Conservatism, Debate Reform, and FedEx
Guest speaker Rick Tyler spoke with Dr. Dana Walker’s Dissident Media class at American University on Oct. 19, 2007.
Some background info…
Rick Tyler currently serves as the press spokesman for former Speaker of the House, Newt Gingrich.
He is a conservative political strategist, and senior partner at Chesapeake Associates, a professional campaign consulting firm.
Tyler was the Executive Director for the Maine Republican Party for five years before moving to the nation’s capitol, where he is now the Director of Media Relations for Gingrich Communications, according to his website.
Let the live blogging begin.
“It’s not often that a member of Newt Gingrich’s staff gets willingly invited to talk to a college class,” Tyler said, greeting a class of almost 30 laptop-armed students.
He took no time getting started. Asking the class how we decide who to vote for, he received various answers from the class. “We go online,” someone said. “Television,” said another. Tyler explained in his day there were only four major networks, compared to today’s common choice of 500 available satellite channels.
Tyler said there is probably less than 10% of the entire American population paying attention to the presidential election. Keep in mind this blog is coming from a university where nearly every student has a political opinion.
Obviously this statistic doesn’t apply to anyone in the room, Tyler said.
He compared the percentage of his life that’s dedicated to politics compared to that of “normal people.” Ninety percent of his life, he claimed, was encompassed by all things political.
“You’re weird!” Tyler said to the students who claimed they watched Sunday morning talk shows, rather than sleep, watch football, or play golf like “normal people.” He was trying to reiterate that most of the nation doesn’t care most of the time about politicians or political issues.
On the topic of television, Tyler recalled the first-ever televised presidential debate – Nixon v. Kennedy. This debate took place where they now do the Meet the Press with Tim Russert, he said.
“What do you think is wrong with today’s current political debate?” Tyler asked the class.
“It’s too rigid and lifeless…They just give the answers they know the voters want to hear,” replied a student.
“You think people can see through that?” Tyler asked, “I do too.”
Tyler criticized the current debate structure, describing it as unproductive and “ridiculous.”
“What’s your answer on Iraq? Thirty seconds.” The buzzer rings faster than you can say “Uh… well…where do I begin?”
What’s his solution to the rehearsed, rapid-fire, sound byte-laden debates today?
He mentioned that his boss, Newt Gingrich, proposed that two candidates get on stage and talk it out in an anything-goes style forum. If they’re from opposing political parties—great. He also briefly mentioned Newt’s NNN plan, which is discussed further down in this post.
“I’d love to see bipartisan debates. If you put a bunch of republican/democratic candidates in a room full of republican/democratic voters they sound like CrAzY right-/left-wing fanatics!!” he said.
On the subject of registered independent voters, Tyler claimed they “have no voice.” He said they have to wait for the “crazy people” to make up their minds between candidates, before an independent voter can have his or her own choice.
As a registered independent, I don’t react well to this statement. Tyler spoke in front of a class that is structured to force students to have their own voice. The term “dissident,” as in Dissident Media, in itself reflects a minority that do not associate with the mainstream press.
To say someone doesn’t have a voice because they don’t associate with one of the two major parties? I don’t know about that. I understood what he meant, that we need to restructure the debate system to give undecided voters a better opportunity to decide between candidates, but he could’ve worded that more eloquently.
Tyler also spoke of newsworthiness. “Does anyone remember what the media was covering on September 11, 2001?” After a few hints, no one in the audience could recall that this was the summer Chandra Levy went missing. That was to be expected (it was over six years ago).
Newsworthiness is highly influenced by a struggle for ratings, Tyler said, “Why be afraid of freedom? I’d like to see no limits.”
If you’re a candidate, you have the weakest position to define your campaign, Tyler stated.
Tyler then advocated for transparency in government. Right now, campaigns are financed by “bundlers,” organizations with names like “Voters for a Better America.” Does anyone actually know where this money is coming from with a name like that?
“I love the five dollar voter.” Big donators are just buying influence, which they get through access.
