Gabby Gomez wants this race to be about anything but policy. He wants to smile, talk about his military cred and your many years in a failed Washington – despite the fact that you actually worked in Washington when it worked, before the Tea Party took it hostage. He does not want to talk about issues or his ever changeable and evolving views. Like Scott Brown before him, he wants a beauty contest, not a contest of ideas – and with a short calendar, he hopes he can skate by and pick off a low turnout victory.
The conventional wisdom in campaigns is often that policy doesn’t matter – message does. Keeping policy meat off the table is the safe route forward. But while such wisdom may work for a policy-lite newcomer like Gabby Gomez, it will not work for a long-term experienced Congressman like you. Your strength is policy so you have to make the race about it.
The way to do this is by calling him out – every morning – holding a press conference in a different city or town in the Commonwealth – and asking “what does Gabby believe?” You start each morning off with a different policy theme. You state where you stand, your record and you ask Gabby where he stands, for his solutions, relentlessly for the next few weeks through May. The goal of such an exercise would be to expose Gabby Gomez for 1) not being clear about what he believes and 2) believing things that most people in Massachusetts find anathema.
So for example, how about tomorrow you go down to Quincy (which you need to focus on given you got destroyed there by Lynch) and you speak about education and the sequester cuts that are devastating education programs across the country – cuts that will result in 70,000 kids being kicked out of Head Start programs, and how programs on the South Shore are being effected. You tell local and Boston press that you want these cuts overturned immediately and that you would pay for it by ending tax breaks that allow hedge fund managers to pay less in tax on their income than everyone else. Then you ask – what does Gabby believe? What is he going to do about these cuts? Would he do anything? How would he pay for it? Is he for his hedge fund private equity buddies keeping their tax breaks at the expense of these kids?
Because you know what you are talking about – you know how things get done – and you have ideas about fixing problems because you have fixed problems in Washington, you should expose Gabby Gomez as not only a lightweight on policy, but also a confused and conflicted light weight. Every time you raise a different issue – the assault weapons ban, choice, corporate tax breaks, the minimum wage, labor laws, funding for infrastructure, climate change – you force Gomez to respond or look empty. Call him out and he will be put on the defensive and have to answer – but his answers will be vague and shaddy because Republicans in Massachusetts have to find some way of saying what they believe without scaring people – and that will further drive the “Gabby is Empty” meme.
The more you ask “What does Gabby believe” – the more the press and people will too. The more the issues come out, the more press and people will remember why this election matters. The more the base hears you talking about the issues, the more it will rally to your cause. The more you are clear and detailed about where you stand and your strong record – the more people will understand there is only one real choice to represent Massachusetts in the Senate – you!
The best candidates focus on their strengths as a means of overcoming their flip-side weaknesses. You can do that by making the race a contest of ideas and experience – not running from yours but embracing it and calling the other guy out for having none.
Good luck – we will be out there with you – backing you on the issues. I mean “What does Gabby believe” anyway?
He’s said two completely difference things so far. The first was on his website in which he acts as if sequestration is a problem needing a fix.
http://www.gomezforma.com/gomez-launches-online-sequester-petition-calling-for-no-solution-no-paycheck-for-politicians/
The second was when he was speaking to a meeting of Boston Republicans and saying that sequestration did not go far enough.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cNSu8r_4p_Y&feature=youtu.be&t=4m39s
out and show Gomez for what he is – a rich opportunist that hides his real views from the wider electorate. Call him out and that will become the story!
I enthusiastically agree that Mr. Markey will win by keeping the focus on policy. I suggest that your proposed strategy requires refinement in order to accomplish that.
As written, your proposal risks shifting the focus from Mr. Markey and strategy to Mr. Gomez himself. It took scientists some years to learn that “debates” about evolution benefited the creationists far more than anyone else. Advertisers have long known that “brand awareness” is accomplished with “negative” advertising as much or more than other strategies — hence “Mr. Charmin” (for those of us of a certain age).
