Accentuate the Positive

Streetcar Line

Conservative War Room Strategy

By Quin Hillyer

Barack Obama is a disaster for the country because his economics are straight out of Mussolini's playbook, his foreign policy is that of Ramsey Clark, his Justice Department is that of Ramsey Clark as well, his ethics are pure Chicago thuggishness, his hostility to Christianity in the public square akin to that of Madalyn Murray O'Hair, and his ego like Napoleon's.

Yeah, … and trying to make those complaints will get conservatives exactly nowhere. Nor will complaints that the establishment media have put their journalistic ethical manhood in collective hock, trading in their watchdog roles for not just a lap dog role where Obama is concerned, but more like lap dancers for the president while asking him exactly what he wants them to show him.

Yes, Nancy Pelosi and Pat Leahy are hypocrites and cheaters; and yes, Barney Frank's economics are a threat to the republic; and yes, making "empathy" a criterion for choosing judges is about as relevant as making calculus skills a criterion for picking a hockey team.

To all those points, much of Middle America asks "so what?" Why should that make them pay attention to conservatives instead of paying attention to dead weirdo musicians and to their own credit card debts? Oh, much of Middle America will indeed give a passing thought to conservatives when those conservatives are flaking out in Argentina, Alaska, or airport assignations. But otherwise, conservatives just don't seem relevant.

A huge part of the problem is that our elected leaders don't seem to have a clue about how to mobilize conservative grassroots, much less the general public, behind positive themes or principled conservative ideals. The number of Republican congressmen not seriously afflicted with Inside-Baseball-itis can probably be counted on a broken abacus on which the beads don't move. And the congressmen who actually understand that good principles are good politics, rather than an occasional tool for political ends, are as rare as the latest confirmed sighting of a hairy-nosed wombat.

But none of that excuses the rest of us for our failures to win political battles.

The conservative movement somehow lost its ability to elect enough of its own to office. The movement certainly lost its ability to stay connected with enough of the politicians it helped elect to office. And it -- we -- clearly failed to maintain the constructive hold that conservatives once enjoyed on state and national Republican Party apparatuses.

To understand how bad things are, one need only watch Republicans in the Senate fumble the chance to win a real public relations battle concerning the nomination of Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court. On every level, polls give conservatives the edge on issues related to judges. Yet Alabama's Sen. Jeff Sessions has been allowed to wage a mostly lonely battle -- a valiant and well-thought-out battle, but still a mostly lonely one -- while most of his colleagues act as if it's a foregone conclusion that Sotomayor will be confirmed.

You can't win by acting as if you can't win.

And that's a shame, because if the nomination battled is waged well, there actually is, or could be, a serious chance, even if decidedly difficult, to defeat Sotomayor.

But I digress. The point here is that conservatives need to relearn politics.

Now that's a tall order. Relearning politics from top to bottom involves all sorts of campaign technology, media savvy, personal skills, and myriad other challenges -- far too many challenges to be discussed in one column.

But one fairly simple lesson from past conservative successes can be emphasized concisely. The lesson is this: To capture the public's imagination, a movement needs to push a galvanizing, positive policy change.

In the late 1970s, a flailing Republican Party rallied around what became the Kemp-Roth tax-cut plan, along with calls for a strong defense. In 1994, conservatives rightly embraced the Contract with America. In 2002 especially, but also in 2004, conservatives effectively campaigned on the issue of judicial nominations. And in 2004, it is almost certain that various state initiatives to outlaw homosexual marriage helped carry President Bush to re-election while helping save or win seats for a number of Republicans, conservative or not, who benefitted from high social-conservative turnout.

In each case, conservatives clearly provided something to vote for. Yes, it also helps immensely to have something to vote against. Parties and candidates can win elections on the strength of being against something or someone bad. But principled movements can't elect enough principled politicians to office, and keep them in office, merely on a negative message. They need to offer something positive -- something either inspirational or at least deeply felt. Something for people to support.

Obama Can't Be Trusted With Numbers

So why should we trust him with health care?

