Rove to The Next Guy: It's Time for a Paradigm

Next Guy,

John did his best considering who he is and how he operates. Did his campaign use the advice laid out on Kerrys Karl Rove to help them win? We'll never know for sure. For what it's worth, I did hear the term "abuse" come up in one or two stump speeches, but that was clearly not enough.

John did not immerse himself in a real strategic campaign. There was no diligence in developing the vision, mission, and goals of the campaign. The Kerry campaign was totally tactical, and based on the energy of anger and resentment. As a result, the people who were full of BushHate voted, and the rest yawned and said that they'd rather have a guy who represented something, at least, in the White House, even if he is an abusive, misleading, miscalculating, misinformed bully.

This is what happens when you're out-strategized.

The point of all this is, the opposition party needs a Rovian Strategist that not only exists (many do, including yours truly), but strategists that the party leaders respect and defer to consistency. Let's hope that the Next Guy has this level of discipline.

So, Next Guy, let's start defining the new paradigm now. Paradigm? Yes, paradigm. No policies, no plans, no positions... not yet. If people don't see an alternate paradigm, they will continue to live in and support the current paradigm that "W" has graciously defined for us.

The new paradigm needs a name, which will emerge as we define it. For the time being, let's just call it "D10" (for those of you playing at home, that's Democrat + 2 + 0 + 0 + 8)

The D10 Paradigm

Beliefs:

We Believe America is the Best Place to Live, Grow, and Prosper
We Believe in Keeping America Beautiful
We Believe in Keeping America Free
We Believe in Fairness to our Fellow Man
We Believe in America's Leadership
We Believe Americans Deserve Safety and Security
We Believe in Americans Working Together

Can any American argue with these? Of course not. That's the point -- if your core beliefs are universally agreeable, then once you communicate these beliefs, you no longer will have explain your positions. They will explain themselves, because you're going to tie each position to a core belief.

However, you cannot simply tie a belief to a position. You need to generate a set of guiding principles that are based upon your beliefs. The next tip will take us from beliefs to principles. Stay tuned.