Democrats Seek Issue to Buoy Turnout in Midterms
By CARL HULSE, NYT, MAY 21, 2014
WASHINGTON — With Tuesday’s primaries reinforcing the strength of the Republican establishment, House Democrats are reassessing their electoral strategy based on a major internal research project that shows their candidates stand a better chance when they portray Republicans as uncaring toward working-class Americans while they continue to back policies favoring the wealthy and corporate America.
Democrats could build on this distrust, the research showed, by emphasizing support for policies such as equal pay for men and women, ensuring that corporations pay a fair share of taxes, and increased job opportunities in the United States.
The research also found that an effort to increase the minimum wage — a recent top priority of congressional Democrats and the White House — is not by itself enough to motivate swing voters to go to the polls and back Democrats in the fall.
“It concerns voters but doesn’t necessarily motivate them to vote in the midterms,” said Representative Steve Israel of New York, the chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.
(More here.)
WASHINGTON — With Tuesday’s primaries reinforcing the strength of the Republican establishment, House Democrats are reassessing their electoral strategy based on a major internal research project that shows their candidates stand a better chance when they portray Republicans as uncaring toward working-class Americans while they continue to back policies favoring the wealthy and corporate America.
Democrats could build on this distrust, the research showed, by emphasizing support for policies such as equal pay for men and women, ensuring that corporations pay a fair share of taxes, and increased job opportunities in the United States.
The research also found that an effort to increase the minimum wage — a recent top priority of congressional Democrats and the White House — is not by itself enough to motivate swing voters to go to the polls and back Democrats in the fall.
“It concerns voters but doesn’t necessarily motivate them to vote in the midterms,” said Representative Steve Israel of New York, the chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.
(More here.)
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1 Comments:
So House Dems outraised Republicans again ... but is that because the Republicans have support from outside groups, so they do not need as much ?
Look at MN-08 where Stewart Mills III had $500,000 spent by the US Chamber of Commerce in television ads earlier this month.
My view is that incumbent Republicans will win easily -- not because they have good policies but because of being incumbents. Look, this week, the House passed WRRDA (the water infrastructure bill) that will create jobs over the objection of FreedomWorks, Heritage, etc. This week it was announced that the House-Senate have agreed upon a Workforce Investment bill that I am sure that FreedomWorks, et al will oppose.
Both programs are jobs bills ... that incumbents can run on ... and make it appear like something is getting done.
Yet, if you look closely at the original House bill, it gutted training programs, and the compromise bill has many of them back ... and the funding will be less in FY2015 then in FY2012 ... so on the surface, the incumbent can say he got a jobs training bill passed and no one will challenge him on its merits.
Add to that the VA situation which ya gotta suspect that the House Republicans will use as a precursor to Obamacare death panels ... "look what they did to our veterans, you know that Obamacare will do that too." I think that the House Republicans will pick-up at least three seats due to the VA -- including two from Arizona (Barber and Kirkpatrick).
The minimum wage issue has never made any electoral sense ... it just won't motivate people to the polls. The paycheck fairness issue is more understandable.
IMO, the only issue that the Dems can promote is student debt and rising student loan interest rates --- that is something that every parent and grandparent can understand.
In January, I had the Dems picking up 8 seats ... I now see them losing 3.
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