Harry and Louise

Kevin Drum follows Digby in suggesting we need Harry and Louise Mark IV. Matthew Yglesias concurs a thousand times, in effect. "The liberal movement in America has very little power to influence the course of events and must, therefore, be crude in order to have any moderating impact on the lunacy that governs the White House."

Below are my proposed TV spots. But - since I am a liberal and cannot entirely go over to the rhetorical dark side, like Saruman hoping to constitute a moderating counterweight to Sauron - a word about fairness. As per my previous post, I am unsure to what degree Republican social security privatization proposals will end up being too risky, per se. Obviously if the Republicans propose reform which is not, as Matt predicts, a lower synthesis of kleptocracy and psychopathology, the following might fail to apply. Then the following wouldn't work. But the Harry and Louise trope is fear-based. We'll go the risky route, speculatively.

The following should be played fast and in a broad, comic manner, conveying that Republican proposals are not so much sinister as absurd. The idea is to avoid the anti-market rhetorical problems David Brooks predicts. You frame the proposal as imprudent.

Nice rural guy - Harry - looks ready to retire; little wife - Louise - clutching his arm. They are in their farmhouse. He's proudly gripping a deed that reads 'social security' on one side, 'a lifetime of honest effort' on the other. Suddenly, a congressman at the door. Conservative-looking but faintly sleazy. He has three shifty assistants who pop into view, hand-truck three one-armed bandits right into the couples' house and plant them in a row, lightning fast, without asking. Plan 1. Plan 2. Plan 3. The congressman plucks the precious paper from the man's hand and indicates with a theatrical gesture 'pull a lever'. The man shrugs helplessly, looks apologetically at his now nervous (hand over mouth) wife. Pulls. We see faces of husband, wife, congressman - the first two nervous, the congressman eager and happy. He clearly wishes the best for his constituents. Dollar. Dollar. Dollar. Lemon. Lemon. Losers. The congressman shakes his head sadly while shredding 'a lifetime of honest effort'. The couple sadly walk out with the congressman, who shakes the stunned man's hand proudly, beams at the crying lady. Inside, the slot-machine guys are getting comfortable. Now we see the couple as older, reduced to begging for coins on the city street in winter. Voiceover: Social Security. Markets are good, but it's not a good idea to bet the farm. If George Bush and the Republican Congress have their way, you'll be betting the farm

It's obviously fallacious to equate investing with playing slots, but there is a valid kernel of concern the ad means to provoke: too much risk.

If Republicans try to reassure people that you don't need to opt in - no one's forcing you - or that risk is not a problem, the response should be: the US government isn't going to let old people starve on the street. We know that. That means the US government is letting other people gamble with your money (since if they lose they are sure to get bailed out to a significant degree.) Hence a second ad:

A whole row of retirees are seen playing the slots in a casino. (Social Security in blinking Vegas neon.) We see how the game is played. If these folks win, they get to keep their money. They are childishly gleeful about their coins. If they lose, they look comically downcast; but there's a government man walking up and down the aisle who solicitiously refills emptied coin cups with a trowel from a huge bag of coins. So everyone is happy. When the man runs out, he goes out into the street, ritually lays his bag down flat with its mouth open. A businessman watches him, curious. The government man suddenly seizes the businessman, turns him upside down and starts shaking coins out of his pocket into the bag. (This should be done very neatly.) Then a woman stops to watch the odd street theater. He gets her, too. Pan back. This is happening all over town in funny ways. (Big black guy turned upside down. Nerd turned upside down.) Inside again, an old man has just lost all his money. He mopes at his cup. Then he has an idea and brightens up. He holds his cup out to the camera, grinning with expectation. Voiceover: It's not his fault. If George Bush and the Republican congress have their way, he's required to do this by law.

This might be too strong if it's actually not required by law. How about? It's his fault. But it wasn't his idea. Thank George Bush and the Republican congress for making it possible.

Would such ads backfire as Brooks' predicts? "The people setting the tone for the opposition to the Bush Social Security effort depict the financial markets as huge, organized scams where the rich prey upon the weak. Their phrases are already familiar: a risky scheme, Enron accounting, a gift to the securities industry, greedy speculators preying upon Grandma's pension." My ads seem to fit the bill. But I think it's tweaked to come out OK. The ads say: stupid politicians. Also, instead of saying 'but poor grandma!' Which might call forth a rugged, 'she should be old enough to look out for herself!' conservative response, you have the implication that the government is incentivizing bad behavior. Classic welfare queen dynamic. It isn't the rich preying on the weak. It's the weak preying on the competent.

It might be that equating investment with playing slots is so patently fallacious that the ads would backfire, rather than communicating the sensible proposition that the risk here is too high. 

Another problem is that, in order to make ads that will work, you might have to make them mean. I don't mean mean to Republicans. I mean mean to old people. The second ad presents old people as idiots. You don't want to imply that old people are idiots. You just want to raise the possibility that people may behave imprudently and you'll have to pay. Dems don't want to seem uncompassionate.

