In politics, you’re either on message or you are losing. Let’s get to it.
Welcome to On Message, a weekly look at where the battle lines are drawn and who is winning the war of words.
This week… SAY NOTHING AT ALL.
There’s an old country song by Keith Whitley, made even more popular by Alison Krauss that includes the line, “You say it best when you say nothing at all.”
Of course, the song is referring to all the non-verbal ways one can express love and how those are often better than the words themselves.
But I don’t think politicians picked up on that meaning.
With five federal races on the ballot across Utah, for the most part, candidates, particularly incumbents, have done their very best to say nothing at all.
It’s not how they express love; it’s how they win.
Think about all four races for the U.S. House of Representatives. What do you recall about any of them?
My guess is the only thing you can remember is that Burgess Owens skipped out on a debate – something that would have been even more unremarkable had he said nothing at all beyond sending a negative RSVP.
Blake Moore, Chris Stewart and John Curtis have all stuck to a campaign strategy that follows the country song’s advice. They’ve said it best by saying nothing at all.
And they are all on cruise control to decisive victories becaue neither have their opponents.
The Senate race has been a bit more boisterous and that hasn’t been a good thing in all cases.
The most memorable non-debate message of the campaign came when Senator Mike Lee tried to encourage his colleague Senator Mitt Romney to endorse him… above a graphic on Tucker Carlson’s show calling Romney “Pierre Dilecto.”
McMullin’s most potent message has, essentially, been that the pro-Lee SuperPACs were being mean to him.
So, it’s hard to blame candidates for saying nothing at all. Often, the cost of saying the wrong thing or even saying what they believe knowing will only rouse a sizeable rabble.
And we should demand better as voters. Of course, that would require we also demonstrate the ability or the discipline to listen to opposing viewpoints on policy wihtout behaving like tired three year olds and then cast a vote for the candidate we agree with.
As it stands it makes perfect sense for candidates to be only as visable as is absolutely necessary to win.
That’s it for this week.
More On Message in the next issue of the Utah Political Underground.
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