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?

[jessduntno]

I don’t get it. If Romney is such a liberal, why go to the lying, distorting, crazed lengths to which the press extends themselves while tottering on the brink of extinction?

Curious. If he’s as big a liberal as some of us say he is, they can’t lose.

[muawiyah]

It's not a question of bringing Priebus up to speed ~ he engineered this Romney takeover ~ so he should have been prepared unless he has his mind in the clouds (of something) and believes this election can be won WITHOUT Social Conservatives, and through adroit use of negative advertising on cable TV.

Bwahahahahahahahahaaaa!

[reasonisfaith]

You seem to express schadenfreude in you criticism of Priebus. Sort of like the scene where Slim Pickens triumphantly straddles the bomb as it plummets to the earth far below.

Obama is trying to destroy our country, and I take this as an attack against my family. My vote for Ryan will be personal, not political.

As another poster put it, a lame duck Obama is infinitely worse than a first term Romney.

[muawiyah]

Take as personal as you want. How I vote is my business.

In this election if you believe as you believe, let me add this ~ both Romney and Obama pose an equal threat to our future.

[reasonisfaith]

Lame duck Obama has no limits. Think of a virulent anti-American in the White House with no limits.

First term Romney is at worst status quo, but more likely will mean at least partly a turnaround until Ryan can get in there.

Maybe Ryan/West in 2016 or 2020.

[muawiyah]

BTW, I opposed the selection of Priebus as RNC Chairman the second his name was put forward. He's been in the bag with Romney since the beginning of time.

If they'd listened to me they'd gotten someone with a winner's attitude ~ not that of the lapdog we have running the RNC.

BTW, the last guy we had as Chairman presided over one of the greatest electoral victories in Republican history. Whatever he did, or didn't do, should be a guide to his successors. Alas, we had a whole lot of folks on FR and throughout the Conservative movement who thought Mike Steele was a loser ~ despite that victory.

Obviously MIke knew some things that Priebus hasn't learned yet else we wouldn't be in this mess where your great messianic, almost god-like (listen to the ads) figure has us running behind the Democrats a good 5 to 10 points almost everywhere.

Steele had 2010 wrapped up before August as I recall. The Democrats were going down hard, and they did go down hard.

This is different ~ we don't have a winner, or even someone who knows how to be a winner. The Democrats will pull out all the stops, lie their lips dry, and in the end ~ as both candidates lurch to the bottom of the popularity pile, they will do everything they can ~ lawful or unlawful ~ to seize the powers of government.

You guys aren't prepared for it.

[liberty or death]

No they don't. They're not equal just similar in some political leanings or in Romneys case expediency.

Don't agree with Mitt except for his 15% financial conservatism but he is nothing like the Socialist spoiled brat that this country crapped out in 2008 and we now call Mr Present.

[reasonisfaith]

Lame duck Obama has no limits. Think of a virulent anti-American in the White House with no limits.

First term Romney is at worst status quo, but more likely will mean at least partly a turnaround until Ryan can get in there.

Maybe Ryan/West in 2016 or 2020.

[reasonisfaith]

“If they’d listened to me they’d gotten someone with a winner’s attitude”

So why a “winner’s attitude” then but a loser’s attitude now?

[muawiyah]

Romney's record is the equal of Obama's in terms of evil and disrespect for standards of democratic self-government.

These guys are no different.

[muawiyah]

You do understand I'm just the messenger. I didn't pick your loser ~ you picked him ~ or you let him slip in without resistance.

Nobody has to follow a loser.

[rbmillerjr]

To equivocate Obama and Romney is political illiteracy.

[muawiyah]

To fail to notice that there’s no difference between these two is to be brain dead!

[reasonisfaith]

“Nobody has to follow a loser.”

This is why I’m not following your message.

[Persevero]

I always like the idea of judging a person by his enemies.

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

[rbmillerjr]

You can’t offer a serious argument that the two are the same.

[comebacknewt]

You are wasting your time.

These guys take it as a badge of honor that they hate Romney as much as they do Obama. It proves they are the “true conservatives”.

It matters not that any objective analysis would show significant differences between the two candidates. What matters is that their conservative bonafides remain in tact.

That way they can maintain their air of superiority over those of us who may not be Romney fans but are realistic enough to see that four more years of Obama damage may not leave much of a country left to save.

[muawiyah]

At the moment I'm not running for anything and I don't need followers.

On the other hand the Republicans owe me and 55 million other voters a decent candidate who can win.

They haven't delivered the goods.

[colorcountry]

The problem is the right hates Romney too.