Ira Rohter
Draft 2/13/05
While Mainland
Republicans are celebrating their major victories in reelecting President Bush
and adding new Congressional seats to their majorities, Hawai`i Republicans did
terribly. Their three Congressional
challengers got blown out. And although
Governor Lingle worked closely with nearly a dozen GOP newcomers, all but one
challenger lost, and five Republican incumbent State Legislators were
defeated. Lingle tried: her team gave
her new players a pretested set of issues to run on, introduced them to
financial supporters, mentored them on public speaking, and even sign waved and
went door to door with them on the campaign trail. Her anointed favorites had
plenty of money for slick mailers and colorful brochures. Nevertheless newcomers and even incumbents
lost in mass. The last two elections
have seen the GOP presence in the House decreasing from 19 to 10 members (out
of 51); and the 25-member Senate still stuck at only 5 GOP members.
Isle Republicans
explain away these most recent loses by citing the last minute frenzied
mobilization of Isle Democrats because of the national Bush - Kerry race. [They
dance lightly about their own contribution to this mobilization by hyping early
polls, and flying in ultra conservative Vice President Cheney — the arch nemesis of most Dems — to pump up their own base.]
It seems inevitable that the Democrats, encouraged
by their
local victories, will launch a similar all-out effort in 2006. So Governor Lingle needs to rethink her
strategy and methods if she will succeed in adding new Republican members to
the State House and Senate, set up strong contests for the Congressional races
of Senator Akaka and Representatives Abercrombie and Case, and possibility even
to win her own bid for reelection in 2006.
Many suggestions are
floating around Republican circles for doing better in 2006. Here is what I imagine President's Bush's
master advisor, Karl Rove, might say to Governor Lingle based on "Lessons
learned from Bush's 2004 victory."
[Karl Rove, known as the "architect" of
Bush's successful winning presidential campaigns in 2000 and 2004, manages the
White House'S Office of Political Affairs, Office of Public Liaison, Office of
Strategic Initiatives, and now holds the title of "Deputy Chief of
Staff." Rove's new position allows
him even more power to implement policy initiatives designed to lure new voters
to the Republican fold.]
In a nutshell, here's how Rove managed his
unprecedented 2004 success:
While Democrats were boasting of
record registration of urban minorities and young people, Rove was methodically
employing state-of-the-art technologies to identify and then deliver to the
polls millions of social conservatives in rural areas and, most important, in
fast-growing "exurbs" such as Warren County, Ohio.
While Rove concentrated on the big picture, his management team handled
day-to-day operations. Campaign manager Ken Mehlman adapted the peer-to-peer
business model used by Amway Corp. to enlist neighbors, church friends, fellow
veterans, and gun-club buddies. And Republican National Committee Chairman Ed
Gillespie made sure that state parties were awash in cash, helping to cement
GOP gains in House, Senate, and governors' races. [Business Week, Jan 10, 2005, "Best Managers —
The Bush Team"
MEMO TO:
GOVERNOR LINDA LINGLE
FROM:
Karl Rove, Oval Office, The White House
[With acknowledgment to political satirist Jonathan
Swift (1667-1745), author of Gulliver's Travels]
Dear Linda:
Since I first ran President Bush's successful campaign for Governor of
Texas in 1994, I have said our goal is not just to win elections, but to build
a national Republican majority for a generation to come. We have made a lot of progress nationally
since then, and extended our control over many states. It is thus imperative for our long-term
"Realignment Strategy" for you to bring Hawai`i into the Red State column.
We Bushites want you to become a Republican Star.
We need to showcase a moderate female replacement for ex-New Jersey Governor
Christian Todd Whitman since she left the cabinet in 2003. That's why we sent you to Baghdad and gave
you a prominent role at the Republican National Convention in New York this
summer. And had you campaigning for the President on the Mainland.
We start from the recognition that Hawai`i's voters elected you in 2002 because they were
dissatisfied with the long reign of Democrats and wanted new leadership and
ideas. So act boldly, as President Bush
has done since he took office in 2000.
