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GOP’s Top Midterm Strategy is All About Hillary

GOP’s Top Midterm Strategy is All About Hillary

“We’re going to make them own her.”

The GOP has decided to use failed Democrat presidential candidate Hillary Clinton as a main part of its midterm strategy in order to keep control of Congress this year. From Fox News:

Even if she avoids the spotlight moving forward, the Republican Party plans to evoke her early and often in key congressional races, particularly in regions Trump won, which feature most of the midterm season’s competitive races.

Internal polling and focus groups conducted by Republican campaigns find that Clinton remains one of the most unpopular high-profile Democrats in the nation, second only to Nancy Pelosi, the House minority leader.

Just 36 percent of Americans viewed Clinton favorably in a December Gallup poll, an all-time low mark that bucked a trend in which unsuccessful presidential candidates typically gain in popularity over time.

“We’re going to make them own her,” Republican National Committee spokesman Rick Gorka said.

This line of attack has already shown up in Pennsylvania, Indiana, and North Dakota. Pamphlets circled around Pennsylvania for its special election in its 18th district a few months ago shouted, “STOP HILLARY. STOP PELOSI. STOP LAMB.”

Democrat Conor Lamb ended up winning that special election despite all the money the GOP poured into it. From the Associated Press:

“I promise you that you’ll continue to see it — Hillary Clinton starring in our paid media. She’s a very powerful motivator,” said Corry Bliss, who leads the Congressional Leadership Fund, a Republican super political action committee ready to spend tens of millions of dollars to shape House races this fall. “It’s about what she represents. What she represents, just like what Nancy Pelosi represents, is out-of-touch far-left liberal positions.”

Of course it doesn’t help that Hillary doesn’t want to leave the spotlight. As the AP noted, “she launched a political organization designed to encourage Trump ‘resistance’ groups” and still makes appearances. She still won’t accept responsibility for losing the election and instead places blame everywhere else.

But it still shocks me that the GOP has decided to take this route considering the Democrats and her former aides don’t want much to do with her. Hillary received a lot of backlash last month when she visited India and implied that us in flyover country hate black people and us women who didn’t vote for her did so because the men in our lives told us not to.

Some of that backlash came from the Democrats and those around her. An interviewer asked Sen. Heidi Heitkamp (D-ND) when Hillary would finally “ride off into the sunset” and the incumbent answered, “[N]ot soon enough.” Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-MO) said that that’s not the way “you should talk about any voter.”

Instead I wish the GOP would concentrate on the victories they’ve had since Trump took office. Give voters a reason to keep the GOP in the majority.

Look at the jobs reports just from 2018. March was a cool month, but the economy added more than a half a million jobs in the first two months of 2018. Unemployment is still at a low 4.1%.

While March didn’t have a spectacular jobs report, the Commerce Department revealed that US retail sales jumped .6% after three straight months of declines. So more people are finding jobs, which has led to people pumping more money into the economy.

Then there’s North Korea. On Friday, the hermit kingdom will meet with South Korea and supposedly they will work on an actual end to the six decade long Korean War. Not only that, but North Korea has announced that it suspended nuclear and long-range missile tests. Kemberlee’s post from Friday provided expert analysis on this move.

President Donald Trump has planned a summit with dictator Kim Jong Un in May. He described the recent moves as “big process,” but knows more happen. He will ask the dictator “to dismantle the country’s nuclear arsenal without conceding significant ground on economic sanctions.”

However, it looks like Trump has done a lot more on North Korea, the most brutal and awful regime in the world, in his first year than anyone else before him. I would hope if good things come from the summit, the GOP will run on that. Granted, I don’t trust anything North Korea says.

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Comments

Huh…

How ’bout running on good ideas and expanding our freedoms.

Bet that would be a winner!

    Edward in reply to Ragspierre. | April 23, 2018 at 12:04 pm

    Agree that promoting accomplishments is important. Given the state of political advertising, I think negative advertising also works. S0 embrace the power of “and”.

      Ragspierre in reply to Edward. | April 23, 2018 at 12:20 pm

      Nothing wrong with “and”. But the “and” isn’t limited to Hellary. There will be a new face, and the ideas of the Collective need to be articulated and exposed for why they are wrong.

    It sucks, doesn’t it? That slow realization that you aren’t one of the cool kids anymore. The polite older generation is dying off and the rebellious young crowd is willing to speak up and point out what a bunch of old hypocrites you are.

    Now they are going to shove that in your fact with Hillary ads and the best you can do is try to appeal to the Greatest Generation’s mentality to be civil. But being 90, they don’t hear so well.

