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SINGLE GAFFE CAN DERAIL A MESSAGE
By Mike Soraghan
The Hill, DC
Oct 23 2007
Last week's vote on overriding President Bush's children's health
insurance veto should have been a brief respite from a pretty tough
week for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.).
After being forced to back away from votes on Armenian genocide and
intelligence surveillance law, she could watch Republicans stick with
an unpopular president on an unpopular position.
But when Rep. Pete Stark (D-Calif.) fired off a comment about troops
being sent to Iraq "to get their heads blown off for the president's
amusement," Pelosi saw her message machine hop the rails.
It's a situation that's played itself out with surprising regularity -
usually on YouTube - since Democrats took over earlier this year.
There was House Appropriations Committee Chairman Dave Obey's
(D-Wis.) dressing-down of a Marine Corps mom about war funding,
shouting in a Rayburn Building hallway about "idiot liberals." Obey
later apologized.
Then Rep. John Murtha (D-Pa.) threatened the spending earmarks of
a member who questioned the millions Murtha was sending to a drug
intelligence center in his district. Murtha later apologized.
Then Republicans succeeded in getting floor votes on whether Democratic
lawmakers would publicly condemn an ad by the liberal group MoveOn.org
calling Gen. David Petraeus "General Betray Us."
Republicans gleefully posted these moments on YouTube and each was
relentlessly flogged by the Republican leadership through websites,
e-mails and media appearances.
For example, when Republican Conference Chairman Adam Putnam (R-Fla.)
lined up on CNN with House Majority Whip James Clyburn (D-S.C.) on
healthcare, Putnam changed the topic to whether Clyburn should
apologize for Stark.
"The Republican leadership has been very clever," said John Feehery, a
regular contributor to The Hill's Pundits Blog who was a communications
aide to Republican leaders while they were in power.
"They've drawn Nancy Pelosi into these debates by demanding that
she apologize."
Republicans have had their moments, too. Rep. Jean Schmidt (R-Ohio)
attracted widespread criticism for suggesting that Murtha was a
coward during a 2005 floor debate on the Iraq war. And earlier
that year, then-Rep. John Hostettler (R-Ind.) called Democrats
anti-Christian. Both comments were "taken down," or stripped from
the record.
This year, right-wing talk show host Rush Limbaugh found himself
backpedaling after calling veterans "phony soldiers" for criticizing
the Iraq war. Limbaugh said his comments were misconstrued and that
Democrats were playing political games.
By contrast, House Democrats haven't scheduled votes on resolutions
condemning Limbaugh's remarks.
"I would like to see us try to restrain ourselves in condemning through
resolutions all of that with which we disagree," House Majority
Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) said at the time, though he also said,
"What's good for the goose is good for the gander."
Some liberals agree that Republicans have traditionally done a better
job of exploiting such missteps than Democrats. Republicans have
a top-down oriented culture that allows them to strike fast, said
Eric Burns of the liberal group Media Matters, while the Democrats'
consensus culture slows things down.
"Conservatives wrote the book on how to exploit these moments for
political gain," said Burns, whose group specializes in discrediting
conservative propaganda. "Democrats just don't believe that's what
Congress should be used for. There's a principle behind it."
Pelosi spokesman Nadeam Elshami explains the differences between the
parties differently.
"Republicans don't let facts get in the way of their message,"
Elshami said. "But as hard as they try, the fact remains that they
are in the minority because they didn't listen to the American people,
while the new-direction Congress has passed into law major bills that
will improve the lives of everyday Americans."
In the instance of the Stark comment, Burns said, "The fact that
[Republicans] weren't able to keep it going for four or five days
indicates it wasn't really working out for them."
Pelosi herself appears to have put the issue to rest with a late
Friday statement calling Stark's statements "inappropriate" and a
distraction from the healthcare debate.
Pelosi's comment was milder than a statement Hoyer issued around the
same time Friday in response to a question from CNN, saying he was
"hopeful that [Stark] will express his regrets to the president and
to our men and women in uniform."
To Republicans, that illustrated the delicate balance Pelosi had to
find between tamping down the problem while not infuriating the liberal
netroots, who had widely praised Stark for his red-meat comments.
"She has a real challenge," said Feehery. "She has to decide how mad
she'll make the liberal left."
And asking the volatile Stark to apologize can be dangerous in
itself. Stark once apologized for mocking then-Rep. J.C. Watts
(R-Okla.) as a family-values Republican with illegitimate children.
But his statement made clear he was sorry only that he misstated
the number.
Stark has not responded to Pelosi's statement, nor did his spokesman
return calls seeking comment. But in a statement issued Thursday in
response to the Republican criticism, he showed no signs of backing
down.
Instead, he called opponents of children's healthcare "chickenhawks,"
a term often applied to avid supporters of the war who avoided military
service. And he said it was Boehner who should apologize for opposing
the children's healthcare bill.