Talking about issues such as affordable housing,
school board reform, transportation and traffic safety measures, is OK, but
hardly likely to generate much excitement.
And the Democrats, if tactically smart, might outfox you, at least in
the public's eyes. [As they did on
education reform, and drugs.] Stand out:
Voters rally to Republican message of low taxes, tough sentences for criminals,
strengthening families, and a hard-hitting approach to national security.
President Bush captured a huge number of votes in
Hawai`i, especially on O`ahu. Your campaign team must build on natural constituents
such as military families and retirees responsive to themes of patriotism and
national security.
At the national level we'll keep the public's
attention on the War On Terrorism. You
should ride our coattails. We are
working hard on cooling down negative news from Iraq. Our neo-conservatives are asserting control
over the State Department and CIA, and we in the White House are debating how
best to alter the geopolitical map of the oil-rich Middle East by bringing "democracy" and "free
market capitalism" to more Arab countries.
(Pay attention to Syria and especially Iran — the second "axis of
evil" state.)
Stamping out terrorists, securing ports, thwarting
weapons of mass destruction, protecting water supplies and power plants, will
dominate the news. International summits
that once focused on investment, world trade and economic growth have, since
the 9/11 terrorist attack, increasingly focus on security matters.
Big dollars can pour into Hawai`i as a bridge to fighting terrorism in Asia. That's one reason we sent Homeland Security
chief Tom Ridge to keynote your second annual Asia-Pacific Homeland Security
Summit in Waikiki a few months ago.
The Bush White House — working with your own
pork-king Senator Inouye — will make sure that the University of Hawai'i
becomes a Navy-affiliated research centers, bringing in $50 million or more in
new government contracts, some of them for classified research. We already approved stationing a large
Stryker brigade in the Islands, and chances look good you'll get a carrier
squadron.
TACTICS:
The Lingle administration should give a prominent role to strong pro-Security
spokesmen and candidates. For example, men such as Jerry Coffee who
spent seven years as a POW in Vietnam.
Captain Coffee came within 53 votes of defeating Dem House leader Blake
Osiro. Captain Coffee remains in the
public's eye via his weekly newspaper column that regularly blasts the
Democrats. Recruit other military
retirees in Hawai`i, and perhaps
veterans returning from service in Afghanistan or Iraq, to run as candidates,
and showcase that Republicans care more about supporting our troops than do
Dems. Let's hear more talk about
expanding freedom and liberty to the rest of the world, in what Secretary of
State Condoleezza Rice refers to as "outposts of tyranny."
President Bush's proposals for major tax cuts and
reform will generate huge publicity. We
and Congress will be reviewing the tax code "in its entirety." The push for private Social Security accounts
and tax reforms will be a replay of the presidential campaign. Big-gun business lobbyists and our
conservative advocacy groups, think tanks, and radio and TV talk-show hosts are
already getting behind the White House and promoting our agenda.
TACTICS:
(1) Launch a Blue Ribbon panel of fiscal conservatives to push radical tax
reform in Hawai`i. Gain publicity for bills to simplify or
overhaul your tax code. Consider major
changes in workers' compensation, health savings accounts, and tort lawsuit
reform. Force the Dems to be seen as the
defenders of their special interest backers — their Insiders network — as they
kill off your initiatives.
(2) Establish branches of conservative lobbying
groups in Hawai`i to popularize Republican issues. We will help you set up a Hawai`i branch of Americans for Tax Reform, the
radical tax cut advocacy group headed by Grover Norquist. Grover is clever at
gaining press. His comment that he wants
to cut government by 1/2 in one generation, "down to the size where we can
drown it in the bathtub" — is widely quoted among conservatives. Norquist's group will help promote other
Republican initiatives such as privatizing Social Security, moving Medicare
recipients into managed health-care programs, eliminating the death (estate)
tax, and reforming tort lawsuits.