I like the relentless laser-focus on specific issues. In your example of the Quincy appearance, I would suggest featuring the children themselves, and refer only to “my opponent”. Have several of the children on-stage, or appear at their school. Find a way to put several of the at-risk educators front-and-center. Have staff identify a specific hedge fund manager, and make a pitch explicitly contrasting his or her opulent lifestyle with the victims of their exploitation (no need to name names, but provide pictures of an estate, a sweet yacht, or a very nice “ride”.).
Force Mr. Gomez to spend his own money, not yours, on his brand awareness.
This tactic would risk raising Gabby’s profile, but I think it is worth it to define him and keep him on the defensive!
Maybe one of them will start to cry, and say the union told mommy that she’d lose her job if the kid didn’t stand there, but now they’re scared!
No exploitation there? Because Republicans are such a class act.
from talking about the People’s Pledge. We get it – Gomez won’t sign it, and that’s bad. I agree, but that is not going to win the election. Markey needs to explain why he is the guy to champion Massachusetts values in the Senate, and why Gomez is out of step. Let’s start hearing about that.
The people’s pledge is about money in politics and how much of it there is especially following Citizens United. It is that aspect that prevents us from getting the environmental policies, gun regulation, economic fairness etc., etc, that we so desperately need in this country.
You DO understand that CU applies equally to labor union PAC’s?
I am all for ‘human only’ donation. No corporations, non-profits, unions, or groups of any kind. THEY can offer endorsements, but not cash.
But until we have individual-only donations, then all groups must be treated equally.
I too favor individual-only donations. However, let’s not get the issues confused. The People’s Pledge is about restricting outside groups’ ability to independently pay for their own ads promoting or criticizing a candidate. It has nothing to do with PAC contributions to a candidate’s campaign. Not sure what the reference to the auto bailout was about, unless of course you don’t favor saving jobs.
you’re right that CU technically applies to unions, but unlike wealthy corporations, unions don’t have nearly inexhaustible resources to spend, and much of the corporate money that is being spent because of CU is being spent on crushing the ability of unions to spend, or even exist, at all.
Whether the court would admit it or not, there is a cap on union donations — and corporations fight to make that cap smaller every day by fighting against the ability of workers to organize and stay united.
the People’s Pledge counted for unions, too, so “all groups” were “treated equally” by the pledge.
So your entire point seems moot.
Does he go by that name? I’m not a fan of 4th grade playground nonsense. We see the right do it all the time [Deval and Obama are names they love to mangle, for example, and they even turned Elizabeth to Liz or Lizzy], but it’s weak tea.
For me at least he’s Mr. Gomez or Gabriel Gomez until he signals otherwise.
is that inappropriate? I got chastised by a Hillary supporter back in 08′ for calling her Hillary instead of Sen. Clinton, but she used Hillary in her own material. I also believe some of the emails I got from Sen. Warren are signed Liz at the bottom, I view it as a ‘give em hell Harry’ or ‘give em hell Liz’ kind of familiarity, but if people here find it offensive or if she didn’t use it I’ll stop.
In this case, it’s clear that ‘Gabby’ is meant to be disrespectful.
but that doesn’t give everybody free reign to call me that under all circumstances.
Context matters, as does respect (thx laurel!) for the position.
.
I meant my signature, like on a piece of paper.
Folks sometimes call you porc, and I think (!) you don’t mind. Likewise, my meatspace friends call me stommie — but they never write it down, so I’m not sure if that is the correct spelling. Maybe it’s stomy, or maybe they “dot” the eye with a heart. =shrugs=
…and that Clinton without a title could mean her husband. I’ve never thought Liz appropriate since I’ve never heard her use it. FWIW I also prefer Christopher to Chris for myself. Gabby I think of as feminine and pronoun notwithstanding when I first saw it an image for former Congresswoman Giffords popped into my head.
When I hear “Gabby,” I think of this person.
back last week when I wrote, “Four for you Glen Coco, You go Glen Coco!”
you said you were older than me, but I didn’t really believe it. If Gabby Hayes is the primary Gabby that you think of, then I believe you.
