This is football season, as well as political season, and this sort of thing happens a lot: There’s a fumble, or a sideline reception, or some other close call that is somewhat in doubt. One of the players begins signaling emphatically that his team recovered the fumble, or that the pass was incomplete. Replay shows just the opposite. But the emphatic player continues to gesticulate, loudly and forcefully, insisting that his interpretation is true.
This is like political advertising. Regardless of the facts, and never mind what an objective analysis shows, if you repeat the opposite often enough and loudly enough, maybe people will believe it.
Political advertising hammers at all the jobs that have been lost since the Democrats took control of everything. That’s true, but most economists say many more jobs would have been lost if it hadn’t been for the stimulus programs passed under both the Bush and Obama administrations. But that’s too nuanced.
Political consultants will tell you that all this tough talk works. A candidate increases his or her chances of winning by attacking the opposition. It’s easier to say that nothing works than it is to explain how some plans might actually have a chance of succeeding.
When there is just a little over a week left before the election, the campaign advertising usually takes a somewhat softer tone. Candidates begin to talk more about what makes them nice people, and less about what cesspools of depravation their opponents are.
Let us hope. Most people have been totally turned off by the vitriol for weeks, if not months. Here are just a few more things that make elections scarier than Halloween.
Do you get tired of candidates promising to “fight for you”? Me too. Politicians spend altogether too much time fighting. Why don’t they promise to actually do something?
Are you dubious of attacks on the “elites”? Me too. People used to strive to improve themselves, to achieve something, to be better educated or make more money. Now anybody who tries to rise above the pack is hooted down as an arrogant snob. As for me, I’d like for the people running my government to be better than me at something — preferably better at a lot of things.
That’s something else. Adding “-ist” to a word makes it considerably less agreeable. It might be all right to be a little bit “elite,” but to be an “elitist” is unacceptable. Similarly, “Islam” is much better than “Islamist,” just as “fundamental” is good and “fundamentalist” is not so good.
And angry? Hoo boy. I’m angry about angry people. Settle down, people. Stop fighting and do something. Don’t just say no, come up with a better idea.
While Republicans say no to everything, Democrats do dumb things too. Many liberals in my mostly liberal circle think it’s rude to spend the money they have while so many people are suffering in a terrible economy. They don’t seem to realize that the economy is terrible because a lot of people like them who have money aren’t spending it in a misguided display of sympathy.
People voted for change in 2008, and now they don’t like the change they got. Or at least so the polls say. But are polls still reliable, if they ever were? A lot of people no longer have land-line telephones, and even if they do don’t always answer them when they ring. When most people have an answering machine and/or caller ID, who’s left to talk to pollsters? Lonely, gullible people, that’s who. Maybe that’s why they’re angry.
Fred Brown (punditfwb@aol.com), retired Capitol Bureau chief for The Denver Post, is also a political analyst for 9News.