I'll ask Grover, who is arguably one of
Washington's best right-wing strategists, to help you plan for the next
election. As right hand man to former
Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich's, Grover helped design Gingrich's famed
1994 "Contract With America" and rally conservative voters to go to
the polls that year. Grover's group
attracts attention these days from demonstrations in Washington and state
capitals on tax-return filing day. Norquist also knows how built alliances with
business guys who have money and support conservative causes. "
Another source of media coverage popularizing our
Republican positions could come from the Club for Growth, whose main
agenda is also promoting tax cuts and drastically reducing the size of the
federal government. The Club for
Growth has been highly successful in raising campaign funds from more than
9,000 members nationally, particularly Wall Street financiers and
executives. The Club for Growth
encourages donors to mail in checks that are bundled and directed to targeted
races.
The Club for Growth consists of a regular
political action committee (PAC), which can give limited donations directly to
campaigns, and a "527" organization which can collect unlimited
contributions, without disclosing donors names, to run issue ad campaigns
during elections. You need to set up similar PACs for your strongest candidates.
(3) Reforming Social Security is another
plank in our efforts to solidify a national Republican majority. We are launching
a grassroots petition drive in all 50 states to push broad-based support for
preserving and improving Social Security.
The Republican National Committee intends to mobilize the 1.5 million
volunteers that helped re-elect President Bush.
Voters respond powerfully to rising crime rates,
rampant drug use — especially ice — and what they perceive as too lenient
courts. Appear tough — look how popular
Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani became when he cracked down on
crime. You already know Rudy, who spoke
at your fundraiser last March. We can certainly fly in him during your 2006
campaign to "toughen" up your image.
I'm glad to see that you are building on your
success in getting four anti-crime state constitutional amendments approved by
Hawai'i voters this November. Having the
radical-liberal ACLU oppose you only strengthens your image as "tough on
crime."
TACTICS: Good PR tactic in getting Honolulu Prosecutor
Peter Carlisle and state Attorney General Mark Bennett to push for two more
anti-crime amendments in 2006. The
November outcome demonstrates that a majority of voters do respond to argument
that the Hawai'i Supreme Court is too liberally interpreting the state
constitution in criminal justice case.
So stand strongly behind the anti-crime packages of bills being proposed
by the Hawaii Law Enforcement Coalition, comprised of the state's four county
prosecutors, police chiefs, the U.S. attorney and the state attorney general.
Excellent too is your new anti-drug package introduced
by Lt. Governor Aiona, which emphasizes deterrence and punishment as the most
effective drug control strategy. Hammer
the Democrat legislators as being "weak on crime."
Campaign Spending Commission Director's Bob
Watada's investigation of widespread illegal campaign contributions given to
major Democratic office holders, certainly helped you win in 2002 on the issue
of political corruption. (And certainly
kept Mayor Harris from running against you.)
But the investigation is winding down.
TACTICS:
your PR teams should be publicizing the criminal indictments resulting from the
Watada audits. And compiling a
devastating summary document of the links between contributors and government
payoffs to be released during the 2006 campaign.
Reinvigorate the issue to remind voters of the
corruption committed by the Old Boy Network.
Establish a special task force in the Attorney General's office to
investigate graft in state construction projects — such as the Honolulu airport
construction. We can assign federal
investigators and auditors to assist you.
This is delicate.
Consider tempering your administration's wholehearted support for the
Akaka native Hawaiian Recognition bill.
We are cognizant of your efforts to attract native Hawaiians to the
Republican fold. Pairing up with now Lt.
Governor Sam Aiona was brilliant. But
our polls and your own letter-to-the-editors show that many voters - especially
among the non-Island born - are put off by what they perceive as excessive
Hawaiian claims. The constant agitation
of Native groups for land, opposition to military bases, and insistent claims
for hundreds of millions more from limited State revenues, are not winning
friends.
