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Born at the Crest of the Empire

Thursday, November 06, 2008

My favorite memes

Two ideas I've seen bumping around today.

1) Obama as symbol. There's alot out there about the international reaction to Obama's election, and, for now, one of the recurring threads seems to be that it is reminding the world what they love of America. It's reminding the world that America's foundational ideals, both of opportunity and of renewal, still exist.

I don't know if it will stay that way, but it's definitely being seen as a "hearts and minds" story for now.

2) Karl Rove destroyed the Republican Party. In his 2000, and more notably 2004, campaigns, Karl Rove pushed the base plus strategy which aimed at maximizing GOP base voter turnout through the use of wedge issues that did turn out the base and win elections, but it also widened the gap between the base and many independent and moderate demographics.

Rove's strategy trapped the GOP in demographics that are stale or shrinking, while casting off to the Democrats most of the constituencies that are growing. (Notice that they weren't complaining when he was winning them elections.

And they can't blame Rove for losing Hispanics, that was all Congressional Republicans looking at 2006
.)

(Not really sure I buy either of these completely, but I found them interesting starting points for thought.)

2 Comments:

  • Evan Thomas (Newsweek) was on Charlie Rose last night. He said something to the affect that Obama is like a screen upon which people project their aspirations. I don't know if it's true of the person, but it's certainly how the campaign "marketed" him.

    "Project Your Hope Here"

    By Blogger -epm, at 2:37 PM  

  • Oh yeah. That's the brilliance of the Hope and Change message among an electorate where 80% think the country is going the wrong way.

    There's a reason he never made a major speech defining "change."

    By Blogger mikevotes, at 3:33 PM  

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