we should start to consistently refer to the dems as the Social Democrats as they are no longer distinguishable from the Socialist parties of Europe. That’s one of his points and the whole article is worth reading. Ace’s point is well taken particularly as getting the folks who aren’t insured isn’t that compelling a problem as far as I’m concerned and I suspect many others would agree. That unfortunately doesn’t make it a winning issue in our Sob Sister electorate.

  8. filbert
    March 23rd, 2010 @ 11:34 pm

    How about: “Real, Responsible Reform.”

    “Real” lets you contrast to the smoke and mirrors of Obamacare;

    “Responsible” not only lets you further highlight the fiscal shenanigans of O-Care, but also opens the door to that discussion of “fundamental” and “right” that we need to have; and

    “Reform” because frankly the system IS broken and needs to be fixed.

  9. filbert
    March 23rd, 2010 @ 6:34 pm

    How about: “Real, Responsible Reform.”

    “Real” lets you contrast to the smoke and mirrors of Obamacare;

    “Responsible” not only lets you further highlight the fiscal shenanigans of O-Care, but also opens the door to that discussion of “fundamental” and “right” that we need to have; and

    “Reform” because frankly the system IS broken and needs to be fixed.

  10. Larry
    March 24th, 2010 @ 1:17 am

    Ace is right; we’ll lose the argument because ’emotion’ will trump facts in too many people. The book ‘Influencer’ illustrates this through many examples.

    What should have been done, is when Obama trotted out his anecdotes we should have responded with facts AND anecdotes of our own. I heard a caller on XM to one of the afternoon shows on America Right the other day say that his insurance company has spent over a million dollars on healthcare for his son (who was, as I recall, just 8 years old). Those are the kind of anecdotes we need to backup the claim that most people are happy with their doctors and their insurance companies.

    The left would have us believe that the Obama’s human shields are the norm, when, in fact, they are far from it.

    They need to be disarmed with facts AND anecdotes; we have to appeal to both emotion AND logic (and not just one or the other).

  11. Larry
    March 23rd, 2010 @ 8:17 pm

    Ace is right; we’ll lose the argument because ’emotion’ will trump facts in too many people. The book ‘Influencer’ illustrates this through many examples.

    What should have been done, is when Obama trotted out his anecdotes we should have responded with facts AND anecdotes of our own. I heard a caller on XM to one of the afternoon shows on America Right the other day say that his insurance company has spent over a million dollars on healthcare for his son (who was, as I recall, just 8 years old). Those are the kind of anecdotes we need to backup the claim that most people are happy with their doctors and their insurance companies.

    The left would have us believe that the Obama’s human shields are the norm, when, in fact, they are far from it.

    They need to be disarmed with facts AND anecdotes; we have to appeal to both emotion AND logic (and not just one or the other).

  12. Lance
    March 23rd, 2010 @ 8:20 pm

    The Democrats will run out their sob stories…

    No, they won’t.

  13. Lance
    March 24th, 2010 @ 1:20 am

    The Democrats will run out their sob stories…

    No, they won’t.

  14. Roxeanne de Luca
    March 24th, 2010 @ 4:09 am

    Larry: this bill is reducing Medicare payments. We should trot out every doctor who can’t afford to treat the patients he has had for years, every widow, and every elderly WWII veteran who wants to see his great-grandkids grow up.

  15. Roxeanne de Luca
    March 23rd, 2010 @ 11:09 pm

    Larry: this bill is reducing Medicare payments. We should trot out every doctor who can’t afford to treat the patients he has had for years, every widow, and every elderly WWII veteran who wants to see his great-grandkids grow up.

  16. Joan of Argghh!
    March 24th, 2010 @ 12:19 pm

    The GOP has failed miserably to invest in its own legacy. It has spent its money within its own inbred bubble of lawyers and lobbyists and has had precious little impact or give-back to support small business, train new generations, dirty its hands in the community, provide scholarships, underwrite homeschooling or charter schools. It has given away our inheritance as quickly as the Dems and it has not earned them our thrall to their bankrupt and myopic narcissism, it has earned the GOP our content.

    They forgot that they were graced with Free Men and Women in their party. We did not mewl for bread and circuses, but they thought to win loyalty from us by providing that which we wanted merely to procure for ourselves. Damnable, damaging and self-propagating desires by our so-called political betters has brought us here. The GOP leadership shares much of the blame.