Let's be candid too about our national party. We all know that some of our Southern and
Western Senators are not happy with what they consider the race-based claims of
the native Hawaiians. The proposed bill,
even though heavily altered to appease the Department of Interior and Bureau of
Indian Affairs, still runs counter to the Bush Administration's
anti-affirmative action posture.
It is no accident that arch-conservative Theodore
Olson, who was the lawyer for Harold Rice during the Rice vs. Cayetano Supreme
Court case, held the post of U.S. Solicitor General until recently. It was Theodore Olson who led the
Administration's opposition to race-based admission standards at the University
of Michigan and other schools during several 2003 and 2004 trials. Olsen has been mentioned as a possible Bush
Supreme Court nominee.
Senator McCain, who now chairs the Indian Affairs
Committee, has also raised objections that reflect the private views of other
senators. So Linda, being seen as a
gungho supporter of a bill unlikely to be passed by the Republican majority,
and not popular with many Hawai`i
voters, may be more a minus than plus for you.
I suggest you adopt a more tempered position, certainly not as extreme
as the Ken Conklin / Hadyen Burdess/ Twigg-Smith anti- sovereignty one. This is topic for future focus group research
and careful wordsmithing.
As President Bush's victory shows, attracting Hawai`i's evangelicals, Mormons, and new faith
Contemporaries (i.e., New Hope Chapel) to support Republican candidates should be given high priority.
Exploit Wedge Issues. Just
as on the Mainland, Hawai`i's Republican
Party must be seen as the bastion of moral values. Given the passing of your "protect traditional
marriage" constitutional amendment in 1998, there isn't much mileage to be
gained from organizing around the same-sex marriage issue, as the poor showings
of Mike Gabbard and Cam Cavasso showed this year. But there is much ground to be gained by energizing
religious conservatives who oppose abortion, stem cell research, and
physician-assisted suicide. The efforts
of groups such as Hawai`i's Family Forum
and Hawaii Catholic Conference to organize their church members to pressure
Hawai`i's Congressional delegation to vote for the
federal Marriage Amendment should be worked to Republican advantage.
TACTICS:
Recruit more traditionalist candidates, and, as we found so successful during
President's Bush's reelection campaign, use the churches' own communication
channels to popularize our candidates. Target especially the rapidly growing new
evangelical churches popping up in fast growing areas of O`ahu, Kaua`i, Maui,
and Hawai`i Island.
On the Mainland, Christian conservative leaders
have already met in Washington to discuss next year's anti same-sex
constitutional amendment battles in about 10 states, including Arizona, Florida
and Kansas. They are planning to take
their grass-roots movement to a heightened level using their computer databases
and well-honed grassroots methods.
Their goal is to build a network of Christian conservative officials,
candidates and political advocates at all levels.
For example, one organizer who helped Bush win in
Ohio intends to draw on his database of 1.5 million names to hold
town-hall-style meetings early next year to identify issues, recruit organizers
and train volunteers. With a cadre of 15
to 20 leaders in each of Ohio's 88 county, he believes that within a few years
religious conservatives can be running school boards, town councils and county
prosecutors' offices across the state.
"I'm building an army," Mr. Burress said. "We can't
just let people go back to the pews and go to sleep." [After Victory,
Crusader Against Same-Sex Marriage Thinks Big ; New York Times, November
26, 2004, James Dao]
Hawai`i's
religious conservatives need closer ties with Mainland networks. The Christian Coalition of America, for
example, distributed 35 million voters' guides to Protestant churches during
the 2004 campaign. The 12 Republicans
seeking open Congressional seats endorsed by Gary Bauer's conservative Campaign
for Working Families won all 12 contests, capturing five Senate seats, and
seven in the House.
Remember, the number of Americans who describe
themselves as "born again" is around 38% — I don't know the figures
for Hawai`i. But Hawai`i's
Republicans should ride the Bush administration's coattails as Mainland
supporters vigorously oppose abortion and gay marriage, and lobby for the use
of faith-based institutions to provide social services.
We are gearing up for bitter appointments fights
over Federal and Supreme Court nominees.