      Merlin in reply to elle. | April 23, 2018 at 1:38 pm

      The Greatest Generation played a significant role in building the free nation that makes your keyboard courage possible. Our country has seen massive benefits from that generation’s renovations to the nation’s foundation. Most of today’s youth live an incredibly soft existence due to the sacrifice, determination, and toil of that generation. Each generation since has had their own forms of rebellion, with each successive generation’s rebellion possessing less sacrifice, less determination, and significantly less toil.

      Those old folks who might not hear so well anymore possess a wealth of hard earned knowledge that is free for those youth bright enough to ask for it. It isn’t always necessary to learn the hard way.

        “keyboard courage”

        Excellent turn of phrase! I’m going to use that one in the future.

        elle in reply to Merlin. | April 23, 2018 at 2:21 pm

        “Those old folks who might not hear so well anymore possess a wealth of hard earned knowledge”

        I could not agree with you more. But what we need this election is for the socialists and the hard core lefties to LOSE their fight to gain majorities.

        My point was not that the values and lessons of the Greatest Generation are not great, but that we aren’t going to win the next generation by putting on redcoats and marching down the lanes while the rebels shoot from the bushes.

        We need to win.

        JusticeDelivered in reply to Merlin. | April 23, 2018 at 4:28 pm

        A key reason for my success was understanding that older people were a wealth of knowledge and experience. I had lots of older friends and mentors, and I preferred them to my peers. I started my first business when I was 19 years old and had nothing in common with people my own age. The only downside to this was having to deal much earlier in life with death of those friends.

      YellowGrifterInChief in reply to elle. | April 23, 2018 at 3:21 pm

      You’re are one of the cool kids? Not in any locale with a population greater than 1.

    buckeyeminuteman in reply to Ragspierre. | April 23, 2018 at 3:47 pm

    Actually repealing Obamacare would have been a start.

You know what? Fuck it. Shove Hillary down the throat of the Democrats like her husband shoving his todger down the throat of a WH intern!

Negative ads do seem to make an impact, it is an unfortunate issue with people in that it generates some anger which is more motivational than good ideas on how to limit government overreach.

I think a combination of the Democrats anti-gun, anti- second amendment, along with Maxine Waters rants, Pelosi’s probable elevation to Speaker, along with talking about the gains we’ve made in the economy, job force, Korea dialog, reductions in regulations, the tax cut, while laying out what they would like to do next to bring back freedoms and using the Democrats words as counter to their positive would be effective.

Tax reform and job creation, then Pelosi saying the cuts were just crumbs. The additional thing needs to be their ideas of what should come next, while juxtaposing Maxine Waters impeach. A compare and contrast the Republicans with the Democrats. To me that is more of a winning combination to push.

Ending some commercials with the candidates belief of all of us being in this together, despite different ideas of how to get there, then playing Hillary’s basket of deplorables, or her blaming women who were forced to vote for Trump.

I think when you show positive things for your ideas, then show the left for what they are saying, the contrast is stark. And it needs to show them saying the negative comments, not just writing out the quotes. Tying into the opposition candidate is important as well. Show how the Democrats, no matter what they say, always vote along the party line. The things the candidates stand for mean nothing if they are Democrats in terms of how they vote. Take Lamb, he might be pro-2A but will not buck the party unless he is given permission to. They march lock-step while Republicans struggle to pass things along party lines. It shows more independence is given to the Republican candidates.

The left has been warned repeatedly, “You aren’t going to like the new rules and norms you’ve established.”

They can’t understand why we voted Trump and want to make an issue of it? Then maybe it is time to highlight why THEY voted for Hillary so we can all contrast and compare.

    JusticeDelivered in reply to elle. | April 23, 2018 at 4:35 pm

    We sure dodged a bullet with Hillary, imagine her juvenile attitude calling the shots as president. Now Hillary will be known as the worst sorehead loser in history of candidates for president.

This may be my first time agreeing with Rags.

How about this crazy idea? The repubs fund the wall, increase deportations, and make the tax cuts permanent. They nuke the stupid 60% rule and push through all the nominations.

Of course, Rags would object because that might help “tRump”.

Nose, face, some disassembly required.

    Ragspierre in reply to lpdbw. | April 23, 2018 at 12:16 pm

    You haven’t been reading my comments, maybe preferring those who lie about my positions. I understand, since they are quite prevalent.

