Monthly Archives: December 2012

OBAMA SHOULD SAY NO RIGHT NOW!

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If McCain should say “No” to the Bush/Paulson bailout plan
that goes double – or maybe triple -
for Obama. And he needs to say it quickly and clearly. He can’t play “Lets Make
a Deal.” Any deal the House Dems can craft will be a bad deal. Obama has to say
“No Deal!” His status as a hero – his core brand of change – depends on it. .

Obama’s best explanation of what he meant by change was, “If
you keep doing the same thing and expecting a different result you are crazy.
That’s why we need to bring real change to Washington.” He was talking about Iraq, but he could have
been talking about the financial crisis.

The Fed, under both Clinton and Bush, has been bailing out
financial institutions, one after the other, for years. It hasn’t worked. It
just makes things worse. Now under intense time pressure, Paulson and Benrnanke ae telling Congress that
if they don’t authorize the mother of all bailouts the whole system will melt down. Maybe they
are right. I don’t know. But it sure smells like a classic con. It’s like a man
running up to you at the carnival and saying “A guy just got stabbed back
there. Hold this bloody knife and I’ll get someone to give him CPR. Oh, and be
sure to touch the handle, OK? ”

The only group of rubes that might be stupid enough to fall
for that (because they really are big-hearted bozos) is the current Dem House
Leadership. Not coincidentally, they are also the only group that actually has
lower approval ratings than the Bush White House.

Obama needs to stay absolutely clear of this legislative
train wreck. And to do so he needs to go with one of his best lines in the
convention speech, “Enough”. Something like this:

“Enough. Enough panic, enough lies,
enough accounting tricks. We will get to the bottom of this and we are going to
get through it, because we are all Americans and we are all in this together. But it isn’t going to be solved by pulling an all-nighter then jumping on a plane to go and campaign. The days of fast fixes and quick bucks are over. It is going to take hard work and hard facts. And to my Wall Street friends all
I can say is calm down, take a deep breath… and then take your hand out of my
pocket.”

The Lone Ranger vs. Seven Samurai

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Peter Block has a new book out on community called “Community-The
Structure of Belonging” I love his thinking. He also talks about his book here. 

Peter brings up important
points. We are limited when we feel and act alone. Fear makes us feel isolated
and weak. Once a sense of isolation sets in we complain and our complaining only drives the feeling of despair
deeper.His remedy is to connect and
form a community of shared purpose.

Peter’s talk made me think about
two archetypal stories competing in the world. We have the great American
myth making story of the Lone Ranger. Here a solitary man works to overcome the
wrongs of the world. He acts alone and is masked so no one can know his
identity. He trusts few and acts alone. Once The Lone Ranger has
finished his task he leaves quickly and moves on. Townspeople try to connect
with him but often he has already left and they can’t even say “Thanks” They
have very little understanding of what he did and if the problem should re-occur
they have not learned how to solve it without waiting for another one of his
interventions. Since he never returns to a town twice they are out of luck.

Contrast this single hero approach to Akira
Kurosawa’s film, Seven Samurai. Here one warrior is asked
to save a village from a marauding gang who sweep out of the hills every autumn
to steal most of the village harvest. The wise Samurai knows he can’t save
the village alone.  He shares his vision
with others and eventually recruits 6 warriors. Each Samurai has an essential
skill and collectively they are able to engage the entire village in the changes
necessary to protect themselves. Everyone is made aware of what must change in
order to move from victim to victory. Everyone gives up old beliefs and
behaviors. The village is saved because they unite around a shared story
and everyone participates.Some sacrifice their lives to protect the
continuity of the village. In the end the bandits are defeated and the village
has gained a story of victory through collective action.

America needs to move past the all powerful, secretive hero
who claims to act in our collective interests and instead embrace the power storytelling
gives us in uniting our community in protecting the common good through collective action.

 

MC CAIN SHOULD SAY NO

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As I said in the last post both candidates should take a
strong NO position on the suggested financial sector bail out for purely story
reasons. Lets start with McCain.

Remember, this election is about America choosing its
“hero-in-chief” We are looking for someone who can hold their ground in a
difficult and dangerous world. In marketing terms it is about having a strong
and sustainable brand.

The McCain campaign has been pushing two related brand
concepts; 1). McCain is a maverick and 2) McCain “will fight for you”. Saying yes to this bailout seriously erodes
both messages.

