Advice to Republicans: Don't Get Too Weird
The trick to winning elections is to convince the voters that you're less odd than your opponent. All politicians are, for the most part, sort of nuts -- who would volunteer, after all, for such a job unless it appealed to his or her inner neurotic? -- but some politicians appear less nuts than others, and those are the ones that win.
How did Reagan beat Carter? Or either Bush beat his opponent? They just seemed more normal than the other guy. Why did Clinton manage, ultimately, to best his most effective nemesis, Newt Gingrich? Because when the dust settled after the 1994 Republican revolution, Newt just seemed a little....you know, weird.
The Politico thinks Republicans may be getting weird again:
A former professional wrestling executive, a libertarian ophthalmologist and a man who thinks bicycle use could empower the United Nations filed to run in elections. That’s not the start of a joke: that’s a sampling of the deeply unusual pool of candidates running — and actually being nominated — for high office this year.
A phenomenon that began with physician Rand Paul’s victory in the Kentucky Senate primary has effectively gone national: Primary voters are again and again choosing offbeat candidates shunned by national party strategists and imperiling potential Republican gains this November in the process.
I'm not sure I agree that they're "imperiling" anything, but I do notice a soft trend towards the oddball. This year has a lot of surprises in store -- if you're in the pundit business, this is a great year to make your career by throwing out a truly out-of-left-field prediction, because the landscape has rarely been nuttier.
And neither have the candidates. Which may not be a bad thing.
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Jun '10
Re: Advice to Republicans: Don't Get Too Weird
A lot of conservatives worry most about the politicians they elect being co-opted and assimilated into the Washington DC government culture. Weird is further down on the list of worries. Give us honest and stubborn, and if that comes with some weirdness, that's okay.
Jun '10
Re: Advice to Republicans: Don't Get Too Weird
Or perhaps we could get Peter Robinson to run everywhere. He's the prototype anti-weird guy. Wish I could say the same about you, Rob (though this week's podcast was a classic. And would have been very different if Peter had been there to provide some adult supervision).
May '10
Re: Advice to Republicans: Don't Get Too Weird
Churchill had a special drain installed in his bathroom floor because he like to spash around exhuberantly while bathing.
Aug '10
Re: Advice to Republicans: Don't Get Too Weird
It's truer than ever, especially with a 24/7 news cycle, that the stress level is off the chart - as it was previously known. Human beings aren't yet adapted to present day levels of scrutiny and pressure. Add to that the problems we face - like the national debt - have been so long in the making and have grown so exponentially huge, that you'd have to be a little crazy to think you could tackle them.
What ideas do we conservatives have? Tax cuts? Sure. Drastic spending cuts? We may wish, but it's not bloody likely. I look in vain for anything that has much certainty about it.
The massive damage done by Obama and the "professional Left" since '07 - when they gained effective control of Congress and the purse - have probably guaranteed eventual bankruptcy and IMF supervision of our budget. This will be catastrophic for our sovereignty. Americans are now hooked on government heroin, and kicking it will really, really, hurt.
Aug '10
Re: Advice to Republicans: Don't Get Too Weird
Rob Long:
The Politico thinks Republicans may be getting weird again:
OK, professional wrestling is weird, making I guess anyone who's been in the business weird by association.
But what's so weird about a libertarian ophthalmologist? Are ophthalmologists predisposed by birth or something to be statists, or is their something about their profession that should (in the eyes of our betters) make them anti-libertarian?
As for "a man who thinks bicycle use could empower the United Nations", well... this doesn't strike me as any weirder than stuff that the UN already does. Perhaps the more time UN delegates spend tooling around on bicycles, the better, since it gives them less time to monkey with everything else.
Or is weird just some sort of code word for not adhering to elite orthodoxy, that is, an excuse for snobbery?
Jul '10
Re: Advice to Republicans: Don't Get Too Weird
Could this be Kinky Friedman's year?
Jul '10
Re: Advice to Republicans: Don't Get Too Weird
Midget Faded Rattlesnake
Or is weird just some sort of code word for not adhering to elite orthodoxy, that is, an excuse for snobbery? · Aug 12 at 2:19pm
M.F. Rattlesnake,
I agree. I'll take eccentric, even unhinged politicians any day as long as they shrink government more than they expand it.
Aug '10
Re: Advice to Republicans: Don't Get Too Weird
When we call something weird, what we're really saying is that we find it unsettling, and that we believe others should find it unsettling, too.
Now maybe there's something that pretty much every human being would find unsettling about some of these candidates, but maybe what the establishment finds unsettling is simply the prospect that one of these fellows might actually endanger the establishment. That instead of a tame Republican who's just Democrat-lite, one of these guys might succeed in peeling back a corner of the establishment in the name of freedom.
Oh, that definitely would unsettle the established order -- and members of the established order would naturally try to convince other people to find it unsettling, too.
So it's possible that "weird" could be a very good thing.
Aug '10
Re: Advice to Republicans: Don't Get Too Weird
In the case of Newt Gingrich, "weird" is simply an inarticulate way of saying that he suffers from "smartest-kid-in-the-class" syndrome. His intelligence-- which he makes no effort to hide-- has caused too many members of the voting public to feel inferior and, consequently, resentful. Although his sharp intellect and impatience with stupidity have proven a handicap in the past, I suspect that in 2012 the prospect of a genuine mind at work on the job will be met with the welcome sense of relief one feels upon seeing a light at the end of a very long and very dark tunnel.
Jun '10
Re: Advice to Republicans: Don't Get Too Weird
I used to always think that the advantage of the right was our weirdo's were not as weird/insane as those on the left.
If this is the best the Politico can come up with, then I think my belief still stands. Afterall, Grayson, Feingold, Webb, Maxine Waters... lets be serious, we can drop acid for years and not make that list...
Re: Advice to Republicans: Don't Get Too Weird
Weird is okay. I don't mind weird. And maybe you have to be a little weird and offbeat to get the job done without getting sucked into the DC machine. Remember that the moment they get to town, folks like Trent Lott are going to try to "co-opt" them.
So maybe "weird" is better.
May '10
Re: Advice to Republicans: Don't Get Too Weird
Newt is definitely intelligent, but I think he carries way too much baggage to be considered as a serious candidate.
Aug '10
Re: Advice to Republicans: Don't Get Too Weird
Midget Faded Rattlesnake
Rob Long:
The Politico thinks Republicans may be getting weird again:
OK, professional wrestling is weird, making I guess anyone who's been in the business weird by association.
But what's so weird about a libertarian ophthalmologist? Are ophthalmologists predisposed by birth or something to be statists, or is their something about their profession that should (in the eyes of our betters) make them anti-libertarian?
As for "a man who thinks bicycle use could empower the United Nations", well... this doesn't strike me as any weirder than stuff that the UN already does. Perhaps the more time UN delegates spend tooling around on bicycles, the better, since it gives them less time to monkey with everything else.
Or is weird just some sort of code word for not adhering to elite orthodoxy, that is, an excuse for snobbery? · Aug 12 at 2:19pm
Exactly. "Weird" is ammo designed to exploit the inordinate human desire to protect reputation. Conservatives must avoid frequent and wide clusters of shotgun pellets. Liberals must only duck an occasional .22.
May '10
Re: Advice to Republicans: Don't Get Too Weird
He wrote most of his books in the bathtub, so there was bound to be some spillage with that much wet time....