Blog for Democracy

Brand Obama

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So right on cue Obama is scooting to the center, which has some of the newbies and a few old timers a little bunchy.

Arianna writes:

Running to the middle in an attempt to attract undecided swing voters didn’t work for Al Gore in 2000. It didn’t work for John Kerry in 2004. And it didn’t work when Mark Penn (obsessed with his “microtrends” and missing the megatrend) convinced Hillary Clinton to do it in 2008. Watering down that brand is the political equivalent of New Coke.

Even though politicians have made this maneuver since the mid 1800s, Obama isn’t supposed to be just another politician. He is brand Obama. As Andrew Romero wrote, in this election, brand has become a form of content. Now pundits are opining that Obama is “damaging his brand” by recent switches (or clarifications), on public financing, FISA, the Iraq War, gay marriage, the faith based plan, late term abortions, and so on.

My only response is so what? Either we trust the man to do the right thing once he is elected or we do not. There’s really nothing that can be done or said now without damaging his campaign, never mind his brand. Those of you who wanted him and those of you who didn’t, need to stop sending junk you want posted, petitions you want signed or whatever else you’ve cooked up to influence his campaign. In all cases, it’s nothing but noise. The primary is over and unless you’ve got $28,500 to plunk down for dinner with Obama, your window of opportunity for influence has closed.

All that matters now is the middle. It’s really that simple and it will forever be so.

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22 responses to “Brand Obama”

  1. odinseye2k Avatar
    odinseye2k

    Zaid,

    The accusation is yours, so the burden of proof is on you.

    However, I’ve seen the “16 months” quote from as far back as 2007:

    http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/01/us/politics/02obama-transcript.html?_r=2&oref=slogin&pagewanted=print&oref=slogin

    The shorter timeline that he signed onto around that time was actually part of the Feingold-Reid withdrawal bill.

    Also, in terms of the Chicago Boys … Obama is a UofC professor himself, so he’s likely to have friends that he’s talked economics with before. As for his recent pick of head advisor, I’m not a large fan of the guy.

    Obama’s been pretty committed to trade throughout his campaign – he’s just stipulated a need to get the labor and environment excesses dealt with. And the free-traders have given him a template for that, namely the investors’ and intellectual property rights that are built into each of these deals.

    But “pay attention more” is not exactly the world’s greatest debate technique. I know you can do better than Bill O’Reilly.

  2. sndeak Avatar
    sndeak

    zaid…please stop this nonsense….from Obama today

    “Look, let me talk about the broader issue, this whole notion that I am shifting to the center,” he said. “The people who say this apparently haven’t been listening to me.”

    To this, he adds, parenthetically: “And I must say some of this is my friends on the left” and those in the media.

    “I am someone who is no doubt progressive,” he said, adding that he believes in universal health care and that government has a strong role to play in overseeing financial institutions and cracking down on abuses in bankruptcies and the like.(…)

    “I believe in a whole lot of things that make me progressive and put me squarely in the Democratic camp,” he said. But, he noted, he does not believe that the active hand of government is a replacement, say, for parental responsibility in education.(…)

    “One of the things you find as you go through this campaign, everyone becomes so cynical about politics,” Mr. Obama said. There is an “assumption that your must be doing everything for political reasons.”

    Voters should understand, he said, that they rarely will find themselves in 100 percent agreement with him. “But don’t assume that’s because I’m just doing it for “political reasons, he said.

    “That just means we disagree,” he said.

  3. Zaid Avatar
    Zaid

    “When I do the reading now, it is looking a lot less like Obama is tacking to the right (I haven’t seen major policy reversals on anything *but* FISA) ”

    then pay attention more

  4. odinseye2k Avatar
    odinseye2k

    When I do the reading now, it is looking a lot less like Obama is tacking to the right (I haven’t seen major policy reversals on anything *but* FISA) and more that the news guys are starting to pounce on him.

    And I think having the blog people police him as quickly (or faster) than the dimwitted media picks up the ball and runs with it is going to end up being good for his campaign.

    But, of course, the media is reporting a “move to the middle” at the same time that it gives a pass on a long, long catalog of McCain’s inability to decide whether he is a moderate or a true conservative.

    And given that Obama recently proposed a way for soldiers to have much more breathing space to resort their financial affairs when they get messed up, I’d say his economic populism is not changing too much.

  5. Zaid Avatar
    Zaid

    He’s not tacking to the center by backing telecom immunity or lightening his stance on Iraq. He’s tacking to the right. Also, he appointed top right-wing economists to his economic team — corporate america’s favorite folks, the chicago boys.