Tyler asked a number of questions about our lives in a technological age, including ones on floppy disks, records, and rotary phones. Doing so provided a comparison between today’s world and the one of only a couple decades ago. Not that this topic needed addressing to a class where nearly every student had a laptop, complete with wireless Internet access, in front of him or her.
This was taken almost directly from Newt Gingrich’s speech at the National Press Club, which is available at the AU library for any AU students reading this. Tyler exemplified the ridiculousness of the fact that FedEx can track about 20 million packages a day, to six-sigma accuracy. Whereas the Federal government can’t track 11 million illegal aliens? Newt Gingrich’s suggested solution: send each illegal alien a package through FedEx or UPS. If that doesn’t get you laughing, check your pulse.
Gingrich calls his debate reform proposal the “Nine Nineties at Nine” plan. Namely, nine candidates speak for ninety minutes every Sunday for nine weeks before the election.
According to Tyler, this plan would allow the candidates to talk about a range of issues for longer periods of time. The debate topics would be chosen by the candidates themselves. This brings us to the question of how do the candidates choose which topics they should discuss?
“Dan Rather essentially got fired by a blogger! Think about that,” Tyler said.
Tyler maintained that the chance a citizen has today of bringing an issue to the attention of the Speaker of the House is much greater, mostly through online blogging, than it was when Gingrich was Speaker. Now, by means of the Internet, voters have more control over which issues get the most attention.
Then the floor opened to questions, of which I include only one.
“What has caused this degenerative debate structure?” one student asked.
Tyler’s answers were money, the financing of campaigns, and the competitive nature of the news media, which has focused people on trivia.
“I think the media has done a terrible job at articulating what people actually get,” Tyler claimed after he explained that every voter only wants to know what he or she will get by electing a candidate.
Talking with Tyler
After being introduced, he speaks about four major news channels that many used to get their news from while he was growing up. “Walter Cronkite used to end his news broadcasts with, ‘and that’s the way it is’, and we believed it,” states Tyler. “That’s not true today.” He goes on to explain that many people today have technology at their fingertips which allow people to access information via radio, internet, and from a plethora of news sources on television.
He draws several circles on the board to represent the general populace. Asking the class a series of questions such as whether or not they listen to talk radio such as NPR etc., whether or not the students watched Sunday morning political talk shows, and so on. The issue with this lies in the fact that few people in the United States actually do. “You guys are freaks,” he laughs when some students raise their hands about watching Sunday morning shows, “You are in the minority. Most people don’t.”
Healthcare, pensions, and social security are brought up in the speech. He asks the group about the students’ first jobs. Joking with the class that they might not be too concerned with social security because they are all in the “immortal stage” of life at the moment, he brings up the idea that social security is going to be non-existent in a few years. He speaks about Newt Gingrich’s idea of having two or four individuals debating one another about the real issues. Tyler speaks about the fact that putting all of the Democrats in one room to debate one another makes them appear like crazed liberals while doing the same with all Republican candidates make them appear as crazed right wing candidates. This, according to the speaker, simply drives those who are uninterested in keeping up with the news on the presidential campaign race at bay.
He also brought up the idea that independents have no voice. Independent voters are seen as individuals who are simply sitting with no voice until after the “crazed Democrats” and “crazed Republicans” to make up their minds. He believes that real debates with the candidates in small groups will be more appropriate.
Tyler also criticizes the media. Bringing up the main piece covered by the media about Chandra Levy every day leading up to 9/11, he discusses the fact that many said that the attack that day in September was a surprise. He states that the idea is ridiculous because we did have stories which could have warned us about the issues, however the media doesn’t cover them. Although he feels that the story should have been covered, he also believes that it should not have been covered all summer long. Media is run by profits, according to Tyler. The reason that the real issues are not focused upon is because media outlets want more viewers, and therefore will show stories about Brittney Spears and Paris Hilton instead.
Candidate funding is also an important issue. The idea of raising funds that are funded by groups like Citizens for a Better Life is ridiculous because you cannot really tell where money is coming from. He believes candidates should simply state where the money is coming from directly because it is easier to discover what the candidate stands for. Are they supported by the labor unions, big businesses, etc?
