The Challenge Ahead for Romney-Ryan

Townhall.com ^ | August 12, 2012 | Carol Platt Liebau

[Kaslin]

Seeing the Sunday news shows did nothing to diminish my enthusiasm over Romney's choice of Paul Ryan for the VP slot.  It did, however, provide a sobering realization of the scale of the challenge ahead for the Romney-Ryan ticket -- given that (1) the Obama campaign has shown a willingness to lie without shame; and (2) the ostensible "referees" of the debate (i.e., the media) have already made it more than clear that they are in the tank for Obama.

There are some things that the Romney-Ryan team needs to do right away.  These include:

(1) Get surrogates and spokesmen the facts -- fast.  Reince Priebus has done a stellar job as RNC chairman, but he was not prepared for David Gregory's onslaught this morning on "Meet the Press."  It is entirely predictable that the left was ready with a "Romney-Ryan want to push Granny off the cliff."  The response needs to be strong, unified, coherent and easy to understand.  Paul Ryan has a talent for making the complex simple.  It is a talent everyone else needs to develop, fast.

People need to understand why entitlement reform is an integral part of our nation's fiscal recovery -- and how it helps them in the short term with the jobs crisis and the other fiscal issues we're currently facing.  The Obama message is short and simple: "They want to cut spending so millionaires don't have to pay taxes."  It's wrong (and assumes a level of evil and bad faith that's simply shocking!) but the GOP needs something almost as crisp and easy, keeping in mind that it has to make sense to normal people (who, quite sensibly, never believed Obama's claim that ObamaCare was needed for economic recovery to take hold).

(2) Inoculate the electorate against the "politics of fear" that's all the Obama team has to push.  How about an ad splicing together every apocalyptic denunciation of Republican reforms that the Democrats have routinely made over the last 30 years?  How about clips showing talking heads of the day predicting doom if Reagan were elected, or his tax cuts went through, or the 1986 tax reform passed, or welfare reform was passed in 1996?  People need to remember that this is the way Democrats have always responded to any effort to reform Big Government.  As part of this effort,

(3) Offer the states as examples.  GOP-led states are thriving (relatively), where governors have made tough choices and withstood the left's onslaught.  As part of the ads referenced above, show the left prophesying doom in Wisconsin and New Jersey . . . and then show the turnaround Governors Walker and Christie are achieving.  And for heaven's sake, get the governors on the campaign trail.  Governor Walker did fine this morning on "Meet the Press"  -- because he's used to dealing with the kind of "fear and smear" tactics the left employs and the media happily passes along.

(4) Help people understand that the Obama campaign is trying to make them afraid of the wrong things.  It's a tough sell to convince voters that President Obama is a bigger threat to government programs as they currently exist than Mitt Romney is -- although we were reminded, accurately and with some regularity this morning, that Obama is the one who cut $700 billion from Medicare.  But people won't believe that any more than the left can convince them that Republicans are the party of high taxes.

Instead, point out that the pain and the cost of addressing tough issues now is going to be significantly less than doing it in just a decade or so.  If we make changes now -- not even terribly horrible changes -- we can right the ship.  If we wait, our entire country will start to look like . . . California.  And that will be a disaster.  That's what we should really fear -- not, for example, paring spending back to 2006 levels.  In addition, explain why this time, it really is different than, say 1992 (when Ross Perot drove concern about the deficit, but we grew out of it shortly thereafter).  This isn't 1992 -- Obama has gotten us into a situation that -- in four years -- will be hard to recover from.

And offer some hope, framing the election as a choice: "The Obama campaign offers nothing but more fear, and more of the same.  Americans don't have to be afraid . . . if we do the right thing now.  We've all had to worry for four years.  It's time those day were over.  And it's time for us to stop blaming each other for the problems we face -- and to start solving them.  It's time for real hope, real change and a fresh start."

Finally, tHIS VIDEO SHOULD BE EVERYWHERE.  It shows Bill Clinton speaking with Paul Ryan about how he hopes the 2011 Democrat win in New York won't become an excuse for his party to "do nothing" about reform -- and invites Ryan to call him.  So who's really out of the mainstream -- Ryan and Clinton, or Obama and his lefty "do nothing" crew?

[reasonisfaith]

And as for Rumsfeld, his message was right.

You fight with what you have, not with what you wish you had.