Another problem is that, by implying that the proposal is comically ill-conceived, you risk seeming frivolous yourself. (I often have this problem in my life.) These are not laughing matters. But if you are too serious, you may sound anti-market. Which of course you actually aren't.

It's sort of fun to think about making ads. I'm probably no good at it because I'm a compulsive complicator and ironizer. Political ads should at least appear to be straightforward, yes? And you know, I actually can't even remember what Harry and Louise said around the kitchen table, way back when. I do understand, however, that it wasn't just the TV spot. It was the whole ground campaign built around the TV spot. What ad campaigns have worked for Dems in a big way in recent memory? How did they work? The Republicans have had more successes, haven't they? Now why is that?

Comments

[back40]

The error, I think, and the reason Republicans will love your stuff, is that it reveals your feelings about other people, that they are stupid and helpless while you are vastly superior. The group of people who will vote for the guy that tells them they are stupid is small and shrinking.

I think Democrats would be better off soft-pedalling their disdain for humans. It's not an endearing trait that gets votes. As long as you are comfortable with the lie, cheat and steal marketing hustle approach why not try to pretend to be good guys that think people are smart, wise and good but are under pressure from those burly Republicans?

[David Moles]

What disdain?

[Krewe Maynard]

People are tired of the scare tactics. "Here come the Big Bad Republicans to take everything! Booga booga!" Nevermind that experts agrees that Social Security has maybe 50 years left at best, and that every year we wait the problem gets worse. Nevermind that while the stock market does have ups and downs, over time it always outperforms SS. How about a different commercial:

You have a bunch of elderly people languishing in a third-world rat-infested hovel. A dusty wind cuts through the cracks in the wall, rustling tumbleweeds and shredded curtains. A small group of visitors come by, shocked at the scene. They go to the front door, where an old woman sits, cleanly dressed in a suit, her hair perfect. The visitors say, "What is this? We need to help these people! They can do better!" to which the 'guard' mockingly replies, "Help them? We ARE helping them! You would take away the only security these people have?!" Then the voice over: "In its current state, the Social Security system is destined for bankruptcy. There are some people who would like to keep it this way. But we know we can do better. Together, we can make Social Security work." Fade out to Republican/candidate logo.

So it may be a little over-the-top, but no more so than the casino commercials. I guess I just don't understand the rabid fight to preserve a broken system.

[baa]

Can I ask, John, why you think individual accounts are a bad idea? I mean, I appreciate a good negative ad as much as the next guy. That 2000 ad, where James Byrd's daughter said repealing a hate crimes law was like having her father murdered again? A classic.

But it seems like there's something missing here. Some of us really think social security as currently constructed is a problem. This is Concord Coalition stuff, not the fever dreams of Tom Delay. So we want to improve it. If forced savings is the goal, why is pay-go so much better than individual accounts?

Is it

a) because you think it will hurt progressivity?
b) because you think it will inevitably involve a "risky scheme"?
c) because you think that forced savings should, in fact, not be structured as an asset?

As far as I can tell, you actually believe #2. How come?

[Adam Kotsko]

baa -- Actually, according to your terms, John believes "b," not "#2." It's completely unfair of you to misrepresent his position like that.

[Adam Kotsko]

Also, after the whole "90s" fiasco, why is the burden of proof on the person who thinks that we can't rely on the stock market to meet all our needs? I mean, sure, the stock market always comes out ahead in the long run -- but sometimes that long run might just happen to include massive worldwide depression, the establishment of a vague sort of socialism in the US, a two-front world war, and the Marshall Plan before the numbers start to come out right again.

On the other hand, we know for a fact that the federal government will always have the power to tax workers and disperse the moneys to retirees. I'm not saying that we're headed for another Great Depression -- I'm just saying that the fluxuations in the stock market might mean that particular people, at the particular moment they need to draw on that personal account, may wind up being screwed by something a lot smaller than a Great Depression. I feel a lot more comfortable with the idea of spreading the risk around society -- for instance, sharing the (relatively minor, in my view) risk that some future congress is totally going to fall asleep at the wheel and not make the adjustments necessary to keep Social Security solvent, rather than having each person bear their own individual risk for their own individual investment decisions.

But then, I've always thought that there should be some kind of bond of solidarity and mutual concern in society, rather than just having a bunch of atomized individuals. Terribly out of date, I realize.

[jholbo]

Back40, I think you are mistaking the character of the exercise. Also, you are actually misunderstanding the content of the ads (if I make no mistake.) They aren't disdainful of the audience and I hypothesize that your a priori conviction that I am helpless and you are vastly superior must be blinding you to the empirical facts. (I kid, I kid. You can take a joke, right?)

Baa, two things. First, like Matthew Yglesias (hence my link to him) I would potentially be perfectly happy with some Cato Institute-engineered bit of market cunningness. But the not unreasonable assumption is that we're getting nothing of the sort. Of course, that assumption could turn out to be wrong. Then you wouldn't run these ads.