By definition a maverick does not run with the herd, and
that goes double in the middle of a stampede. It looks like that is what
Paulson is trying to get going. The Treasury Secretary probably sincerely
believes that this is best way to save the situation, or it may just be that
this is the way the Bush Whitehouse likes to market its proposals (it does seem
eerily similar to how we got into Iraq and passed the Patriot Act) but that is
the current administration’s story choice. For McCain to beat the bad rap that
he is “McSame” he needs to separate himself from those choices. He needs to stand strong against the biggest special interest in
Congress – the Financial Products Industry. If he doesn’t his maverick brand is toast.

McCain also needs to say no to protect his only really effective brand slogan
“I’ll fight for you.” You can’t go into a fight by giving up before it
starts. And you won’t have much leverage to “hold the bad guys
accountable” and “make them famous” if you give them a blank check and promise
not to ask any hard questions for the next two years, and that is what this
bailout does.

So McCain should just say “Thanks but no thanks” to the
Treasury Secretary’s proposed 700 Billion dollar “bridge loan to nowhere.” His
political survival depends on it.

If you don’t think a tsunami of populist anger is heading
our way check out this ad I found on that bastion of socialist skullduggery –
Market Watch. BTW last Friday was the 13th Annual “Speak Like a Pirate Day” so in
the spirit of better late than never – ARGHH!

MONEY TALKS

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Not all stories are words. Some are told visually, some
numerically. The right spreadsheet at the right time can speak volumes.

A headline like the one I woke up to in this Sundays L A
Times:

“Bailout to reach
$700,000,000,000”

(with every zero in there for emphasis) makes it crystal
clear that the Market Meltdown will be sucking up all the story oxygen for a
many news cycles to come.

So how can the McCain and Obama campaigns get ahead of the
story and roll it into their candidate’s vision of the future? I’m not talking about political spin or
partisan posturing. Any hint of that will probably prove fatal. I’m talking
about how the candidates can use their points of view – the empathic connection
they have been developing for months with the voters – to help us all get
a handle on this problem. That’s what heroes do – they bring us together for
the common good by giving us a common framework to solve our problems.

How should Obama and McCain do it? Interestingly enough both
campaigns should follow the example of Nancy Reagan and “JUST SAY NO!”

The reasons why they should say no are different for each
candidate because each candidates story is different but the fact that they
should both end up saying the same thing – NO – gives me bipartisan hope.

In the next day or two I’ll go into details on the story implications for each
candidates. But to get an overview of the situation I suggest you check out
this interview Bill Moyers just did with Kevin Philips.
Philips first major work – The Emerging Republican Majority – was done
while he was working in the Nixon White house and laid out what became known as
the Southern Strategy. Since then his analysis has crisscrossed back and forth
over party lines. His book “Wealth and Democracy” is as good a macro analysis
of the problems America now faces as I have ever read. In this interview Phillips makes it clear that
current financial crisis is a bipartisan problem long in the making, with more
than enough mud to go around if we want to start slinging. Hopefully we
won’t.

To stay up on breaking
news you might want to try out ‘The Big Picture” blogsite if you don’t use it
already.

CONFESSION

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If you have been following this blog for any length of time
– and if you have, sincere thanks – you have noticed an increasingly partisan
tone lately. You deserve to know why.

When Bob and I started to comment on the political stories
we weren’t doing it as Repubs or as Dems. Our expertise is in corporate (Bob
prefers to say “organizational”) story telling. Political campaigns are great
examples of that sort of state-of-the-art persuasive communications. Our
expertise isn’t in what you are trying to sell, but how you are trying to sell
it. That’s the point of this blog.

And for many months we hewed to this “neither Dem or Repub”
line. Both political parties had
candidates who told their stories well, and that is what interests us.

Then the McCain Palin campaign crossed a moral line with a
truly scurrilous ad. I’m talking about the Obama “sex ed” ad from a few weeks
ago which implies through camera angles and general creepiness that Obama is a
pedophile when in fact the bill he was voting for was to help protect young
children from sexual predators.

We didn’t comment on it at the
time because as we point out in The Elements of Persuasion this sort of negative ad thrives on controversy. Far better to let it die
unnoticed. In fact we consider this ad is so immoral that we will not even
provide a link to it. We will however provide
links that debunk it. Read what the NYT has to say about it here, and see what FactCheck has to say here.

Recently on the “Straight Talk Express” the press
started to chant “Bring back Mac, Bring back Mac.” This ad proves it may
already be too late. Mac, we considered
you an honorable man. You broke our hearts.

