Bogeyman Politics

I noticed a couple of stories today regarding campaigns currently promoting their candidates by waving bogeymen from the opposing party at the voters. First, Republican House candidates are raising the spector of a "Speaker Pelosi" to drive voters away from Dems:

Instead, Taylor's target this summer is Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, the California congresswoman who has emerged as a "boogey-woman" of sorts for Republicans campaigning this year on the idea that Democrats can't be trusted with control of the House.

"Rookie Heath Shuler is following the playbook of San Francisco liberal Nancy Pelosi," an announcer intones as the noise of a stadium crowd and marching band plays in the background of a 60-second Taylor radio spot. "The Pelosi game plan: Elect Heath Shuler and others like him, and take over Congress with the votes of illegal immigrants."

These rugged, rural mountains, which couldn't be more different from Pelosi's San Francisco, aren't the only place Republicans want to make the specter of a Democratic House a key campaign issue.

In South Carolina's 5th District, state Rep. Ralph Norman is challenging 12-term Democratic incumbent John Spratt and has repeatedly linked Spratt to Pelosi, saying voters should elect Norman if they want the GOP to maintain control of the House.

Before announcing in April that he would leave Congress, former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay criticized the Democrat lined up to run against him as a tool of "liberal activists" like Pelosi, Barbra Streisand and financier George Soros.

House Republicans recently released a document claiming that a Democratic House takeover would lead to committee chairmanships for several prominent liberal Democrats, including California's Henry Waxman, New York's Charles Rangel and Michigan's John Conyers Jr.

I'll bet a "Speaker Pelosi" almost scares as many Dems as it does Republicans.

Meanwhile, Howard the Donkey is trying to connect every vote for a Republican to a vote for President Bush. He's trying to sell a bad gubernatorial candidate in California that way:

Democratic Party Chairman Howard Dean says California voters would be endorsing the policies of President Bush if they re-elect Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger in November.

Dean was helping fellow Democrat Phil Angelides, who is battling Schwarzenegger in the November election, spread one of his central campaign messages.

Surrounded by cheering teachers, nurses, gay-rights activists and firefighters at a labor union hall in San Francisco on Friday, Dean and other elected officials compared Schwarzenegger's record on the environment, deficit spending, immigration reform and corporate influence with the president's.

"There are a lot of similarities between George Bush and Arnold Schwarzenegger," said Dean, chairman of the Democratic National Committee. "America needs a new direction and California needs a new direction. And if Phil Angelides is elected, we will have a new direction for California and a new direction for America."

I doubt that either of these approaches is going to be wildly successful, though given the wacky left nature of the Dem House leadership, I think the Repubicans will be more successful with their campaign. However, you don't win elections by being against things, you win by being for things and by making your case for those things to the voters.

The Dems have been running against Bush since 2000 and have not succeeded. Until they can figure out what they're for (other than anyone but Bush), there's really not much reason for voters to trust them with the leadership of the country.