By KARL ROVE

In February, President Barack Obama signed a $787 billion stimulus bill while making lavish promises about the results. He pledged that "a new wave of innovation, activity and construction will be unleashed all across America." He also said the stimulus would "save or create up to four million jobs." Vice President Joe Biden said the massive federal spending plan would "drop-kick" the economy out of the recession.

But the unemployment rate today is 9.5% -- nearly 20% higher than the Obama White House said it would be with the stimulus in place. Keith Hennessey, who worked at the Bush White House on economic policy, has noted that unemployment is now higher than the administration said it would be if nothing was done to revive the economy. There are 2.6 million fewer Americans working than Mr. Obama promised.

The economy takes unexpected turns on every president. But what is striking about this president is how quickly he turns away from his promises. He rushed the stimulus through Congress saying we couldn't afford to wait. Now his administration is waiting to spend the money. Of the $279 billion allocated to federal agencies, only $56 billion has been paid out.

Mr. Biden has admitted that the administration "misread" the economy. But he explained that away on ABC's "This Week with George Stephanopoulos" on Sunday by saying the administration had used "the consensus figures and most of the blue chip indexes out there" to draw up its stimulus plan. That's not true.

The Blue Chip consensus is an average of some four dozen economic forecasts. In January, the consensus estimated that GDP for 2009 would shrink by 1.6% and that unemployment would top out at 8.3%. Team Obama assumed both higher GDP growth (it counted on a contraction of 1.2%) and lower peak unemployment (8.1%) than the consensus.

Instead of relying on the Blue Chip consensus, Mr. Obama outsourced writing the stimulus to House appropriators who stuffed it with every bad spending idea they weren't previously able to push through Congress. Little of it aimed to quickly revive the economy. More stimulus money will be spent in fiscal years 2011 through 2019 than will be spent this fiscal year, which ends in September.

On Sunday, Mr. Biden, backpedaling from his drop-kick comments, said that "no one anticipated, no one expected that the recovery package would in fact be in a position at this point of having to distribute the bulk of the money."

This fits a pattern. The administration consistently pledges unrealistic results that it later distances itself from. It has gotten away with it because the media haven't asked many pointed questions. That may not last as the debate shifts to health care.

The Obama administration wants a government takeover of health care. To get it, it is promising to wring massive savings out of the health-care industry. And it has already started to make cost-savings promises.

For example, the administration strong-armed health-care providers into promising $2 trillion in health savings. It got pharmaceutical companies to promise to lower drug prices for seniors by $80 billion over 10 years. The administration also trotted out hospital executives to say that they would voluntarily save the government $150 billion over 10 years.

None of this comes near to being true. On the promised $2 trillion, everyone admits that the number isn't built on anything specific -- it's an aspirational goal. On drug prices, a White House spokesman admitted that "These savings have not been identified at the moment." It is speculative that these cuts will actually be made, when they would begin, or whether they would reduce government health-care spending.

None of this will stop the administration from arguing that its "savings" will pay for Mr. Obama's $1.5 trillion health-care plans. By the time the real price tag emerges, it will be too late to do much more than raise taxes and curtail spending on urgent priorities, such as the military.

The stimulus package is a clear example of how Mr. Obama operates. He is attempting to employ the same tactics of bait-and-switch when it comes to health care, only on a much larger scale.

Mr. Obama has already created a river of red ink. His health-care plans will only force that river over its banks. We are at the cusp of a crucial political debate, and Mr. Obama's words on fiscal matters are untrustworthy. His promised savings are a mirage. His proposals to reshape the economy are alarming. And his unwillingness to be forthright with his numbers reveals that he knows his plans would terrify many Americans.

Mr. Rove is the former senior adviser and deputy chief of staff to President George W. Bush.

Karl writes a weekly op-ed for The Wall Street Journal, is a Newsweek columnist and is now writing a book to be published by Simon & Schuster. Email the author at Karl@Rove.com or visit him on the web at Rove.com.

Or, you can send him a Tweet @karlrove.