  17. Joan of Argghh!
    March 24th, 2010 @ 7:19 am

    The GOP has failed miserably to invest in its own legacy. It has spent its money within its own inbred bubble of lawyers and lobbyists and has had precious little impact or give-back to support small business, train new generations, dirty its hands in the community, provide scholarships, underwrite homeschooling or charter schools. It has given away our inheritance as quickly as the Dems and it has not earned them our thrall to their bankrupt and myopic narcissism, it has earned the GOP our content.

    They forgot that they were graced with Free Men and Women in their party. We did not mewl for bread and circuses, but they thought to win loyalty from us by providing that which we wanted merely to procure for ourselves. Damnable, damaging and self-propagating desires by our so-called political betters has brought us here. The GOP leadership shares much of the blame.

  18. Joan of Argghh!
    March 24th, 2010 @ 12:24 pm

    Please to amend to read, “conTEMPT”.

    The GOP is overly fussy about a shining light like Palin, but the Dems don’t have a problem with a demonic creature like Pelosi. Could be something to think about.

    And as long as we’re playing, I’m calling it Pelosi-Care. Obama barely lifted a finger to help.

  19. Joan of Argghh!
    March 24th, 2010 @ 7:24 am

    Please to amend to read, “conTEMPT”.

    The GOP is overly fussy about a shining light like Palin, but the Dems don’t have a problem with a demonic creature like Pelosi. Could be something to think about.

    And as long as we’re playing, I’m calling it Pelosi-Care. Obama barely lifted a finger to help.

  20. McGehee
    March 24th, 2010 @ 12:29 pm

    Lance, he said “run out,” not “run out of.” Of course they’ll never run out of sob stories.

  21. McGehee
    March 24th, 2010 @ 7:29 am

    Lance, he said “run out,” not “run out of.” Of course they’ll never run out of sob stories.

  22. McGehee
    March 24th, 2010 @ 12:31 pm

    The GOP has failed miserably to invest in its own legacy.

    Invest what? I hope you’re not talking about government spending.

    It’s all “other people’s money” regardless which party is spending it.

  23. McGehee
    March 24th, 2010 @ 7:31 am

    The GOP has failed miserably to invest in its own legacy.

    Invest what? I hope you’re not talking about government spending.

    It’s all “other people’s money” regardless which party is spending it.

  24. The Mexican
    March 24th, 2010 @ 8:22 am

    Joan, I agree with much of what you say, but your wrong on this point, “They forgot that they were graced with Free Men and Women in their party.” They didn’t forget, they were removed from the party. The infiltration of socialists happened in both parties. The best way to control the opposition is to become the opposition.

    The jig is up.

  25. The Mexican
    March 24th, 2010 @ 1:22 pm

    Joan, I agree with much of what you say, but your wrong on this point, “They forgot that they were graced with Free Men and Women in their party.” They didn’t forget, they were removed from the party. The infiltration of socialists happened in both parties. The best way to control the opposition is to become the opposition.

    The jig is up.

  26. Joan of Argghh!
    March 24th, 2010 @ 1:24 pm

    No, not invest government money, invest party money. Not everything has to be a think tank, but there should be seed money for growth at more home-grown levels, scholarships, programs, etc.

  27. Joan of Argghh!
    March 24th, 2010 @ 8:24 am

    No, not invest government money, invest party money. Not everything has to be a think tank, but there should be seed money for growth at more home-grown levels, scholarships, programs, etc.

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  29. McGehee
    March 24th, 2010 @ 2:06 pm

    No, not invest taxpayer money,

    FTFY. 😉

    invest party money.

    For good or ill, parties exist to get their members elected and keep them elected, and fostering ideas isn’t really a cost-effective use of their resources.

    The kind of thing you’re talking about is best done independently, and let the parties deal with the resulting (hopefully) change in voter demand.

    After all, wouldn’t it be nice if both major parties were competing for the small-government bloc, and actually had to deliver because failing to do so would mean the other party would be elected in its place?

  30. McGehee
    March 24th, 2010 @ 9:06 am

    No, not invest taxpayer money,

    FTFY. 😉

    invest party money.

    For good or ill, parties exist to get their members elected and keep them elected, and fostering ideas isn’t really a cost-effective use of their resources.

    The kind of thing you’re talking about is best done independently, and let the parties deal with the resulting (hopefully) change in voter demand.

    After all, wouldn’t it be nice if both major parties were competing for the small-government bloc, and actually had to deliver because failing to do so would mean the other party would be elected in its place?

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  32. Lance
    March 25th, 2010 @ 5:31 pm

    Re: McGehee

    Hater.

  33. Lance
    March 25th, 2010 @ 12:31 pm

    Re: McGehee

    Hater.