Fox News has a good headline today . . .but, not good enough . . .

House Republicans Find 111 New 'Bureaucracies' in Health Care Bill

"111 new boards and commissions" looks good as a battle cry. "111" is a big number and a good number to use.

111

But . . .the good folks in the middle will look at "111" and then they'll realize that their medical bills are even bigger numbers. "111" won't do the trick.

Less coverage. Higher taxes.

Death Panels. Longer Waits.

All of that is true. None of it is sexy enough.

You gotta give 'em a hook:

Just Say "NO"

Nancy Reagan nailed it a long time ago.

Just say "NO" and then go on to sell what John Boehner put into his radio address on Saturday and what I rewrote for him (see below, Nov. 1 entry):

“Medical care is your medical care. The issue is to lower health care costs and make it easier to obtain high quality, affordable coverage without imposing a massive burden on individual families or impossible debt on all of us together.”

Be careful. Go slow.

It’s your healthcare.

And, it can’t be free.

Ultimately, this isn’t about healthcare. That’s why today’s election is so very important.

It’s about power.

The GOP leadership hasn’t done a very good job of recognizing that. And, I’m surprised that Newt failed to recognize the importance of this situation.

Those folks who backed Doug Hoffman were fighting this battle against ObamaCare, too.

Don’t call it PelosiCare because general voter outrage is only a vague threat to Nancy Pelosi, where it is an enormous threat to The Won.

Is 2009 the new 2008 ? I don't think so.

Whatever happens today in the odd-year election, it is important to note that the Democratic efforts in NY-23, against the Conservative Doug Hoffman have culminated in this door-hanger straight out of 2008.

It would seem that the Democratic Party, which regards this election as a very important referendum on Obama, could come up with nothing more compelling than this recycling of ideas that have become . . .

in Washington bureaucratese: O.B.E.

Overtaken By Events

Today we'll see how deep they are in.

We've seen the fraud and corruption . . .

Now introducing the concept we have all been waiting for . .

The QUANGO !

The QUANGO - per Wikipedia: The term has its origin in a humorous shortening of quasi-NGO, an ostensibly non-governmental organisation performing governmental functions, often in receipt of funding or other support from government.

The QUANGO - No, it is not a new dance, in the traditional sense.  This is a long-needed term to describe how government evades responsibility, hides public aid and conceals financial liabilities.  It is the public equivalent of the investment banks' off-balance-sheet entities that brought so much kaka into the financial storm a year ago.

Al Franken's very close election as senator was accomplished by ACORN voter registrations; hooray.

The QUANGO - like ACORN, below the radar, funded by the government and destroying The Republic . . .like FANNY MAE and FREDDIE MAC spreading financial destruction with a federal government guarantee.


The QUANGO -  much more sophisticated and more specific a word than BOONDOGGLE, don’t you think?  A bi-partisan cross between a mango and a quagmire, with a hint of rhythm and romance . . .and fattening! 

Today’s admittedly silly meme on this essential issue is:

Tango, Yes!

Quango, No!

Why is the GOP playing Pelosi's silly game ???

2,000 pages -

 JUST SAY IT !

Say that the ObamaCare bill is two-thousand-pages long.  Say it.  Rounding is perfectly respectable.  Why are you being shy? (1,990? Really!)

If you say "two thousand" and Speaker Pelosi objects, who do you think wins in the ensuing playground-quarrel over "Yes, it is." versus "No, it isn't."?

Congressman John Boehner's GOP weekly radio address - re-written by Memetics & Marketing™

Steven Bassion -- memetics k marketing™

publisher@agoodbook.com – Oct 31 GOP radio address re-write

I’m House Republican Leader John Boehner. At the beginning of this year, I told President Obama and Speaker Nancy Pelosi that Republicans would be ready to work with them whenever possible to address the nation’s biggest challenges. I also said that, where there are differences, it was our obligation as a party to explain to the American people how we would do things better. And on the "stimulus," the budget, the energy bill, and health care, we have done exactly that.

Instead of using Republican ideas, President Obama and Speaker Pelosi have made each of the problems facing the United States worse.

They have passed thousand-page bills to spend enormous amounts of money to make the economic statistics look better but they haven’t fixed the economy. Americans continue to lose jobs in record numbers.

They have proposed dozens of conflicting ideas for taxes and rule-changes, making it impossible for businesses and employers to plan for recovery.

They have bowed to union pressure and union campaign contributions to make it impossible for industries to make meaningful changes (including the American auto industry).

But President Obama and Speaker Pelosi claim that the Republican Party is being obstructive because we refuse to help them make things worse.