KATRINA WITH CASH

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There is a real symmetry between what is happening right
now on Wall Street and what happened in the 9th Ward of New Orleans
when Katrina struck. Both that hurricane and the financial down turn we are now in were acts of nature. Hurricane seasons brings nasty storms, and stocks go down as well as up. 

The job of a government agency – FEMA or the SEC – is to
make sure that as few people as possible are hurt by the laws of physics. But if you are a committed Neocon and believe that if you can’t have less government you can at least make
sure the government you do have will work less well, then the
crooks and cronies you have manning the levies and policing the street when the shit inevitably hits the fan will be predictably
incompetent. This isn’t a mistake. It is the result of doctrine.

According to Andrew Leonard at “How the World Works” John McCain is trying to get ahead of this story by calling for the firing of
SEC head Christopher Cox. Aside from the slight “lets eat our own young” aspect
to this, it is a good story move by McCain. A bad move would have been to say
Cox was “doing a heck of a job.”

But Cox alone isn’t the real culprit. Over at “The Big
Picture” Barry Ritholtz makes it clear that the real decisions that put us in
this mess happened in 2004. So it now seems there might actually be a smoking gun here. Unfortunately for
McCain if his suggestion to have a 9/11-style
investigation of this mess were to actually take it looks like there would be plenty of GOP
fingerprints on the pistol. 

If it is all seems too much
of a bummer to bare believe me I understand, and so does Jon Stewart.  He’ll put it in perspective. 

IT’S THE NEOCON ECONOMY, STUPID

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If you find yourself fighting someone you can’t lay of glove
on (say a legitimate war hero or a cute, plucky, hokey Mom) you could get down
in the mud and scuff up their heroic image, but you’ll end smelling like dirt.
What you should do is attack not the people, but their point of view. That is what makes them Heroes in the first
place.

This means that Dems shouldn’t run against McCain (or Palin)
– but should run against the Repub
point of view- aka Neocon dogma. And at least at first they should stick to the number one issue
on voter minds – the economy.

McCain’s statement that “the economy is fundamentally sound”
could be the gift that keeps on giving. But it isn’t enough to show McCain is
out of touch – no duh, right? That would be attacking the man. Attack the ideas
behind him.

Dems need to get voters to ask, “What caused the market to
crash?”

Experts agree it was the lack of adequate market oversight.
And most of the oversight protections put in place by the New Deal Dems after the Great
Depression in 1932 were scaled back after the Neocon Revolution swept through Congress after 1992. Who was leading
the charge to turn your money and mine over to “the invisible hand” of the
hedge fund hustlers? Republican Senator Phil Gramm of Texas.

Gramm is no longer a Senator (he is too busy as a lobbyist)
but until he was caught on tape calling American investors “whinners” he was
McCain’s main financial adviser! Off the record it seems he still is. He,
and the ideas he champions, are the Dem sweet spot. If you are looking for a place to put a stake in the heart of the neocon market
monster – Phil Gramm’s chest is ground zero.

So Dems should drive one simple point home – "Markets go up under Dems
and down under Repubs". That is a fact. Has been for the last 75 years. If you are a
Dem, say it loud, say it proud, say it often.If you are a Repub – do you best to change the subject.

The best thing about Dems running against the neocon economic
brand rather than against a person is that Obama and Biden can stay out of a negative
tit or tat game of gottcha. Instead of coming across slightly rabid they can
come across as having a calm hand on the tiller. That is going to be key.
Because when the seas get rough I don’t want a guy at the wheel who “will fight
for me,” (McCain’s favorite phrase) I want a guy who knows how to find a safe
harbor and keep things calm on deck until we get there.

HOME COURT ADVANTAGE

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Central to our analysis of this election is the idea that
the campaign itself is a story and moves through the story elements in
sequence. The primaries are about who can fire up the party base and get them
Passionate about politics. At the convention each party nominates its Hero. In
the months after Labor Day each candidate works to define the Antagonist –
showing that the other party’s candidate is what stands between the voters and
a better tomorrow. This is when candidates and surrogates go at in hammer and
tongs. In the final three days before the election Awareness dawns and voters
make their real decision of who to vote for. The result is a Transformation -
for better or worse.