[muawiyah]

You grossly underestimate Romney. He hates your guts. The Mittbots won’t let you get to the camp.

[muawiyah]

You people are reduced to name calling and insults.

You really need to come up with something about how to win the election or you are toast.

[rbmillerjr]

We need to come up with how to win this election??

BWWWAAA

Your unknown and unannounced Third Party loser pick, sort of puts the burden on you to come up with a plan.

It’s going to be Obama or Romney, not rocket science.

[reasonisfaith]

The pro-Obama message is a loser.

I refuse to follow it.

[reasonisfaith]

“You grossly underestimate Romney. He hates your guts.”

Wherever this came from, it didn’t come from a knowledge of Romney. It’s an extreme statement to the point of sounding desperate.

[reasonisfaith]

“Obama is like Teen Talk Barbie, but without the intellectual endowment, the fashion sense, or the looks.”

Couldn’t pass this up.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/2917738/posts?page=3#3

[reasonisfaith]

“Democrats in Panic Mode After RNC Raises $3.5 Million Following Ryan Pick”

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2917721/posts

[Kharis13]

Those were all good suggestions, but I prefer R&R to keep it simple. Don’t worry about our Dear Leader, simply marginalize him. Every speech, every TV appearance, every radio interview must be full of “over 40 straight months of unemployment over 8%, very little job creation, more Americans than ever on food stamps and welfare, rising energy, gas and food prices, 5 trillion in new debt in less than four years.....”. Anytime Obama and his minions bring up some tangential issue, simply state “This election is about the President’s record, including unemployment over 8%...”. Do that EVERY TIME.

Pound, pound, pound Obama on his miserable record. Keep it simple, keep it straight-forward, keep it on message. The economy is our winning hand and it’s far too late for our Dear Leader to right the ship.

[going hot]

Pound, pound, pound Obama on his miserable record.

When the retiring politician was asked how he always won re election, he replied,"First, I tells the crowd what I am going to tell them, Then I tells them, then I tells them what I told them."

[dsrtsage]

“If the left hates Romney, there has to be something to commend him.”

If there was no Obama, and Romney was running with a D after his name, he would be godlike to the left. He is only hated for the R.

Nevertheless, despite my opinion of him dropping to utterly scumbag level from his tactics in the primary, I cannot in good conscience help Emporer Nero Kardashian Narcissus in any way. His pick of Ryan, has given me at least enough hope that he may do something right, and it sets up Ryan for 2016 or 2020.

[lone star annie]

After seeing Obama 2016 I realize more than ever that this man must be defeated. The reason he is giving amnesty to the illegals is because he feels the Southwest really belongs to Mexico. He is destroying our nuclear capability and just plain hates this country and its origins.

[muawiyah]

Let me put it to you this way ~ if Romney ever had a Conservative thought it'd frighten him so much he'd have a fatal heart attack on the spot.

The fact he's still walking around means he has not had any such thoughts.

[muawiyah]

Just occurred to me that you are one of those who believes that criticism of Romney is the same as praise of Obama ~ which means you used to be a Democrat voter.

Sometimes there's no zero sum game. A vote FOR someone is not necessarily a vote AGAINST someone else.

Some of us think for ourselves, Democrats typically don't and can't imagine how others can do that.

In fact I'd go so far as to say that your typical Democrat thinks of dissent as being the same as treason. Former Democrats have to get over that.

I"m here to help you. Say after me ~ "I Will not vote for the acolytes of the antichrist". Repeat that several times a day. All will become clear.

[muawiyah]

The pro-Romney message is a pro-Obama message. You can’t win with this guy. Bring in someone who can win.

[muawiyah]

Romney's campaign managers still don't want him to say anything that upsets the so-called independents, or the moderates.

[rbmillerjr]

There are people of principle and there are the brain dead.

Pathetically sad.

[Mike Darancette]

These guys are no different.

That is something that the Democrats are aggressively trying to get the electorate to believe. Obama cannot win on his record so he must bring R/R down to his level. It's working on some folks.

[going hot]

Get back to me when you formulate something original and with basis and foundation. Otherwise, you are simply wasting both of our time.

[muawiyah]

Actually, when it comes to moral standards they both exhibit the same qualities ~ or lack thereof.

You can try to cover up for you guy but it won't work. Others can see for themselves ~ and he's defective.

He also attracts those of similar lack of character.