Social conservatives will mobilize nationally and the fights will give
us lots of press and be covered on Fox and our radio broadcasters. Enlisting Island Republicans join in this
struggle will build better connection to Hawai`i's evangelicals and religious conservatives.
Once again the Dem Old Guard is trying to bring
legalized gambling to Hawai`i. Recall during the 2002 race that Andy
Anderson, running as a Democrat [??], prominently advocated a "Pineapple
Lottery" in his ads and speeches.
Former Republican Anderson was backed by unions and well-known grey-hair
Dems. This year Former Speaker of the
House Joe Souki introduced bills to place a pro-gambling referendum on the 2006
ballot and set up a Gambling Commission.
Souki and his allies know this would unleash the gambling industry's
capacity to pour millions of dollar into PR and advertising, and spend
thousands of dollars on campaign contributions to pro-"gaming"
candidates.
What a gift these guys are giving us to organize
around! Even before you were elected
Governor you took a firm stand against extending legalized gambling to the
Aloha state. If one looks at the wide
range of groups belonging to the Hawai`i Coalition Against Legalized
Gambling, we would attract religious organizations from all over the
conservative to liberal spectrum, and a host of secular groups such as the
League of Women Voters, social workers, and law enforcement, on this issue.
The 2004
election again demonstrated the NRA's stunning ability to turn out voters who
care deeply about the right to bear arms.
In South Dakota, a state with only 750,000 citizens (compared to Hawai`i's 1.2 million), the National Rifle Association
aired 750 television ads, 1,200 radio spots and 300 newspapers ads; put up 30
billboards; and made 150,000 combined
mailings and phone calls to help defeat prominent Democrat Senate Minority
Leader Tom Daschle. Of the 18 candidates
endorsed by the NRA nationally for the Senate, 14 won, for a net gain of four
pro-gun Senate seats. In the House, the NRA endorsed 251 candidates, and 241
won. Linda, need I say any more about
seeking ways to get Hawai`i's hunters and
gun enthusiasts on board to support Republican candidates?
The Ascendancy of Republicanism in Hawai`i has
history and time on its side. Each
campaign the Dems roll out their old "plantation days saga." Resurrected by older Democratic party
stalwarts, we hear tales of the "Old Hawai`i," depicted as a closed
society dominated by Republican plantation Sugar Barrons, that was opened up to
shared political and economic equality by the Democrats and unions in the
mid-1950s.
But that was 50 years ago. As you keep pointing
out, today's Republican Party is ethnically diverse. The number of voters who remember first-hand
those pre-1950s days keeps shrinking.
The 2003 census data show how few of these old-timers are left, and
nearly half of Hawai`i's current
residents were not born in the Islands.
The old history is becoming less relevant as old
attitudes are changing among locally-born residents, and lots of newcomers have
settled in the Islands with quite different values. Union membership rolls have dwindled by half,
and among locally-born residents, the younger generation is more educated and
less seeped in plantation docility than their parents.
Table 1: Age Distribution of Hawaii Residences
(2003)
Age Group
0-19 22%
20-34 17%
35-54 25%
55-59 20%
60 and over 15%
Table 2: Percentage of Hawai`i Residence
Born-in-Islands
Year Census taken Percent
Hawai`i born
1950 71.1%
1960 66.6%
1970 59.2%
1980 57.8%
1990 56.1%
2000 Not available
Where once the Islands were relatively isolated
from Mainland trends, the advent of jet aircraft, TV, satellite, cable, and the
internet, has reduced Hawai`i's
insularity. So Hawai`i has joined the Mainland in being enveloped during
the last 30 years in pro-business ideals.
Religious conservatives widely broadcast their messages via the media
and mailings. Free markets ideology,
cutting taxes and regulations, and other neo-Conservative themes, have replaced
liberalism as the dominant ideology.
