Cut-It-Out Communications: PR and Politics

PR, Healthcare and Foreign Policy

The image of the President is important and though this goal would seem to be limited to PR practitioners, it has very real implications for foreign policy and the future of our country.

A President who is viewed as a strong leader will both persuade our allies and face down enemies regarding vital elements of America’s national security. And a weak President will engender the opposite.

The raucous debate over national healthcare, as noted by Tom Friedman in today’s New York Times, was essential in creating an image, or even a caricature, of our new President. The fact that he was able to drive the legislation through and get it passed, despite a bitterly divided electorate, was closely observed by countries around the globe.

So, the winning of healthcare legislation had repercussions far beyond U.S. domestic policy, even beyond the creation of momentum for other legislation such as financial regulation. It gave the President a strong hand in dealing with foreign leaders.

The ability of President Obama to face down Russia regarding its desire to include missile defense in the recent arms reduction treaty was derived, in part, by his victory over healthcare. This then, should be a result viewed as favorable by all Americans.

In today’s world, everything is interconnected, and the dividing lines we once drew are no longer applicable.

The Politics of Triangulation

Triangulation, intrinsically, is a mathematical term and suggests that the best path between two points is not always a straight line. Politically, it is less complimentary and was used to describe the poll-driven policies of the Clinton administration.

 

However, our country was founded through techniques such as triangulation because the term implies the necessity of compromise to achieve your goals. You must placate individuals by addressing their needs, or those of their constituents, in return for their support on any given legislative item.

 

We witnessed elements of triangulation during the health care debate. The dropping of the public option, while painful to the wishes and dreams of many legislators, was necessary to get a bill passed.

 

A clearer example of triangulation occurred during the special White House summit where President Obama invited many Republican legislators to discuss their ideas on healthcare. Mr. Obama must have known they would refuse to cooperate, but he was able to use their intransigence to convince many legislators in the House to support the bill. He triangulated, or pivoted, from the healthcare summit to secure ultimate passage of the legislation.

 

Obviously, triangulation has its place, and there are many instances when it is not the best technique for moral reasons. However, it can be a useful technique when used in moderation for the ultimate good of the majority of Americans.

Does Healthcare Make the Democrats Stronger?

Does the passage of healthcare make the Democratic Party and President Obama stronger? Or has it sapped all the energy from them and caused the President to use up his political capital?

 

The debate reminds me of supply-side tax theory. This theory says that we can increase the government’s revenue by lowering taxes. In other words, less taxes leads to more job creation which leads to more taxes, offsetting the previous reduction and then some.

 

Well, the answer for the Democratic Party is similar. By passing healthcare, they have received a bump in public opinion, and, as a result, some have called them to use their “newfound popularity” to pass cap and trade, immigration reform, etc.

 

Much as I’d like to see this happen, I remain skeptical. Many people have said that the Congress can really only take on one big issue at a time, and this seems to be an inconvenient truth (with a footnote to Al Gore). I think the Democrats need to be proud of what they have accomplished and then take a breather for a few months.

 

It’s important to get reelected as much as possible this fall, and the party apparatus, as well as individual lawmakers, needs to swing into place, defend the healthcare bill just passed and consolidate their gains.

 

Anything else could result in a public relations debacle.

The Public Relations of Profanity

Generally, public relations and communications aim at the least common denominator. Where image is concerned, you always try to avoid offending people. Thus, if some people are insulted by long hair, and others don’t care one way or the other, it’s probably a good idea to keep your hair short. As a result, you never, or very rarely, see a politician with long hair.

 

There are a host of other characteristics that follow the same dynamic: obesity, provocative clothes, and the subject of this post, profanity.

 

The impetus for the topic comes from Vice President Joe Biden, who whispered into the President’s ear at the signing ceremony yesterday for the landmark national healthcare legislation. He said, “This is a f---ing big deal.”

 

Well, I can tolerate and even applaud this remark. There is a difference between everyday profanity and the rare use of a word to punctuate an idea where no other expression quite fits. From an English standpoint, one could argue that the specialness of this occasion really rendered only one word appropriate to convey the extent of its significance, and that word was the strongest available, a profanity.

 

So, kudos to you Vice President Biden for telling it like it is and letting our President know what a great thing he has accomplished.

Public Relations Suggestions for the Republican Party

It goes against my better judgment to offer public relations suggestions to the Republican Party, but knowing that they probably won’t take them helps me to raise the issues anyway.

 

The Republican Party has just suffered a devastating defeat on national healthcare and seems unsure how to proceed. Some want to move on and provide a more positive agenda for the nation while others are obsessively clinging to the defeat by threatening lawsuits, vowing to repeal it, etc.

 

A word to the wise: one of the most effective public relations techniques is flexibility. The Republicans must learn how to pivot away from healthcare to other issues crucial to their Party’s agenda. Yes, it was hard to lose after a year of intransigence, but the vote is over, and it’s ridiculous to threaten a repeal as they will never have the votes to override President Obama’s veto.

 

Nobody, least of all the American people, likes a sore loser, and the Republican Party must have the wisdom to know when to cut their losses and regroup for the next battle. It really is a shame to see them all tied up in knots after the fight is over as even the Republicans can provide a positive input to future legislation.

 

The strategy of opposing Obama on every single issue must end, for the Party’s own good and even its future existence.

The Role of Public Relations in the Democrats' Victory

Public relations played a major role in the passage of national healthcare by the Democrats in the House of Representatives last night. The favorable stories and coverage generated by President Obama’s campaign swing supporting the legislation seemed to finally turn the tide and change the momentum of the debate.