    I’ve supported a border barrier (a fence system is much more intelligent) for decades. I support making life here as an illegal alien MUCH less attractive (as that’s FAR more effective than a border barrier). You don’t have to deport people illegally present here; they do that themselves because they can’t stay here comfortably.

    Tax cuts should be permanent. But the entire tax code should be burned down, and the roots dug up. The tax code is the single greatest affront to the idea of a free people ever conceived.

    If…T-rump notwithstanding…those things were put forward by the R candidates (I’m not a Republican…for decades), I think they’d enjoy a lot of support.

      Hmmm, that’s funny. I thought that is what they did put forth… at election time.

      JusticeDelivered in reply to Ragspierre. | April 24, 2018 at 10:17 am

      How about:
      1) Routinely seizing illegals assets, and using the money to fund enforcement?

      2) Making repeated illegal entry a capital crime and sending them back in a body bag?

      3) Extracting heavy fees, say 20% of any money being transferred back to Mexico by illegals, again using proceeds to pay for border control?

      4) Building a few thousand human cannons on flatbed semi trailers, and using them to return first time offenders. There could be a TV show showing funniest and most tragic deportations.

      5) Amend or repeal the 14th amendment, make it retroactive for 30 years.

      6) Wall or fence, use drone swarms, 80% surveillance, 20% antipersonnel, capturing terminations, airing in the most tragic category on TV.

      I agree that making their lives miserable is the most cost effective means of getting them to leave.

      Then there is the issue of recovering all costs related to this problem from Mexico.

They have to run with some sort of attack strategy. What else are they going to use, repeal Obamacare? Reduce the national debt? If they try to run on Republican principles, they’ll get laughed right out of office.

    elle in reply to irv. | April 23, 2018 at 12:13 pm

    sadly, that’s kind of funny. But no, they won’t get laughed out of office because what are we going to do? Vote for someone who is running on a platform of raise our taxes, curb our free speech, and repeal the 2nd amendment and let’s be like Venezuela?

    No, Hillary is the poster child for what they actually stand for. I’m all in.

Actually…I would just like it if for once the Democrats actually post some policy ideas. Just once would be enough.

Funny how the media NEVER asks Democrats what their actual policies are for the nation innit. Most likely because even Democrats understand that running on a platform of increased taxes, reduced freedom of speech and repealed 2nd Amendment aint exactly vote winners for anyone capable of rubbing two or more brain cells together!

    Exiliado in reply to mailman. | April 23, 2018 at 1:05 pm

    Hillary’s platform was “It’s my turn.”

    Now that she lost the Democrat platform is “Get Trump!”

In other words, their strategy is “the other guy is worse.”
While this may be true, it only guarantees that the GOP candidate has to be marginally better.

That is why the GOP is so lousy these days. Voters should demand better.

It’s probably much more of a winning proposition to remind people of the very tangible and recognizable good things that have happened since January 2017. And then remind people of the kinds of things that have been prevented since January 2017. Hammering people with how much Hillary sucks will get old fast, and may actually galvanize many lefties who still have the butthurt from 2016. Talk about the wins for everyone in the last 15 months and how that sets things up for more wins for everyone. Ah, what do I know anyway, right?

    elle in reply to UJ. | April 23, 2018 at 1:37 pm

    Hammering people with how much Hillary sucks will get old fast

    Maybe. But the left has the high ground with the media and the talk shows. Talking about Trumps wins is important (embrace the power of “and” as noted above). But the young and stupid crowd believes that supporting the 2nd amendment is murder and that free speech is hate speech and that Trumps tax cuts and border controls are racist.

    Their megaphone is so big that what good does it do to only promote what they have been led to believe are bad policies with a president who is the devil himself?

    No Make them own who they really are and what they really want.

      UJ in reply to elle. | April 23, 2018 at 2:34 pm

      You may be giving the young and stupid too much credit if you think they’re capable of perceiving, accepting, and valuing reality in a 6 month period after they’ve been indoctrinized to think wrong since kindergarten. I’m thinking more about latter part of baby-boomer and other generations preceding millenials that still have at least a passing appreciation for facts over feeeeelings every once in a while. But I do see where you’re coming from.

Well, the Republicans can’t run on their support for the Trump agenda, because most of them don’t support it. So they can’t do much else than carry on about how awful the D’rats are. And the embodiment of that awfulness is Horrible Hillary.

But it has to be personal. The fight about Hillary isn’t a war of ideas, because Hillary has none, except that she should be President. And that remains one reason why she isn’t President—she never gave a decent reason for anyone to vote for her, short of vague stuff about being on the “right side of history”. No voter is going to bother getting out of bed for silly rubbish like that.