As a matter of fact, only Republicans have offered real solutions to each of the problems facing the United States. But, today I want to talk about just medical care.

Medical care is your medical care. The issue is to lower health care costs and make it easier to obtain high quality, affordable coverage without imposing a massive burden on individual families or impossible debt on all of us together.

We first released our health care plan in June, and over the last six months, we have introduced at least eight bills that, taken together, would implement this blueprint.

There is no need to fix everything at once. A massive law and a massive change create pointless confusion. This is your medical care. We should be careful with it.

We have proposed four three major changes:

Number one: let families and businesses and insurance companies compete nationally, instead of only within a single state. This increases competition and lowers costs.

Number two: Lower insurance costs by allowing individuals, small businesses, and trade associations to pool together for better health insurance at lower prices, the same way large corporations and labor unions do today;

Number three: end junk lawsuits that may constitute one third of your current medical bills (in unnecessary procedures and sky-high doctors’ premiums). Replace it with a fair compensation system for the small number of patients who are actually harmed by medical care. This is resisted by President Obama and Speaker Pelosi because the Trial Lawyers Association – like the labor unions – is among the Democrats largest financial supporters.

Instead of four three simple and fundamental modifications to health care in the United States, President Obama and Speaker Pelosi propose a complete takeover of healthcare – your healthcare - by means of a 2,000-page law that they haven’t read, more bureaucracy, more rules, more limits, more taxes, unelected boards, bureaus and commissions ruling on what drug and what treatment you get when.

The estimated costs of this takeover of healthcare are enormous and no one believes that the published estimates are high enough. Who will pay for it – when and how? New jobs will be killed by costs and regulations. Senior citizens’ Medicare will be cut.

The answer to the takeover of medical care by President Obama and Speaker Pelosi is “NO.”

This coming week, Republicans will continue to stand on principle, defend freedom, and fight for our better solutions to make health care more affordable and accessible for American families.

Thanks for listening.

~ ~ ~

#3 in the original address was vague to the point of meaninglessness; moreover, in number one you want a national market and here you want to give tools to the states without a simple explanation.

ObamaCare - The Biggest, Fattest Target for Memetics & Marketing™ Since Forever

Today's Wall St. Journal has a perceptive article by David Henninger, called "Obama and the Old Hat People."

"In a world defined by nearly 100,000 iPhone apps, a world of seemingly limitless, self-defined choice, the Democrats are pushing the biggest, fattest, one-size-fits all legislation since 1965. And they brag this will complete the dream Franklin D. Roosevelt had in 1939."

If the GOP cannot frame opposition to ObamaCare  for this electorate in a manner that is compelling, then the GOP will lose The Republic and will deserve to lose it - not that The Republic deserves to be lost, as it has been the best hope for mankind since its inception.


In this AP photo, we have Schumer, Reid and Leahy bravely striding forward into our bright tomorrow.

The alarm bells should be going off in everyone's head when they look at these two photographs.  How can such a thing be such a serious menace in a nation with universal education and mass communications?  Something is fundamentally askew.

Meme of the Week

This week's "Meme of the Week" is directed at GOP management, rather than the general electorate.  Folks, this is how you will prevail.  It isn't difficult; it's just different than how you are accustomed to doing business:

 reality, reason, experience and empathy

Those good folks in the middle can be convinced by reality, reason, experience and empathy. 


Rigidity and righteousness are not what is called for. 

The road to reclaim the government from The Won is wide open.

Now let us discourse upon SUB-OPTIMIZATION * . . .

The measure of dismay and disappointment

with The Won

is the measure of the GOP's failure.

Blah . . .blah . . .blah.  No excuses are acceptable.  The GOP – from McCain to the precinct captain – failed in 2008 – failed to win and failed to protect the Republic.

Headlines like USA Today’s – ONE YEAR LATER, PUBLIC'S VIEW OF OBAMA HAS CHANGED – are a measure of that failure.  

What the past year has demonstrated is precisely 

what the GOP failed to make real during the election.  

It doesn’t matter that everybody tried.  Everybody failed and has come perilously close to losing The Republic.  How could everybody be so dumb?  Yes, dumb.  Dumb.

Sub-optimization* is a concept of systems analysis where parts of the system may be running optimally but the over-all system could be running better.  In plain language, each department is doing its best but the entire organization could be doing better if each department did things differently.

That’s a best-case characterization.  In the real world, each department is probably screwing up in its own special way without recognizing how detrimental their efforts are to overall success.

For example, McCain honoring his word to use public campaign financing after Obama broke his word to do the same, outspending McCain 2:1.

For example, McCain racing back to the Senate to deal with the financial meltdown, proving to the electorate that he was a tired, old fire-horse who couldn’t learn new tricks.