American impatience is also a key part of his discussion. The fact that people get impatient over things such as waiting for receipts, ATMs to deposit money, etc is brought up. Tracking and information such as package whereabouts is considered. He asks students to consider why the government is not always run in such a manner. We have illegal immigrants, yet they cannot be traced. The tragedy with Hurricane Katrina was considered, and Tyler speaks about the fact that people should have been able to help more quickly. He also brings up the fact that Americans often tune things out if they are not directly affected by the issue. Politics is often viewed as foreign to many Americans due to the fact that they don’t feel directly involved.
Rick Tyler is incredibly open to questions, and was more than happy to engage in conversation. His speech is quite interesting and has brought up several valid points. The quality of debate and the importance of activism in politics are some crucial issues that the speaker has brought to light. He ends his speech on the reiterated fact that in the 1950s everyone had access to the same news and information. Today, he states, people are able to make up their own “news worlds” in which they take information from their own variety of sources (The Washington Post, RNC, etc.) to create what they find important.
LIVE BLOG: Rick Tyler in class
Tony Romm
October 19, 2007
LIVE BLOG: Rick Tyler in class
I’m sorry, Gingrich lovers of the world (or, er, this blog), but if Rick Tyler, his press secretary, is anything like his boss, that entire camp is but a walking contradiction.
I transcribed quite a bit of the discussion and I’d like to post all of it, but I’d clog up the blog. Instead, I figured I’d just analyze some of the more pertinent and contradictory things Tyler said.
And, a final warning: I wrote what I could as fast as I could. I do not promise front page quality journalism.
For starters, consider his analysis of the major problems affecting America:
“There are basically several challenges American faces today that are quite serious, they are, in fact, life threatening, they are in fact, western civilization threatening. First, there are enemies around the world who hate us… You have weapons of mass destruction. You also have weapons of mass disruption… what happens if manufacturers overseas inject a virus into the system and everything collapses? A lot of them are on diversified networks… but you can have mass disruption that hurts out economy. We have trouble on the world… why in the world would you spend millions of dollars when you can drive a pickup truck across a border?”
Thanks, Rick. In a speech that’s supposed to be about renewing political debate, you opened with the traditional ode to all things threatening. You invoked 9/11 (if not in name then in spirit) as if to say ‘its a matter of life or death that you listen to me.’ How… typical.
Then you noted:
“Another threat is competing with China and India, which is a threat all of you have to face (population comparisons). They all want to pursue happiness, like we do. We always imported talent, but today that’s changing. If it’s so hard to come to the US and create jobs in the US, why don’t they just do it at home? Now I have a feeling that the US will stay competitive for the next 50 years if the us reforms taxation…, immigration, health.”
“If we don’t have choices of higher quality and lower costs, the system is broken. Now, how do we get to those challenges? I don’t hear insightful commentary on this… In both the democratic and the republican base, you have 9 candidates like seals, waiting for someone to throw them a fish for 9 seconds. So when Newt Gingrich proposed… to have no more than two candidates get on stage – and I don’t care if they’re from same parties on different parties.
Oh, that oozes conservatism. I didn’t think I attended class today to be indoctrinated. I thought renewing political debate was an issue that far transcends partisan politics. Guess I was wrong. In pairing conservative issues with progressive reforms, Tyler is taking advantage of students who aren’t questioning his rhetoric.
There is no greater example of this than Tyler’s quick yet caustic statement about independent voters. Asking students to raise their hands, he remarked:
“If you sit it out in the primaries, you don’t have a choice… don’t get a chance to vote.”
Really, Mr. Tyler? I’m registered independent, and I raised my hand. Does this mean that I’m uninformed or unwilling to participate? Quite the contrary, I’d imagine. How can one profess to revolutionize the election system yet belittle third parties and alternative movements? How can one tell a group of students that they ought to defect to the republican or democratic parties in order to have a say? Essentially, Mr. Tyler, you’re arguing that we should reject candidates who aren’t mainstream, accept the system how it is and vote accordingly. Doesn’t that contradict everything you JUST told us about reinvigorating debate?