It’s been pointed out before that the R’s could turn themselves into the party of a crusade. They could actually stand for something, just as they did in 1860. And there have been some very practical suggestions for what that something might be. But they won’t. Their vision seems to extend to little more ambitious than kicking at the football again so that Lucy and the other D’rats can jerk it aside, as usual. So lacking a positive message, they have to spend their ad funding on something else.

    elle in reply to tom_swift. | April 23, 2018 at 2:13 pm

    I agree with what you write, but it is what it is and the dye is cast for this election. Voting in the primary is the best we can do until we can get rid of all of the uni-party members. It’s going to take awhile.

    I voted for Trump because he wasn’t Hillary, even though I thought he’d just be another liberal democrat. We need the electorate to vote AGAINST the socialists and those who stand on a platform of taking away our rights. We need to stop the young and stupid from putting in the people that the late night talk show hosts and the ladies on The VIew tell them to vote for. They really believe that guns kill people, free speech is hate speech etc., so that’s a negative platform for them.

    We need to fire up the base to show up because they are disgusted just like you and I are. And we need the young and stupid to get what the DNC stands for so they either stay home or get a clue. That will require embracing the power of going negative. Right now, we need to win. They may not be great, but they are better than the alternative.

      YellowGrifterInChief in reply to elle. | April 23, 2018 at 3:35 pm

      If the really believe, how do you intend to stop them?

      Your base isn’t big enough to win; especially now that the democratic has got a taste of what it means if they stay home.

      I guess you could always run on

      Get your government hands off my Medicare and Social Security!

        “If they really believe, how do you intend to stop them?”

        uh…isn’t that the entire point in discussing going negative with Hillary?

        You see, the left still doesn’t understand why people voted for Trump So, shhhh…..listen closely and I’ll tell you. The reason they voted for Trump is because Hillary is everything that everyone claims to hate. Everything. Pointing out that Hillary actually did everything that you claim Trump should be burned at the stake for doing will demoralize the tender young snowflakes and they will remain in their safe spaces rather than go vote.

        The left is nothing more than corrupt old hypocrites selling us the slogan, “Let’s Be Venezula So Politicians Can Get Rich!” They need open borders and large populations of homeless people to farm their ballots to win. You suck. You suck MORE than the GOP. That’s how bad you suck.

        Your base isn’t big enough to win

        The base is yuuge. All that’s needed for a tsunami of votes is a candidate who hasn’t turned into a suckass RINO as soon as he got in office.

“….that us in flyover country hate black people and us women who didn’t vote for her did so because the men in our lives told us not to.”

WE..not us!
We in flyover country [who] hate.
We women who didn’t vote.

No such thing as “us didn’t vote”.

Just picking a peevey nit.
Your article is spot on.

Henry Hawkins | April 23, 2018 at 6:12 pm

Pollsters in 2018/2020 will again fail to identify the breadth of Trump support. Campaign decisions based on that errant polling will cause the same seeming electoral mystery that occurred in 2016.

If this truly is the game strategy of the GOP, then the Democrats are going to hand them their head! Seriously, Hillary has become “old” news, worthy of entertainment value only. Nobody, especially the Dems gives a rip about Hillary Clinton or anything she’s ever done. If they did care, she’d be found in a ditch somewhere…OR…not found at all.

Yes, if this is the entire “game strategy” of the GOP then the Dems will hand them their head. But let’s be honest, at least it is a strategy. It’s been a long time since the GOP had any type of comprehensive winning strategy. The Dems play winning chess while the GOP manages to lose Go Fish every year.

Firing up the base and educating voters as to the level of corruption that the DNC now represents by using Hillary as their poster child is not “old news, worthy of entertainment value only”. Simply saying that does not make it so.

We would all prefer the GOP had a killer ground game and comprehensive game strategy. But let’s be real about who they are. If this is all they’ve got, at least it’s something.

    C. Lashown in reply to elle. | April 24, 2018 at 9:28 am

    The problem is that Trump needed a few “trophy heads” to hang on his wall, but the only thing Sessions could do was chase people who smoked weed. It’s one thing to accuse people of wrong, and even have the proof. It’s a completely different beast to see that same person sitting in prison for 10 years…and there are a magnificent crowd of Democrats banging on the prison gates, demanding entry.

    Thanks go to terrible management of manpower, the DoJ and the FBI….and let us not forget the political judges, where the written laws are considered ‘fish-wrap’.