For example, ACORN doing systematic destruction to the electoral process while a)local folks were screaming and b)nobody in charge took the charges seriously.  Why does the Titanic come to mind?  Why do flight-students not interested in take-offs and landings come to mind?

For example, the “Bob Dole/John McCain Selection Process” that guarantees that the senior old fart in Washington has a clear shot at losing the Presidency.

Next time we have to do better.  

How do we do better?

We focus on over-all maximization.

For example, GOP hacks in Upstate New York put up an Arlen-Specter-wannabe for next week’s special election for Congress in the 23^rd District . . .and everyone from the rank-and-file to 2012 Presidential hopefuls cries “NO!”  Very well done!

And Newt Gingrich threw his lot in with the hacks.

Bye, Newt!

How do we do it?  Here are a few ideas:

1. Stop using XIX^th century communication techniques.  Don’t think that adding a Facebook and a Twitter button makes you cool.  Things aren’t that easy.
2. All politics are local.  Give local GOP politics a combination of education and support.  Al Franken was elected by ACORN.
3. Forget the folks you are never going to convince.  Don’t listen to them and don’t try to convince them.
4. The 2012 campaign has already begun.  What have you done and what has the GOP done for it?  Next week’s election is a skirmish.  The 2010 election is a battle.  The war has already begun.  No excuses for coming late to the war.

Not Swine Flu.

Not “busy with the current election.”

Not “the dog ate my homework.” 

5. Details are very difficult for many voters to grasp.  Think memetics k marketing™.  Think The Witch-Doctor.  Think me.

*This concept from systems theory refers to the extent to which attempts to improve the performance of a sub-system by its own criteria may act to the detriment of the total system which includes that sub-system, and even to the defeat of its objectives.

Meme of the Week – Wednesday, October 21, 2009

What Good is Obama?

“A government with the policy to rob Peter to pay Paul can be assured of the support of Paul.” — George Bernard Shaw (quoted by Jeffrey Ellis at http://jeffreyellis.org/blog/?p=1905 ) 

Apart from the Pauls of this world, who can say what Obama has been  good for?  There's no there there, apart from fluff and smoke and mirrors.

We can't convince Paul.  We just have to help the other folks see another way.  Arguing the details isn't the only way to succeed.

Meme of the Week – Friday, October 16, 2009

If you want economic recovery,

Stop changing the rules.

This is a new feature of Memetics&Marketing™ –  

a special, extra benefit for those who relish brevity as a salubrious alternative to cerebration.

Abandoning the Dollar is another aspect of The Won’s assault on American Exceptionalism.

The Dollar is a sacrifice 
to The Won!

The easiest, fastest and cheapest defense of the Dollar is talk.  The Won will not even talk in defense of the dollar.  Talk is what The Won does best.  He won’t even do that.

The next easiest and fastest defense is raising interest rates.  The Won will not do that because it will raise the projected costs of his massive deficits – increasing the price of his massive re-do of America – thus increasing opposition to his proposals.  Never mind that this is real life arguing against The Won’s fantasy; anything (including reality) that stands in His way is to be denied and otherwise resisted.

The near-zero interest rates are not increasing credit or promoting general economic recovery.  The near-zero interest rates are accomplishing only two things

• Reducing the projected costs of The Won’s absurd make-over of the U.S.
• Temporarily inflating profits (and bonuses) in the financial sector.

Let's see what a small increase in interest rates does for the value of the dollar and the forecast profligacy of The Won!

In the most powerful, most wonderful, most exceptional country on earth, . . .

Primitive, Protozoan Survival  = 
XXI^st Century Politics

The November 2009 elections are critical to the fate of American Liberty because each Republican victory causes every Democrat to fear for his/her own re-election in 2010 or later.  That primitive protozoan survival mechanism should not be misinterpreted as cleverness or wisdom or statesmanship.


Each victory is potentially critical in discouraging Democrats and Olympia Snowe (?-ME) from supporting The Won’s agenda.  In the Senate, the change of a single vote may mean success or failure in preventing Obama from overturning the American Republic.


From where I sit (literally, very far removed), GOP campaign techniques seem likely to succeed.  After all, the facts and the first ten months of The Won give pause to many of the good folks in the middle.  The GOP may well pull off victory in the 2009 elections with traditional arguments and techniques. 


However, GOP victory and success in 2009 are likely to be measured in inches.  And, a victory of inches is not likely to prompt a systematic re-think of GOP political/electoral strategy. 


That’s human nature – if you get what you want, you are not apt to think about how you could have accomplished your goal better or more easily.  Very few people are going to think, “We should have won by a mile, instead of inches.  What are we doing wrong?”