Polls show a general rightward shift in young
people's views. Nationally, more 18 to
29-year-olds now identify themselves as Republicans (30%) than Democrats
(24%). A Harvard University poll found
two-thirds of its students in favor of invading Iraq when the war first
began. Pro-war groups sprouted at such
liberal campuses as Brandeis, Yale, and Columbia.
The number of College Republicans have tripled in
the last three years, now numbering more than 100,000 members.
The
conservative message is spreading more widely each year. The rightist Collegiate
Network distributes $200,000 a year to 58 right-leaning student newspapers
around the country, and sends aspiring conservative journalists to Washington
to receive instructions from what Time called the "high priests of
conservative journalism." Its
sister organization, the Intercollegiate Studies Institute, regularly
places conservative articles in campus publications.
The well-funded Federalist Society provide
young conservative lawyers with a supportive social network and job
opportunities.
So Linda — do everything you can to support your
College Republicans and Young Republicans organizations, because they serve as
a major pipeline to recruit youngsters into Hawai`i's conservative movement.
[Fond memories: my political
career really started when, in 1971, I left the University of Utah to become
Executive Director of the College Republicans.]
Linda:
Early-on you must set the agenda for what issues will define the 2006
elections. Develop a strategic media
plan, and commit substantial resources, to constantly place conservative ideas
and your arguments before voters.
On the Mainland conservatives laboriously built a
counter-movement to the liberal-controlled media, first by sending out direct
mail, then establishing rightist think tanks and advocacy groups, bolstered by
talk radio. Now we have Fox News and
Republican-leaning media stars disseminating conservative ideas.
Hawai`i's
Republicans can take advantage of this conservative media system.
Mainland-owned Clear Channel owns 7 radio stations in Hawai`i, carrying Fox news reports hourly. They, and the Christian stations, broadcast
such pro- Republican commentators as Rush Limbaugh, Bill O'Reilly, Bill
Bennett, Michael Reagan, Sean Hannity, Rick Hamada, and Focus On The Family's
Gary Bauer.
The Honolulu Star-bulletin regularly runs
columns by national conservatives George Wills, Cal Thomas, and William Safire,
and its subsidiary, MidWeek, prints Michelle Malkin. Most importantly, they also run
Republican-favoring local columnists Jerry Coffee and Rick Hamada, who address
local topics from a Red State perspective.
Nevertheless we need a lot more pro- Republican
column-inches in the papers, especially if we wish to counter the influence of
your state's most popular newspaper, the liberal-leaning Honolulu Advertiser.
TACTIC:
Set up teams to submit pro-Administration letters- to- editors for all Hawai`i newspapers.
Have your communications people issue weekly themes and backup materials
to loyalist citizen-writers, especially members of advocacy groups mentioned
above in an earlier section.
Create more local branches of think tanks like the
CATO Institutes to pump out pro- Republican reports and policy proposals
tailored to Hawai`i. You already
have a branch of the pro-property rights Pacific Legal Foundation in the
Islands; they can help you lead the charge on eliminating the Land Use and
Water Commissions and reducing regulations that impede developers. You already have your own libertarian Grassroot
Institute Of Hawai`i that issues a lot of Island-tuned commentaries. See
that they are properly funded and their opinon-pieces better disseminated.
We in Washington will talk to our network of
conservative financiers backers to fund more support for Island groups as
well. The influential advocacy group
Club for Growth is already spending $15 million on a national public
relations campaign to promote President Bush's plan to privatize Social
Security. The theme of "gaining
control of your own money" and "ownership rights" is especially
popular with younger voters. [See section above.] The next time you visit D.C, be sure to
speak to the directors of the Cato Institute, the American Enterprise
Institute, the Heritage Foundation, and the National Business Roundtable about
helping you out with their existing staff.
Be sure to speak to Sam Brunelli, Executive
Director of the American Legislative Exchange Council, an organization
pushing legislation that favors big business and rollbacks of environmental
regulations. As Sam has put it,
"ALEC's goal is to ensure
that these state legislators are so well informed, so well armed, that they can
set the terms of the public policy
debate, that they can change the agenda, that they can lead. This is the
infrastructure that will reclaim the states for our movement.