As we have said before each candidate has story strength.
Obama’s is his ability to inspire Passion, particularly among the young.
McCain’s is his skill as an Antagonist (that is he defines himself by what he stands against  – corruption, lobbyist influence, whatever). McCain’s maverick persona
is the natural outgrowth of this – he is even opposes his own party at times. This doesn’t mean he can’t be the Repub Hero. In fact, it gives the Repubs the current home court advantage because we
are in the Antagonist phase of the campaign. This is when “fighting words” are
key. And here the Repubs shine.

Two new attack ads came out today
that make this point. “Still” is the new Dem ad.  It is clearly true, but so what? Is it really news?
“Disrespectful” is the new Repub ad.. It might better be called “Uppity”. FactCheck says it is
demonstrably false – click here to see why -
but it generates lots of adrenalin. Which candidates name is more likely to
stick in your memory?

It is starting to look like Obama
brought a knife to a gun fight after all. He does have two prime surrogates –
the Clintons – he has yet to unleash fully, but if Obama doesn’t decide that
winning is more important than looking good he – and the Dems – are going to be
in for a world of hurt.

WHEN HEROES FALL

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As reported in the NYT Keith Olbermann and Chris Matthews have been replaced as MSNBC political
anchors. From a hard-nosed business standpoint this is a very strange decision.
MSNBC has been rising in the ratings because Olbermann and Mathew tell
political stories – not just dryly report spin-meister prepared data points.

What’s the difference?
A political story has a defined point of view. That is, it is told by a hero
who lets us know how they feel about the facts (stories are fact wrapped in
emotion) . If the hero’s point of view agrees with mine, then I stay tuned to
that channel. If not, I click my remote. It’s a free country.

Fox shot to the top of the cable
news pack by recognizing that the idea of a purely impartial “objective” point
of view was a paradigm whose time had long passed. Fox crossed the line by failing to report the facts
accurately (famously the largest common factor among people who erroneously
thought Iraq was behind 9/11 was that they got their news for Mr. Murdock’s
organization) but it was on to something. When political tastes started to
shift, people looked for a fresh set of news heroes. MSNBC’s stock began to rise
because Olbermann was willing to say how he felt about the facts he was reporting on Iraq. The audience shared his outraged point of view – and so his audience grew.
Mathews, for all his blow-hard faults, is clearly passionate about politics and tends to wear his heart on his sleeve. Both Olbermann and Mathews are powerful political story tellers and because of them  MSNBC could claim
to be “THE PLACE FOR POLITICS”

But all that is gone now, and when
in a few months MSNBC gradually leaks away the loyal viewers it spent years
courting and sinks back beneath the waves becoming not a distinct brand but
just one more cable news mash up it will be the lack of guts of its parent
company NBC to stand up to a little heat from the Repub hit teams that will be
to blame.

Once you loose brand loyalty it is
very, very hard to get it back. If I were a shareholder in GE I would be very
upset, because the NBC execs are clearly putting their political cowardice in
front of my cash profits. And that doesn’t seem very American to me.

AT THE STARTING GUN

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Now that both parties have rolled out their candidate teams
it’s time to look at story strengths and weaknesses. The success of each campaign will be determined by how they
strengthen their weak story elements and exploit the weaknesses of their
opponents.

Obama’s strong element is Passion. If you can get 200,000
Germans in Berlin to show up for your standard stump speech and wave American
flags, you have stratospheric motivational mojo. But the Dems need to address
Rove’s “elitist” attack and clearly establish Obama as a version of every
citizen – better and brighter maybe, but essentially our equal. A guy who sees
things the way we do. The President is above
all our Hero-in Chief. This Ad – featuring Bidin’s voice
- is a great example of how the right VP pick can help make that crucial arch
of equality with key voters in a swing state. Take a look.

McCain’s strong suit is Antagonist. His campaign defines him
by what he is against – as a maverick. In his acceptance speech he used the
word ”fight” a staggering 27 times! He is a war hero – he has done
heroic things – but he hasn’t really shown himself to be our Hero in the story
sense – a point of view that we can all share. That is why the “how many
houses” moment is so important. It’s hard for a guy who inherited 100 million
bucks (by marriage) to be a regular Joe who sees things the way we do.

Instead of addressing this weakness McCain doubled down on
his Antagonist persona – choosing a self described “pit bull with lipstick” as
VP. The selection of Sarah Palin wowed the Repub base but reports are that she
didn’t test very well among independent swing voters at focus groups.
Apparently her snide, lip-curling attacks were a bit much.

But Repubs had to do something try to recapture the
narrative initiative, even if it is only a short-term bounce. The race is
officially on! May the best man win.