    If he continues to let Gore/Kerry advisers tell him to tack right and alienate the economic populist base that consists of 2/3 of the country, he could lose the unlosable election.

  6. JerryT Avatar
    JerryT

    This is new territory in some ways I think. For example:

    Not sure if anybody here keeps up with democrats.com, but they are upset with the Obama position on FISA, but they don’t want to actually hurt the campaign- just nudge him to change his position. So they’ve created an “escrow fund” in which they hope to collect $1 million from people who feel the same. Fair enough. In theory, this would be a strong statement of where the progressive left is coming from. But, in order to not negatively affect the campaign, you don’t actually have to contribute money to the fund, you only have to PLEDGE to the fund, and they are explicit in encouraging us to definitely donate any money pledged directly to the campaign at some point no matter what. (I assume the implicit message there is that your donation would be an indication of money your were *temporarily* withholding from the campaign.) Then, since this is a virtual escrow fund, there is an ActBlue page through which you are encouraged to make your actual donation when the time comes. (Ironically, ActBlue is a PAC.)

    So it’s all very confusing. At least to me. But I don’t think it is necessarily damaging to talk about criticisms we have of the campaign or the candidate. We Dems would certainly want to try to avoid a can-you-top-this bashfest, but constructive criticism can help develop the rhetoric and may even strengthen the brand in the long run. Let’s face it, neither Obama nor any other candidate could possibly be perfect for everyone, therefore, all of us who are not Barack Obama are likely going to disagree with him on something. It’s OK. We don’t have to hide it, and it doesn’t have to be a deal breaker.

  7. CatherineAtlanta Avatar
    CatherineAtlanta

    Odin,

    I wish this were true, but I think you are attributing much more advanced reasoning and thought than truly exists. Us “inside baseball” people will hold true, but we cannot reveal weaknesses to the GOP, they will grasp onto them and make them grow.

  8. odinseye2k Avatar
    odinseye2k

    And a little just-in-time perspective, courtesy the Washington Post:

    Conservative activists are preparing to do battle with allies of Sen. John McCain in advance of September’s Republican National Convention, hoping to prevent his views on global warming, immigration, stem cell research and campaign finance from becoming enshrined in the party’s official declaration of principles.

    McCain has not yet signaled the changes he plans to make in the GOP platform, but many conservatives say they fear wholesale revisions could emerge as candidate McCain seeks to put his stamp on a document that currently reflects the policies and principles of President Bush.

    “There is just no way that you can avoid anticipating what is going to come. Everyone is aware that McCain is different on these issues,” said Jessica Echard, executive director of the conservative Eagle Forum. “We’re all kind of waiting with anticipation because we just don’t know how he’s going to thread this needle.”

    We are the picture of tranquility in comparison to the other side, methinks.

  9. odinseye2k Avatar
    odinseye2k

    I think the main trick for us is the ability to give vociferous feedback but still remain supportive of the cause.

    The ability to gripe directly via blog, email, etc. much easier than before may make it a lot easier to keep the newer folks connected rather than simply wandering off in a confused huff as may have happened earlier.

    Keeping information going can make people a lot more patient than when they have to speculate about what someone is up to.

    The only important issue in all the above at the moment seems to be FISA. It got a lot of attention really fast and is now the subject of the largest group on Obama’s website. An Obama filibuster on immunity is probably sufficient red meat (and just a darn good thing to do, even for independents that don’t like being spied on) for his core supporters.

    There’s been some squawking on the faith-based stuff and public financing, but no big deal.

    As for Iraq, I’ve seen the 16 month number as far back as last year.

    So, a lot of that stuff is noise, but I think Obama ignores large signals like the FISA thing at his peril. FISA alone is certainly not enough to depress his support, but the phenomenon among his own supporters on his own website is something that I’m guessing his campaign is studying quite closely.

    That’s the great promise of the web right there – to cut through the mass media crap of “what the public wants” and see right there in stark numbers just how many people in your base care about what.

  10. MelGX Avatar
    MelGX

    Yes, that’s it Catherine. There was always the question of whether or not his base would hold once he shifted right for the General. I think it will, if everyone can just relax and allow him to do what he needs to do.

  11. plange Avatar
    plange

    Yep, and that’s what I was trying to imply with my metaphor…

  12. CatherineAtlanta Avatar
    CatherineAtlanta

    I think what Mel is trying to point out is that whether he was your choice or not, he’s our candidate now. We risk damaging “the brand” if we bring to much noise to the front now.

