The “never again” theme
In last night’s debate (at 8:45 in the video), Sarah Palin said something that scored in the 80’s with both Democrats and Republicans in Frank Luntz’s focus group (note the italicized portion):
Darn right it was the predator lenders, who tried to talk Americans into thinking that it was smart to buy a $300,000 house if we could only afford a $100,000 house. There was deception there, and there was greed and there is corruption on Wall Street. And we need to stop that. Again, John McCain and I, that commitment that we have made, and we’re going to follow through on that, getting rid of that corruption.
One thing that Americans do at this time, also, though, is let’s commit ourselves just every day American people, Joe Six Pack, hockey moms across the nation, I think we need to band together and say never again. Never will we be exploited and taken advantage of again by those who are managing our money and loaning us these dollars.
We need to make sure that we demand from the federal government strict oversight of those entities in charge of our investments and our savings and we need also to not get ourselves in debt. Let’s do what our parents told us before we probably even got that first credit card. Don’t live outside of our means. We need to make sure that as individuals we’re taking personal responsibility through all of this. It’s not the American peoples fault that the economy is hurtin’ like it is, but we have an opportunity to learn a heck of a lot of good lessons through this and say never again will we be taken advantage of.
Many, if not most, Americans are furious about a government bailout that involves sums of astronomical proportions for a problem that no one was talking about until, it seems, just the other day. Probably just as many Americans are convinced that no politician is going to really change things much. (As you know, we think the Paulson plan is only step one of a multi-part program that is likely to be even more expensive and intrusive than the government is currently admitting.)
Last night, the focus group was almost perfectly in tune with Sarah Palin when she tapped into that deep anger and frustration. In the days remaining before the election, the McCain campaign might do well to go with the “never again” theme. Palin is an excellent vessel for that theme. Though Peggy Noonan thought she was a bit over the top, she succeeded in making the three others in the race look like politicians by comparison. And people are pretty fed up with politicians.