And just when I thought my rage subsided, Tyler asked the class to voice the issues they believe most affected Americans. Money, politics, Iraq… whatever… but one of the issues a classmate voiced was gay rights, an issue I personally feel is immensely important.
But Tyler quickly dismissed that notion: “How many people do you think rank gay rights on the top of the list? Only 2-3%. But the media spends so much time talking about it anyway,” he said.
He quickly clarified his off-key statement when a friend of mine called him out on it. He emphasized the importance of agenda-setting, but didn’t really touch the issues of gay rights.
How convenient, right? Tyler keeps silent on issues he lacks a strategy to address; he dances around the issue. In other words, Tyler does the same thing the politicians he criticizes does. Another hypocrisy.
Even better, Tyler’s remarks on campaign finance reform:
“Important people in today’s campaigns are bundlers… Bundlers are people who can raise hundreds of thousands of dollars. The candidate is the single most valuable resource in a campaign, and they take that candidates time to seek money… But the most valuable thing a candidate has is thinking and planning time. If you [take time away from] a candidate, how are they supposed to think and plan?”
Excellent, excellent analysis. I agree. Let’s keep listening:
“I would like to see… why be afraid of freedom, I’d like to see no limits (fundraising limits)… PACS and interest groups can get into a campaign and influence it and define you and your campaign… Unions, corporations and individuals can raise as much as they want but the moment that check comes it, it goes up on the internet so people can see”
What. You can’t emphasize open dialog and the need for issue-specific debate when you restrict politics to the richest and most effective fundraisers. I was appalled, to say the least.
After brooding over that idea, I decided to ask my own question. As I posted in a previous blog and comment, campaign contributions are a big concern in 2008. With mainstream networks turning fundraising successes into big headlines (re: my Obama criticism), it seems only the richest candidates survive. It seems the politicians are more accountable to big donors than tiny voters.
And you know what Tyler said?
“Campaign finance reform didn’t solve those problems, I don’t think any of that has changed. But I think the American people are very smart, they don’t always pay attention, but if you give them the right information, they’ll make the right decision… but if they saw one person donating a billion dollars, the people would see that and not vote for them. Its got to be transparent, people need to know where the money is coming from and what its purpose is. When we invented campaign finance reform after Watergate, there was no way to be reporting information, now we can with the internet.”
Again, nothing. No specific answer to my question, no concern for the little voter who only meagerly pays attention to politics. Apparently, transparency legitimizes inequality. Cause that’s not oligarchical.
And that’s when I stopped listening and started typing. Sure, Tyler and Gingrich are dead on in terms of renewing and reinvigorating political debates. But both are the same old, same old, as I predicted. Both reek of the same dirty, unaccountable politics this blog has sought to criticize. I’d hate to say I told you so, but I did. The truth (when someone’s willing to tell it) hurts.
A sad day, indeed.
Serving Softly at Page’s
I have vowed to stop at Page’s Ice Cream on every trip to Cumberland, regardless of season or dietary concerns. It has hand-dipped ice cream and lots of frozen coffees but all I need is that smooth, creamy soft-serve. And you don’t need to get a sundae; just a cup of the vanilla will do. Page’s is located on the north end of Centre Street and its distinctive purple and yellow paint job is visible from our deck if the trees aren’t too leafy.
Of course, the Queen City Creamery’s not too bad, either.
Question for Guest Speaker
I am going into PR (hopefully), so I will be in contact with a lot of people who work with the press or as press spokesmen or women. My question isn’t so much about Newt Gingrich or politics but more about how you handle your job. What is a typical day like for you?
Thanks,
Anna
Dworkin, Debate Scholar
“I think our politics are in an appalling state, and I doubt that many of you would disagree with that. We don’t have a rational discourse, and the greatest casualty of our dumbed-down politics is the lack of argument.” –Ronald Dworkin, from a transcript published by the Carnegie Council.