Now a slightly more complicated point is that the biggest objection to the scheme is likely NOT to be its market risk. The objections will be the ones Krugman has been making so far, which I won't rehearse here. Nevertheless, since it comes from the Bushies, it is likely to be badly designed and risky. (I realize you disagree, but again it's my assumption for post purposes. It very much needs to be tested against future political realities.) The idea is that the risk angle is more rhetorically promising. Then, of course, if you get the skeptical ball rolling with the public, you are not forbidden to roll out the other even more serious objections once people are primed to listen to them.

[jholbo]

Adam, I guess you and I probably just disagree but I think holding the line against markets is a loser both rhetorically and substantively. Rhetorically because if one were to do that, back40 might turn out to be right (at least about the perception angle; I don't actually think you despise humans, obviously.) Substantively because in many ways Social Security has a silly design. It is absolutely certain that there are better systems out there, many of them harnessing the power of markets to some extent. But it is also highly unlikely that the Bushies are going to hit on one of those. I suppose I ought to give a little more evidence this is so, since I know all these bland proclamations of Bush's venality are setting baa clawing the walls. I can't really say anything that won't send him clawing in a different way, however, so I'll just say: wait and see.

I should also add that the causal reason I wrote this post was that Kevin Drum said - 'bring back Harry and Louise!' - and the evil wheels just started turning of their own accord. I really do think it is rather sordid to make misleading ads, as these surely would be. (No matter how bad the Bush proposal, it won't be LITERALLY as risky as slots.) But politics is sordid. And it's sort of fun to think about doing sordid things. I truly am fascinated by the question of what rhetoric would work for the Dems. I am convinced Lakoff is dead wrong. I don't think I'm right either. But I'm curious and interested to know what the magic combination would be.

[Adam Kotsko]

I thought the ads sounded great as you laid them out. And I would be glad to "harness the power of the markets" -- I just object to placing all the risk on the individual. The benefit of a federally administered social program is that risk is spread throughout society. It's the non-social nature of the "individual account" plan that ultimately bothers me most.

[jholbo]

Thank you for the vote of rhetorical confidence, Adam. And rereading the above, let me add that the reason I think baa will be clawing the walls no matter what I say is not that he is somehow congenitally incapable of retracting his claws and moving away from vertical surfaces. It's just that I appreciate that he has a very different view of the nature of the Bush administration than I do. We aren't going to settle that dispute by arguing about ads.

[William S]

But only if the risk is fully born by the individual can they enjoy the glory of their virtue. Or clearly differentiate themselves from the incompetent. The dramatic possibilities of such a system are, I think, its true appeal. This also allows one to make sense of the economic policies of the Bushies which are not actually economic policies (ex: "the ownership society")

[Nicholas Weininger]

John, you highlight the fundamentally dishonest part of the Democratic approach to SS when you say it's about "not letting old people starve on the street" and then claim that cuts in guaranteed benefits would somehow imperil that.

The problem with this is that the current system doesn't guarantee everyone the same benefit; it guarantees higher benefits to people who need them less. Thus, a lot of people's current guarantees could be cut by a lot without exposing them to a risk of absolute destitution in old age. For example, suppose that, as the price of instituting private accounts, the guaranteed benefit for everyone were cut to the level now guaranteed to a person who's worked $8-10/hr jobs his/her whole life. How can that reasonably be described as imperiling the system of protecting people from street bum-hood?

Now, I oppose private forced-savings accounts for a bunch of other reasons, including the fact that Bush's implementation of any such thing is likely to be so bad as to actually result in a much less free market than what we have now. But I don't see how the "you'll be begging on the street!" attack passes any sort of well-intentioned-liberal-honesty test, unless there is some variation of the Bush plan I haven't heard about which proposes to eliminate guaranteed minimum benefits entirely.

[baa]

I think of it more as congenital tooth grinding!

As it happens, I was really curious only about the status of your opposition to a private account structure per se (the idea seems to have been oddly totemized as an avatar of Cthulhu on earth). Now that I understand that you don't really have this view, serenity is the watchword.

[baa]

Adam,

Just to note: that's funny.

[troll du jour]

Instead of better marketing or ad campaigns, democrats should push for a sort of positivist meritocracy: Poll tests. Education requirements for politicians and voters. Evidence requirements for economic and policy decisions. Perhaps restrict voting to college graduates, or to those citizens that could pass say a stats. test and reading comprehension quiz . Yes these are far-fetched and perhaps harsh proposals, but had the election been decided on the candidates' intelligence (rather than marketing or "spin"), Kerry obviously would have won.

[Adam Kotsko]

troll du jour -- So you're saying you want our education system to be even further corrupted?

[washerdreyer]

Apparently this thread was more prescient than it seemed at the time. Have you seen this:

One advertisement shows a couple in their 40's looking at the reader. "If we feel like gambling, we'll play the slots," the message says.

From: http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2004_12/005395.php