Wednesday, February 15, 2006

The Good and The Truth

Both Democrats and Republicans poll public opinion. The difference in the parties is how they use the results of those polls.

Democrats use the polls to determine which ideas are "popular" and which are not and adjust their policies and politics to match those results.

Republicans use the polls to determine which messages resonate best with the public and then adjust their talking points to match those results.

The flaw in the Democratic approach is that it leads to a party afraid to express core convictions out of fear that they might not be popular.

The flaw in the Republican approach is that it leads to lying about your true intent because if the people really knew what you stood for they would reject you.

Unfortunately, the latter approach tends to lead to electoral victory while the former does not. It would be nice if we lived in a world where lying was considered as serious a flaw as a lack of personal convictions.

Here's an idea: stick with your core convictions, use polling to determine how best to present them, but never use messaging to trick people into thinking you are for something you are not.

Stand for The Good and The Truth.

The Good and The Truth always win in the end. Get on the winning team!

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