Ronald Dworkin is better known as a legal philosopher, but he is also a debate scholar. He wrote a book titled, Is Democracy Possible Here? Principles for a New Political Debate. In the book, he stresses the need for conservatives and liberals to understand that they are not enemies, but have the same goal: Bettering America.
He goes on to insist that debaters must have at least a few shared principles in order to form discussion. Without a common ground, campaigns become wars. This trend is recognizable if one considers the Republican vs. Democrat, Conservative vs. Liberal, Red vs. Blue, grudge-match image that is promoted by the media. Unfortunately for the American constituency, the biggest loser is always rational discourse.
By focusing on their basic commonalities they can transcend petty squabbling. As he puts it, “this will lead to substantive political debate among people who mutually respect each other.”- Ronald Dworkin
Writer for The Guardian, Jonathan Derbyshire criticized Dworkin’s book in his blog:
“He envisages a “partnership” model of democracy, in which public reasoning and debate are placed at the centre of political and policy justification. This deliberative conception functions as a sort of utopian ideal, but since Dworkin is doing political philosophy here and not advocacy, his book is none the worse off for it.” –retrieved 10/16/2007
Derbyshire’s analysis of Dworkin’s book is right on point. Is Democracy Possible Here provides an interesting dialogue about the ramifications of the debate crisis. His solution to the problem is a bit unrealistic.
Can Mike Huckabee and Hilary Clinton bonding over their mutual appreciation of something vague like civil liberty, lead them to a rational debate about abortion?
I doubt it.
Al Gore: Old Man? …Or Spry Youngster?
rushed to send Gore words of congratulations after he was honored with a Nobel Prize. Fournier argues that, despite his potential threat for the democratic candidates, they seek his endorsement because he is such a popular figure in the media. In the interview, Fournier also brings an interesting idea to the table – Gore for President: 2012. After I stopped contemplating whether or not the Oval Office is walker accessible, I actually considered this idea. Could Gore potentially run in 2012? Or even, dare I say it, in 2008?! Interactivity
“Rene
wing” political debate…
I’ve tried to always stay on track with my blogs, and not wander too far from our class blog’s actual mission. Inspired by the words of Newt Gingrich, my posts have concentrated on either debate topics, or on actual political involvement. How responsive the 2008 presidential candidates are with their constituents, how they interact with the media (whether they use it to their advantage or not), and how they embrace technology.
Consider this post my “midterm blog.” It’ll focus on the involvement of the candidates. Before this semest
er I had never blogged, or even spent a notable amount of time at someone else’s blog. Now I recognize that it is a useful tool in the ever-growing technological age. This post is going to demonstrate (hopefully) all that I have learned about blogging this semester (labeling, adding pictures, etc…)
…
I wanted to get the attention of the people that this blog is actually about – the presidential candidates. I figure the best way to contact them is in an informal way, one
in which they are likely to respond. Now, I know that the candidates themselves may not be the ones checking their MySpace accounts everyday, but I went out and friended 16 of them anyway.
As for the democratic candidates, I checked the profiles, and requested friendship with democratic candidates Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, Christopher Dodd, John Edwards, Mike Gravel, Dennis Kucinich, and Bill Richardson. For republican candidates, I friended Sam Brownback, Rudy Giuliani, Duncan Hunter, John McCain, Ron Paul, Mitt Romney, Tom Tancredo, and Fred Thompson.
Once they confirm the friend requests, I’ll be able to post on their walls, and send them messages…this is where I’ll send them a link to our blogs and ask them to take a look, and maybe even write a quick response to some of their favorite posts.
It’s encouraging to know the candidates have learned where to find the young voters, and are now trying to reach us at OUR level. They have accepted the fact that they must come to us, and the Internet is the easiest way to reach the Y generation.
Their participation in the YouTube debates (YouChoose ’08) is only one example of their efforts to reach a wider array of voters; the fact that almost every presidential candidate has a MySpace profile is another.