[www.sourcewatch.org]
Lastly, establish pro-Republican webpages and blogs
to counter the liberal press by expanding the universe of political news
coverage. The Republican National Committee is soliciting donors to finance its
efforts to, as we frame it, get Bush's message "past the liberal media
filter" to the public. You should
do the same by setting up your own state's alternative news dissemination
system.
That the mainstream media no longer need play an
exclusive role in setting the national news agenda is another thing we proved
with this election. Instead, the agenda
was often set by partisans, via political advertising and committed freelance
efforts on private websites and internet blogs.
Time and again, the established media reacted to issues rammed through
by outside groups.
The power of Advocacy Journalism is firmly
established. In a barrage of competing accusations, the public doesn't know who
to believe. That 72 percent of Bush
supporters believe that Iraq had or was actively developing weapons of mass
destruction, and 75 percent believe that Iraq was substantially supporting
al-Qaed, tells us we've done a good job in defining the election debate.
Despite the public saying they don't like negative
ads, we all know that partisan attacks can work spectacularly. In mid- February, Kerry's favorable / unfavorable ratings stood at 60% positive
to 26% negative. But after the relentless hammering of our own
ads and speeches made by the President and Cheney, and the anti-Kerry ads,
books, and news releases put out by the Swift Boat Veterans, Kerry's ratings plummeted to 32% positive vs 41% negative by late summer.
So your communications team must greatly expand the
internet distribution of Lingle and Republican-favoring news and
interpretations, such as done by Malia Zimmermann's webzine Hawai`i Reporter
during your Honolulu mayor's race.
Some people complain that their mailboxes were
overflowing with negative campaign mailers that were more brazen than ever in
distorting opponents' records. You had your own instances where both parties
distributed hard-hitting mailings.
Defeated mayoral candidate Duke Bainum
complained about what he called a distorted, blatantly partisan attack on his
spouse spread by the webzine Hawai`i Reporter
during the final weeks of the campaign.
One can debate whether this was a smear or just
hard campaigning. But my long political
career tells me that aggressive campaigning tools work. The materials put out by the Swift Boat
Veterans for Truth this year, or directed against Ex Georgia Senator Max
Clevland, or McCain in 2000, had their intended effects. We won, they lost.
You need to set up an Oppositional Candidate
Research Team to carefully investigate the voting records, campaign
contributors, business deals, newspapers and court records, speeches given in
the Legislature and outside before civic groups, of all Democrat opponents.
Spend a ton of money to win. The near success of Duke Baiumum professionally
managed campaign shows what can be accomplished to compensate for fewer
grassroots supporters. But as I will
describe below, we can build up our own network of dedicated face-to-face
advocates. This requires competent
management of volunteers, and the paid staff to prepare and distribute
carefully scripted handouts, videotapes and CDs and DVDs, a website with
state-of-the-art registration and video streaming capabilities, sophisticated
data bases and data mining programs, etc.
Highlight new party spokespeople. The
Party needs new faces to better reflect its new agenda. If I can be candid, the
public needs to see less of genial spokesmen like Representatives Galen Fox and
Barbara Muramoto, and more red meat types such as Jerry Coffee, to highlight
war themes, and photogenic and smooth moderate, such as Councilman Charles
Djou. Get them to write Viewpoints for
the newspapers, appear on radio talk shows, and put up their own blogs to
address partisans.
Another pillar of Republican victories is to
greatly increase the number of dedicated people going door-to-door or just
talking with their neighbors, about our issues. This "Politics of
Persuasion" helped us push President Bush over-the-top.
The Democrats used to be viewed as the party best
focusing on the future, as advancing new ideas and solutions for perennial
problems. But on the Mainland we have
succeeded in casting the Dems as the party of the past, trying to survive
simply by defending a narrowing circle of obsolete 1930s New Deal programs, or
placating single-agenda pressure groups such as homosexuals, extremist
environmentalists, radical feminists, and the like. Younger voters, Hispanics, Blacks, and other
upwardly mobile voters, are buying into our message of reforming taxes and
Social Security and creating more choices and opportunities.