By Mike Soraghan
The Hill, DC
Oct 23 2007
Last week's vote on overriding President Bush's children's health
insurance veto should have been a brief respite from a pretty tough
week for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.).
After being forced to back away from votes on Armenian genocide and
intelligence surveillance law, she could watch Republicans stick with
an unpopular president on an unpopular position.
But when Rep. Pete Stark (D-Calif.) fired off a comment about troops
being sent to Iraq "to get their heads blown off for the president's
amusement," Pelosi saw her message machine hop the rails.
It's a situation that's played itself out with surprising regularity -
usually on YouTube - since Democrats took over earlier this year.
There was House Appropriations Committee Chairman Dave Obey's
(D-Wis.) dressing-down of a Marine Corps mom about war funding,
shouting in a Rayburn Building hallway about "idiot liberals." Obey
later apologized.
Then Rep. John Murtha (D-Pa.) threatened the spending earmarks of
a member who questioned the millions Murtha was sending to a drug
intelligence center in his district. Murtha later apologized.
Then Republicans succeeded in getting floor votes on whether Democratic
lawmakers would publicly condemn an ad by the liberal group MoveOn.org
calling Gen. David Petraeus "General Betray Us."
Republicans gleefully posted these moments on YouTube and each was
relentlessly flogged by the Republican leadership through websites,
e-mails and media appearances.
For example, when Republican Conference Chairman Adam Putnam (R-Fla.)
lined up on CNN with House Majority Whip James Clyburn (D-S.C.) on
healthcare, Putnam changed the topic to whether Clyburn should
apologize for Stark.
"The Republican leadership has been very clever," said John Feehery, a
regular contributor to The Hill's Pundits Blog who was a communications
aide to Republican leaders while they were in power.
"They've drawn Nancy Pelosi into these debates by demanding that
she apologize."
Republicans have had their moments, too. Rep. Jean Schmidt (R-Ohio)
attracted widespread criticism for suggesting that Murtha was a
coward during a 2005 floor debate on the Iraq war. And earlier
that year, then-Rep. John Hostettler (R-Ind.) called Democrats
anti-Christian. Both comments were "taken down," or stripped from
the record.
This year, right-wing talk show host Rush Limbaugh found himself
backpedaling after calling veterans "phony soldiers" for criticizing
the Iraq war. Limbaugh said his comments were misconstrued and that
Democrats were playing political games.
By contrast, House Democrats haven't scheduled votes on resolutions
condemning Limbaugh's remarks.
"I would like to see us try to restrain ourselves in condemning through
resolutions all of that with which we disagree," House Majority
Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) said at the time, though he also said,
"What's good for the goose is good for the gander."
Some liberals agree that Republicans have traditionally done a better
job of exploiting such missteps than Democrats. Republicans have
a top-down oriented culture that allows them to strike fast, said
Eric Burns of the liberal group Media Matters, while the Democrats'
consensus culture slows things down.
"Conservatives wrote the book on how to exploit these moments for
political gain," said Burns, whose group specializes in discrediting
conservative propaganda. "Democrats just don't believe that's what
Congress should be used for. There's a principle behind it."
Pelosi spokesman Nadeam Elshami explains the differences between the
parties differently.
"Republicans don't let facts get in the way of their message,"
Elshami said. "But as hard as they try, the fact remains that they
are in the minority because they didn't listen to the American people,
while the new-direction Congress has passed into law major bills that
will improve the lives of everyday Americans."
In the instance of the Stark comment, Burns said, "The fact that
[Republicans] weren't able to keep it going for four or five days
indicates it wasn't really working out for them."
Pelosi herself appears to have put the issue to rest with a late
Friday statement calling Stark's statements "inappropriate" and a
distraction from the healthcare debate.
Pelosi's comment was milder than a statement Hoyer issued around the
same time Friday in response to a question from CNN, saying he was
"hopeful that [Stark] will express his regrets to the president and
to our men and women in uniform."
To Republicans, that illustrated the delicate balance Pelosi had to
find between tamping down the problem while not infuriating the liberal
netroots, who had widely praised Stark for his red-meat comments.
"She has a real challenge," said Feehery. "She has to decide how mad
she'll make the liberal left."
And asking the volatile Stark to apologize can be dangerous in
itself. Stark once apologized for mocking then-Rep. J.C. Watts
(R-Okla.) as a family-values Republican with illegitimate children.
But his statement made clear he was sorry only that he misstated
the number.
Stark has not responded to Pelosi's statement, nor did his spokesman
return calls seeking comment. But in a statement issued Thursday in
response to the Republican criticism, he showed no signs of backing
down.
Instead, he called opponents of children's healthcare "chickenhawks,"
a term often applied to avid supporters of the war who avoided military
service. And he said it was Boehner who should apologize for opposing
the children's healthcare bill.