[Dialogue] {Disarmed} Re: {Disarmed} The Uphill Struggle

Fri Jul 27 12:24:35 EDT 2007

FRom everything I've seen and heard, a Hillary nomination will guarantee a  
republican president!  Without Hillary, the republicans have nothing to  talk 
about.

Dick Kroeger

In a message dated 7/27/2007 8:41:50 A.M. Central Daylight Time,  
FacilitationFla at aol.com writes:

From a conservative  columnist 
New York  Times  
The  Uphill Struggle  
By _DAVID BROOKS_ 
(http://topics.nytimes.com/top/opinion/editorialsandoped/oped/columnists/davidbrooks/index.html?inline=nyt-per)  
Published: July 27,  2007 
The  biggest story of this presidential campaign is the success of Hillary 
Clinton.  Six months ago many people thought she was too brittle and calculating 
and  that voters would never really bond with her. But now she seems to offer 
the  perfect combination of experience and change.  
She’s demonstrating that it  really helps to have lived in the White House. 
She can draw on a range of  experiences unmatched by her rivals. She’s 
dominated most of the debates.  She’s transformed her position on Iraq without a 
ripple. Her  measured, statistic-filled speeches rarely inspire passion, but always 
 confidence. 
Her success has put incredible  pressure on Barack Obama. He continues to 
attract huge crowds and huge money,  but he also continues to make rookie 
mistakes, like saying he’d talk with Hugo  Chávez. He’s forced to campaign on the 
defensive now, knowing that each  misstep reinforces the “He’s too young” story 
line. 
Clinton’s performancewill also have an  effect on the Republican race, though 
many Republicans are only now beginning  to realize it. When you ask 
Republican presidential candidates about Clinton, a smile of  professional respect 
comes over their faces. 
But their world is transformed.  The one thing Republicans had going for them 
was the head-to-heads. Bush, the  war and the party could all be unpopular, 
but individual G.O.P. candidates  beat Clinton  because her negatives were so 
high. But she is changing that. People who’ve  said they would never vote for 
her will take a second look once they see her  campaign.  
That means in 2008, Hillary  won’t save the G.O.P. An orthodox Republican 
will not beat an orthodox  Democrat. If Republicans want to have any chance next 
year, they have to go  for broke.  
You can see hints of the bad  environment at Republican campaign events. A 
city councilman in Franklin, N.H.,  introduced Mitt Romney by saying that 
America is looking for a leader “to  take us out of the shadows.” A questioner in 
New London asked how Romney will bring  honesty back to the White House. A 
questioner at a McCain event in Keene charged, “We’ve  had 16 years of draft 
dodgers in the White House!”  
These are Republicans talking  about seven years of Republican rule. 
Then there’s the issues.  Iraq will still be a shooting war  in 2008. Health 
care is emerging as the biggest domestic concern. This is  natural Democratic 
turf. So as I travel around watching the Republican  candidates, I’m looking 
for signs that they’re willing to try something  unorthodox. Eighty percent of 
the time, what I see is the Dole campaign:  Republican candidates uttering 
their normal principles — small government,  military strength, strong families —
 and heading inexorably toward  defeat. 
But there are flashes. There are  times when they break out of the 
conventional trench warfare and touch the  anger and longing that define this historical 
moment. 
One occurred at a McCain event  Wednesday. In Washington, the McCain campaign 
is  considered dead, but somebody seems to have forgotten to tell the people 
up  here. A man at one packed event rose to vent his outrage at Washington. He 
ignited  something in McCain, who started talking about what he’d learned 
from the  failure of immigration reform. McCain worked himself up, recounting one 
 failure and disgrace after another, culminating finally with an angry 
bellow,  “Nobody trusts us to do what we say we’re going to do!”  
It wasn’t a Howard Beale  “Network” moment, but it touched something. The 
crowd was with him all the  way. 
The other flash I saw was at a  Romney event at the Lincoln Financial Group 
in Concord. Romney had slipped away from the  policy chunks of his stump speech 
and was talking about his success in  business and in running the Olympics. 
He was talking about how you assemble a  team of people with complementary 
skills. How you use data and analysis to  replace opinion. How you set benchmarks 
and how often you should perform  self-evaluation. 
It wasn’t impassioned or angry  (he doesn’t do anger). But it was Romney 
losing himself in something he really  cares about, and it opened up a vista of 
how government might operate.   
The McCain and Romney flashes  weren’t about policy. They weren’t part of 
the normal Republican vs.  Democratic dynamic. They were about leadership, honor 
and intelligence. If  Republicans are going to have a chance, it’ll be 
because, by focusing on the  state of American politics, they reshape the 
battleground under everyone’s  feet.  

Cynthia N.  Vance, M. A.
Strategics International Inc., Miami, Florida
305-378-1327;  fax 305-378-9178
Venice, Florida Office: 941-483-9165
_http://members.aol.com/facilitationfla_ 
(http://members.aol.com/facilitationfla) 

Want  to build your own facilitation skills? 
Want to meet facilitators from  around the world and in your own backyard? 
Mark your calendar for the  International Assoc. of Facilitators Conference 
2008
Atlanta, Georgia --  April 10-12, 2008 See _www.iaf-world.org_ 
(http://www.iaf-world.org/) 

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