The candidates whose names are linked above, were chosen because I felt their MySpace profiles were the best of the 16 that I checked out. They (or someone working for them) took the time to make their profile as user-friendly and interactive as possible. The three I linked were chosen based on several criteria: the last time they checked/updated their profile, how long their “wall” was, the personal information they included, and how much interactive/informational “stuff” they had in their profiles.
Actually as I’m blogging right now, Dennis Kucinich is online.
So, if the candidates are going online for the sake of our generation – we’d better meet them there. I’ve learned that it’s possible to make my voice heard, and intend to do just that when I contact the candidates. I don’t expect them to respond after just one post on their “Wall,” which is why I’ll try to contact them through their homepages, and maybe if I get brave enough.. I’ll post a video on YouTube.. Who knows..
A Staffers Insight
This blog is the home of much dialogue about the 2008 elections, the candidates and debate issues. To get a more insightful view into the world of politics I went to the experts. Well, they might not be experts in the sense of conducting research and years of studying, but they work for the politicians. This semester I work on Capitol Hill for my Congressman, Maurice Hinchey form the 22nd district of New York, and the other day I took some time to ask one of the staffers a few questions.
My first question was: does the Congressman support or like one candidate more than the others? The staffer answered by saying that Congressmen do not usually say anything until the nominations are set. This way all the democrats can get behind the democrat and likewise for the republicans. However, since my Representative is from New York he is more or less obligated to support Hillary, but he has said nothing publicly. This answer got me thinking. Everyone gets to say who they like and don’t like and everyone gets to say the issue that is most important to them, expect for our politicians. This is a bit ironic; after all, the members of Congress are going to be the ones that need to work with the next president. If anyone should be guiding the public’s decisions, it should be those who know most of the candidates personally, and in some cases their colleagues.
Another question I asked was about campaign finance. Campaign finance has been the topic of many blogs and I thought I would try to get a deeper insight. I asked the staffer, who is a legislative assistant that handles a variety of domestic issues, what her thoughts were. She believes that too much money is invested into presidential campaigns. Consequently, candidates such Joe Biden, who has tremendous experience and is a great candidate with great ideas, is not given a chance. At the root of the problem are big business and certain interest groups that can donate a lot of money. Raising money is part of the game, she said, but if each candidate was given or allotted a certain amount the game would get more interesting. Spending money would become a strategic game. Since a candidate is only given so much money, it would become more important to do well at debates.
I asked several other questions, however, I felt these went along with the theme of the blog and were the most interesting to examine. So, now we have the view of someone who works in politics. Congressional staffers are the geeks of politics who have a unique insight to the world of politics.
Federal Budget
With all of the posts it is becoming harder to find a political topic that someone has not already covered. In my opinion the focus on the presidential race and the vast sums of money their raising has overshadowed other issues. My issue of choice is the federal budget, which is so irreparably damaged with all the war spending that most have given up of fixing it in the next few years. Our current account deficit for fiscal year 2008 stands at 258 billion dollars. The total debt is a staggering $9,048,823,310,499.34. Crunching the numbers that is $29,837.91 per person, which is about $3,000 more then the median individual income or almost three times the budget for the fiscal year 2008. Its current pace is an increase of a paltry $1.4 billion dollars a day. The payments on the interest of this debt alone are more then the federal government spends on medicare/medicaid.
Where does all the money go?
Well after searching through countless federal spreadsheets on the government website that the breakdown goes something like this.
Fiscal Year 2008:
Total Budget = 2,941,121,000,000
Social Security = 655,564,000,000 or 22.3%
Medicare/Medicaid* = 404,511,000,000 or 13.8%
Military** = 624,638,000,000 or 21.2%
Interest on Debt = 469,919,000,000 or 16%
These four sections add up to 73.3% of the total budget.
Education = 58,603,000,000 only 2% 😦
I couldn’t find a clean pie chart or break down for the current fiscal year so I had to obtain these numbers from individual spread sheets, if anyone wants to check my math feel free.
* Obviously doesn’t include state contributions to the program
** military spending does not include any kind of retirement benefits or veterans administration cost, it also does not include costs for the FBI or CIA
M. Appeal (Mass Appeal) 