    To my mind, it’s imperative that “the brand” stay strong so that we can beat McCain in November. Too much criticism of Senator Obama could easily risk that.

  13. odinseye2k Avatar
    odinseye2k

    And I’ve also got to agree with Arianna’s points a bit. If you are at the end of the end of a two-year campaign and you are too dumb / unplugged / busy / whatever to know the differences between the two candidates … I doubt you will notice the finely tuned attempts to reach out to you with specific policies.

    I think these people would be best reached by Disney or fervent supporters rather than by cold, hard calculations. Because frankly, if you are undecided at this point, you’re a pretty crappy calculator.

  14. Drew Avatar
    Drew

    I don’t know its provenance, but that image is available as a background and a poster from the media / downloads section of the Obama website.

    I don’t know how different Obama is from any other politician, but whether he is or isn’t, I don’t think I’d dismiss efforts to influence the campaign as noise because the primary is over.

  15. plange Avatar
    plange

    Problem is Odin, is that the faithful were the ones who bought this package and now that he’s our package they’ve got to help take it home. They can’t all of a sudden leave us holding the bag.

  16. odinseye2k Avatar
    odinseye2k

    True, Mel. But when was branding ever about reality?

    I’ll take a Disney fairy tale over a Swift Boat echo chamber any day of the week. If people come out of this with an inflated sense of their engagement with the body politic, I can see worse happening.

    However, somewhere in that big mythology of Brand Obama, is a nugget of truth that I like very much. That 21st Century Town Hall sounds like one potential revamp that participatory democracy could really use.

    The best thing about blogs as a candidate, in my mind, is not only do you see what your base wants, but you see what unites it and what divides it. Pure gold for a campaign in General Election mode as you can then use the polls to read the general feeling in the room.

    There’s a parallel thing I remembered called OpenNASA that I’m a bit of a fan of.

  17. MelGX Avatar
    MelGX

    Those are all good points odin, but I guess I just never bought into the hype. This campaign seems like some Disney or Steven Spielberg interpretation of politics that bears no relationship to any political reality I know. Cue the sticky sweet John Williams music with a hip hop back beat.

    Rusty, the art above isn’t from the campaign. I grabbed it from eventful, so I’m sure it’s by one of the faithful.

  18. odinseye2k Avatar
    odinseye2k

    I should also have said above, Obama isn’t just the Great Left Hope (I hope he can do for common sense what Ronald Reagan did for hollowing out this country’s wealth and cultivating our worst natures).

  19. odinseye2k Avatar
    odinseye2k

    And my rant just gave me a great idea for my day job…

  20. odinseye2k Avatar
    odinseye2k

    The benefit of the Obama cult is the same as any other in history for gaining converts: authenticity. Those low-level foot soldiers look you in the eye and really mean what they are saying as whole-heartedly as if they were running for office themselves.

    For example, all of this:

    My only response is so what? Either we trust the man to do the right thing once he is elected or we do not. There’s really nothing that can be done or said now without damaging his campaign, never mind his brand. Those of you who wanted him and those of you who didn’t, need to stop sending junk you want posted, petitions you want signed or whatever else you’ve cooked up to influence his campaign. In all cases, it’s nothing but noise. The primary is over and unless you’ve got $28,500 to plunk down for dinner with Obama, your window of opportunity for influence has closed.

    All the above can make one feel wise and urbane and knowledgeable at all, but it sure as hell ain’t inspiring. Know your place, play your role, and eventually you’ll get the big office.

    I understand the grind and all – believe me, I play it every day in my day job.

    But the magic of the Obama campaign is that a lot of this laundry is being aired. If he changes his position (again) on FISA, you won’t have to guess about some shadowy meeting with a telecom exec. You’ll be able to point to hundreds of blog posts with his supporters imploring him to do something.

    Brand Obama isn’t the Great Left Hope. Brand Obama is about togetherness, the importance of the follower being just as great as that of the leader, and many voices clattering off each other to get it together. Brand Obama is Google, Facebook, Apple, and many hard-hitting, ass-kicking firms that straddle the line between order and chaos.

    Such is my interpretation of the brand, anyways.

  21. rusty Avatar
    rusty

    Brand Obama looks kind of like an upside-down Pepsi logo:

    http://img61.imageshack.us/img61/906/pepsi20logozr5.jpg

  22. innerredneckexposed Avatar
    innerredneckexposed

    Even though politicians have made this maneuver since the mid 1800s, Obama isn’t supposed to be just another politician.

    Quote of the millenium. Well the week at least.

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