In Hawai`i
the Democrats are seen as more committed to defending their party loyalists
— the Old Boy Network — and special
interests backers — labor unions, trial lawyers and the insurance industry — than in fixing the educational system,
ending transportation gridlock and pothole-filled roads, deregulating
burdensome government regulations, etc.
Keep hammering on this theme: we are the party of change, the Democrats
are the backers of the status-quo who fear losing their power, the general
public be damned.
Around the country — especially in the state where
the election was closest — Republican volunteers held thousands of parties for
the President in their homes, where they brought in their neighbors to listen
to the case for Bush. This was no
spur-of-the-moment exercise. For more than a decade the Republican Party and
its ideological allies have been systematically training people at the local
level to proselytize and persuade for our ideals. Once we had only direct mailings and obscure
books and pamphlets to get our message out.
But then our well-funded foundations and think tanks began to issue
reports and studies that today are distributed widely by our own conservative
radio and TV commentators, and repeated by the mainstream media as well as on
blogs and web sites. But another step is
required to win. It's people talking
face-to-face with others they know personally, who are most effective in
enlisting voters for our side.
On the Mainland, then, we Republicans have
continuously recruited and trained
average citizens to argue politics and spin our ideology to their
neighbors. Through this process we have
built a network of dedicated people far beyond the hard-core fundamentalists
and Chamber of Commerce businesspeople.
This year we will take on reforming Social
Security, another plank in our broad agenda to solidify a national Republican
majority. The Republican National Committee has launched a website and
grassroots petition drive in all 50 states to mobilize broad-based support for
"preserving" and modernizing the antiquated Social Security
system. We will be energizing our State
parties will mobilize the 1.5 million volunteers that helped re-elect the
President.
As GOP Chairman Ken Mehlman observes:
"By allowing more Americans
to build wealth through low-risk investments and a nest egg they can pass on to
their children, Social Security reform will create larger constituency for
pro-growth, pro-ownership, pro-free-market politicians and policies."
[Ron Fournier, "Social Security Plan Dicey,
but might work," the honolulu advertiser,
Feb 3, 2005]
Hawai`i's
Democrats once mobilize similar networks of dedicated followers among union and
ethnics. But these old networks are in
decline because of demographics and dysfunctional leaderships. Republicans can fill in the gap, especially
among those who have achieved some degree of middle class status — who are the
majority of voters today.
reflects similar problems faced by the Mainland
Democrats. Nowadays, American liberalism
is fragmented into a collection of single issue pressure groups (the teachers
union, abortion rights activists, gays....) and an ineffective leftist protest
movement, furious about the Iraq war and conservative advances on the social
and economic fronts. For years the
Democrats have lacked a coherent governing philosophy capable of rising above
the self-interest of their constituent pressure groups or the fumbling and tiny
Left. [Ralph Nader for President again
in 2008?]
Hawai`i's
Dems still haven't recovered from their loss of the governorship to you in
2002. They are admittedly slowly
rebuilding their organizational capacity, and are buoyed up by our legislative
losses in November. But many of their
wins were by under 100 votes. They still
lack any kind of liberal-leaning Think Tank to analyze and issue reports on
major public policy issues. They lack a
well-funded PR operation, and a candidate-recruitment farm team and training
program. They lack a single Head of
Party or spokesman of any stature. Most
significantly the present generation of Democratic leaders have no guiding
"core philosophy" to replace the old plantation days narrative, that
would appeal to today's mostly middle class voters.
The opportunity is here for you and the Hawai`i Republican Party to seize the moment. Hawai`i
can join in the building of a national Republican majority in U.S. for a
generation to come.
-------------------------------------------------
Ira Rohter is Associate Professor of Political
Science,
The University of Hawaii -- Manoa