Unless your path to knowing him is through Radioactive Man and Fall Out Boy? I wonder?
and who?
Hayes was in a lot of Saturday-afternoon movies on TV. I didn’t realize until I read the Wiki that he was a sidekick to Hopalong Cassidy and Roy Rogers. (And John Wayne and Randolph Scott and Gene Autry and Wild Bill Elliot, but apparently not Rex Trailer.)
I don’t think she is offended that people called her by her name. We all may want to call her Senator Warren now (woot!), but back then, Liz was certainly acceptable.
I have no idea if Gabriel Gomez likes Gabby, but I know David Bernstein calls him Gabs, so I’ll presume he’s okay with at least that. It would be a tough childhood to have the name Gabriel and not go by a nickname. (Not because Gabriel is a weird name, but because it’s quite formal. It would be like calling someone William instead of Bill, Billy or Will)
Reading the diary, I worked off the assumption that Lanugo knew Gabriel used Gabby, not (another assumption) that Lanugo was trying to use a petty insult. Perhaps we should have both ditched the assumptions and just asked if Lanugo knows something we don’t, in terms of how Gabriel likes to be called.
It seems to me that if there is to be error, it should be on the side of civility. The “Mr. …” standard was good enough for the New York Times for years, it is good enough for me.
I think it’s like wearing a coat and tie to a sales call. It makes a statement about respect and maturity — it often creates a power edge as well.
None of them are in my family, then. I think I’ve heard my dad called William once and my brother, William, never.
That’s never really existed in the blogosphere. It seems odd to complain about it now, particularly given that politicians have not only accepted it, but embraced it (case in point: Hillary).
Blogs have existed for what — 6, 7, 8 years? I feel like this is a fence that was accidentally put on a sliver of a neighbor’s property for so long that it’s no longer the neighbor’s property anymore. Personal first names are ours, now! (Cue Dr. Evil laugh and pinky-finger gesture.)
and there are plenty who take either side on this particular semantic. Still, plenty of bloggers who use first names don’t make up nicknames for the subjects of their writing, sticking instead to the names that the subject prefers to be called.
I didn’t just start for this comment. I remember making myself stop referring to “Dubya”.
I generally avoid reading ANY publication, online or in meat space, that refers to any public figure by only their first name. Such pieces are the province of bad tabloids like National Enquirer and Boston Herald, trashy magazines, and their blogosphere counterparts.
As a side note, I date the existence of blogs back to 1997, when Ward Cunningham put the very first wiki online. Even before that, “chat rooms” had existed for about as long as the browser. Interestingly, the “adult” market was again the technology leader — the first generation of chat sites was for the then-new “cybersex” mania. Guess how “hotmail” got it’s name …
I thought Hotmail was named that because it had HTML in the name…
We’re talking about 1996, when terms like “hot-chat” were new. There was a small blossoming of sites like “bianca.com”, and participants were eager to hide their true identity. Hotmail was among the first, if not the first, web-based mail site. The alternative, at the time, was to establish an account with a dialup provider like The World. Some form of anonymity could be achieved by maintaining multiple accounts with multiple names (and therefore multiple IP addresses) — this was at least one of the origins of the “sock puppet” phenomena.
The first generation of webmail providers (I think, aside from hotmail, that yahoo launched its webmail offering around then) were heavily patronized by the men and women (mostly men, often masquerading as women) who kept the chatrooms open and active.
Instant messaging, cucme, and a host of similar communication sites all emerged from this same audience. Not surprisingly, so did credit card processors like CCBill.
There actually was an internet before the web. At that time, people shared information on sites like The WELL. It was a surprisingly short step from file-sharing and chatting to wikis and blogs. Ward Cunningham was fond of saying something along the lines of “A blog is a conversation that might turn into a document, while a wiki is a document that might turn into a conversation.”
But also for another important reason.
WE have a Gabby!
“Mr. Gomez” or “Gabriel Gomez”. Period.
Just because the fourth-graders on the right act like themselves doesn’t mean we should do likewise.