 

Public opinion did play a major role in legislators’ decision despite the Republican claims last night. The ability of the right wing to organize opposition last summer threw a monkey wrench into the deliberations and helped to delay the final result.

 

But it was finally the ability of supporters of the legislation to organize -- the images on the evening news of cheering crowds during President Obama’s speeches -- that gave wavering Democrats the cover they needed to cast a very difficult vote.

 

And the bit of political theater by Speaker Nancy Pelosi yesterday afternoon, the march of legislators hand-in-hand to the Capitol, with John Lewis, veteran of the civil rights struggle in the lead, seemed to put the Democrats on the right side of history, the inexorable march of progress.

 

It remains to be seen how the implementation of the legislation will play out, the fixes in the Senate, etc. But the images of last night and the past couple of weeks will endure in the American consciousness for a long time to come.

Public Relations, the Public and the Vote in the House

The use of the Presidency as a bully pulpit to convince wavering House Democrats to vote for national healthcare on Sunday illustrates the nexus between public relations, the public and Congress.

 

The President is travelling across the country to promote the legislation even though the public has no vote in the matter. But the publicity he is generating, the favorable crowds and the convincing rhetoric are working in his attempt to convince House Democrats to vote for the bill.

 

The favorable PR his speeches are receiving is providing cover for the Representatives who will be taking a very risky vote in terms of winning reelection in November. With the Republicans threatening to use healthcare “like a club” to beat those voting in favor of the legislation, the President needed to create a countervailing force. He has done so in his recent speeches.

 

At last, the war of words is turning in the Democrats favor. By describing the vote as “historic,” and relating the history of Presidents who have failed in this effort, the President has provided a convincing overview and perspective on his initiative. He has transformed the vote into one of leadership rather than a “2,000 page bill.”

 

While the result is undecided, it’s starting to look good, and the real winner will be the American people.

When Public Relations Requires Flexibility

High-end public relations requires a certain amount of flexibility from practitioner and client alike. The concept can be described succinctly by the aphorism, “When you’re in a hole, stop digging.” In other words, you should be able to tell when your PR strategy is failing and be astute enough to change course.

 

A prime example would be the Republican opposition to healthcare reform. At an early stage of the debate, they decided to try to defeat the President on this initiative and were fairly successful in the attempt. They unified their whole caucus and actually had an impact on public opinion as well.

 

Then, after another Republican success in electing Scott Brown as Senator of Massachusetts, the President invited key Republicans to a healthcare summit at the White House.

 

The Republicans were flummoxed. They couldn’t refuse the invitation to talk, but they knew their blanket opposition to the legislation would be exposed as obstructionist to the American people. This was the time to change their PR strategy.

 

Instead of using the blatantly obvious formulation of starting over from the beginning, clearly not an option, they could have agreed to participate in a more meaningful way. This change in strategy would clearly not be expected by the White House, and, as a result, the Republicans’ image would be catapulted forward in the process.

 

However, in Washington, it seems to be anathema to change your mind, and the lack of flexibility will hurt the Republicans severely in the end. Because when the healthcare legislation passes, a lot of people will see immediate benefits, and the Republicans will only be remembered as the party of no.

The Public Relations of Talking Points

Anchors at news programs and opinion shows typically rail against “talking points.” They are referring to a list of themes put out by the heads of political organizations in order to keep everyone on message and facilitate integrated communications.

 

Talking points work on the assumption that if anything is repeated often enough, the public will come to accept it as the truth. This approach nearly always works unless the opponent is clever enough to rebut a talking point directly and just as frequently with incontrovertible facts.

 

For example, in the healthcare debate, one of the Republican talking points involves the idea that Democrats are “jamming the bill down the throat of the American people.” You will hear the exact same phraseology from multiple speakers, trying to personify the idea of jamming something down your throat, even though it’s fairly moderate legislation.

 

The Democrats, while refuting the argument by citing previous uses of reconciliation, have failed to come up with similarly graphic imagery. As a result, they are losing the war of talking points in this matter, and support for the healthcare bill has dropped as a result.

 

Lately, however, you see President Obama on the campaign stump again, telling how passing the healthcare bill may not be good politics, but it’s the right thing to do. Similarly, he’s repeating this phrase again and again as he’s been going around to different locations. He’s starting to accumulate his own talking point victories in the process.

PR and the Legislative Process

Many have compared the creation of legislation to making sausage. You really don’t want to see what happens on a step-by-step basis.

 

Perhaps, some of the problems with our current national healthcare legislation derive from this pertinent aphorism. The deals made in the Senate, dubbed the Louisiana purchase and the cornhusker kickback, were clearly made solely to secure votes without any redeeming value.

 

Now, we have another sausage-making moment, the inclusion of education reform within the reconciliation process. This reform, designed to eliminate the middleman in college loan applications, was unable to beat the Republican filibuster machine in the Senate. So, since the Democrats are doing reconciliation in the Senate anyway, why not include this worthwhile element within the legislation?

 

In fact, the educational component in itself is more likely to induce wavering members in the House or Senate to support the healthcare bill. It seems to be a very pragmatic tactic.

 

Of course, the Republicans are going to hoot and holler, as they always do, about any perceived injustice to their minority will. Well, I say, too bad. When you win an election, you can and did do similar things. We’re all getting a little tired of your whining in any case.

 

I’m looking forward to finally getting this legislation into the history books and letting the American people judge for themselves instead of forming an opinion through the prism of Republican distortions.