A GOP failure would prompt a colossal rethink . . .while enabling The Won to wreak all manner of havoc before the 2010 elections -  assuming that the GOP could get smart that quickly.  GOP re-thinks tend to produce the resolve to do the same thing louder and longer.

The GOP needs a leader who says,

“We should win by a mile.  How do we do it?”

The GOP needs the confidence to expect to win by a mile.

How and from where does that expectation come?

Ask the Witch-Doctor (me) !!!

Near-Zero interest-rates are The Won’s drug of choice . . .

For the Benefit of Those Too Young to Know . . .

Normal people, in normal times, used to live on the interest from their savings.  No one can live on zero or near-zero interest rates.  Grandmothers and grandfathers used to live on interest, then they lived on reverse-mortgages and now they live on principle. 

You may think of that as your parents

consuming your inheritance.

The foreign exchange rates for the dollar are – in normal times - largely a reaction to the interest rate paid on dollar deposits.  As interest rates go up, foreign investors buy dollars to earn the higher interest. 

You may think of this as interest rates going up

and the price of BMW’s going down.

The Won’s stated reason for near-zero interest rates is to accelerate business expansion by making borrowing less expensive.

            But banks aren’t eager to lend at all in this business environment.

            But businesses aren’t eager to borrow when changes to tax and employment policies are discussed without assurances or time-tables.

            But banks are making a fortune borrowing at near-zero interest rates and charging the moon on credit card and other debt.  Yes, I know that their back rooms are stacked to ceiling with bad debts on credit card, residential and commercial mortgages.  How that will shake out is anyone’s guess since the banks have special relations with Washington.

            You may think of that as your classmates in banking pocketing bonuses through the meltdown

and having no idea when the party will end

 . . .but probably very soon

 unless Washington bails them out again

 . . .and that’s a not a bad bet.

Interest rates are the cost of money.  Just like the cost of oil or BMW’s or bloomers, interest rates – the cost of money - determines what is worth buying or not . . .or, in the case of money, worthy of investment or not . . .or, whether consumption is worth deferring for the sake of the interest earned.  When interest rates are near-zero, there is no point in deferring expenditures. 
You may think of this as the Federal Reserve 
(contradicting your parents’ advice) 
encouraging you to spend 
as though there were no tomorrow.

For business, near-zero interest rates (a figment of Washington speechifying, at the moment, since banks aren’t giving low-interest loans) make investment less expensive.  But investments must generate the income to pay back the borrowed funds.  The economy is now being controlled by imperial edict, rather than by market forces; in this environment, near-zero interest (almost-free money) does not fix anything.  At the moment,

No one knows how long interest rates will remain low;

No one knows when the economy will improve;

No one knows what tax rates will be;

No one knows what the dollar exchange-rate will be.

This all rolls into a ball where the risks are cannot be measured.  In this environment, businesses avoid risk.  Near-Zero interest rates accomplish nothing but give banks a temporary boost in earnings (and bonuses) until the bad loans become impossible to ignore.

You may think of this as

the economic equivalent of crack cocaine.

You will find a concise and compelling restatement of this thesis in geek-speak here: http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/9a5b3216-c70b-11de-bb6f-00144feab49a.html

Adjusting Expectations . . .

From a campaign that can fairly ("This will be remembered as the moment when the seas stopped rising") be characterized as

Messianic,

cries are now heard in many quarters (foresight.org, Camille Paglia, inter al.) for a leader who is simply . . .

Competent

and now, competently orchestrated, the loyal conservative opposition of this country should already be popularizing the next, (hopeful and hopefully) inevitable, meme:

Over & Out.

I'll say the same thing now, to the GOP, that I said to the good folks who are "Values Voters" (below, Sept. 23):

Your arguments just won't convince the good folks in the middle. 

They just won't.

 If you want to win, 

you must find/embrace another point of view from which to espouse your convictions. 

That's it. That's all. 

Tell your tale from a different perspective.

It's So Nice to be Appreciated !

  

  Somebody Loves Me . . . !


40 countries read Memetics & Marketing


but . . .strange as it may seem . . .


Total hits from 
    Jackson MS 
+ St. Paul MN 
+ Anchorage AK                                  < total hits from Moscow.
Does Putti-Poo see more than Haley Barbour + Tim Pawlenty + Sarah Palin combined?

Most US hits from CA, NY and TX.

Biggest surprise fans are from Brazil, Ukraine, India and Singapore.


Outside the Beltway, that's us !   
MEMETICS & MARKETING™
Thanks for your interest.  Stay tuned, folks!  There's more to come!