Unconventional Wisdom: Winning by Losing

February 28, 2005

Winning by Losing

Private accounts are dead. That is the Conventional Wisdom, anyway. I think the Conventional Wisdom is right. I'm not sure that even an articulate White House could have sold this idea, because too many well-meaning, reasonably intelligent people have a problem with it for a variety of reasons.

Here's some Unconventional Wisdom: Private accounts are still a winning political issue. Being for them will gain a politician more votes than it costs them. People aren't afraid of private accounts. People don't believe President Bush is trying to destroy Social Security. They just fundamentally oppose the idea philosophically. The Democrats will overreach by believing their attacks are getting through when that's not what's happening at all. They believe they've "won" when in fact they just happened to be present when an idea whose time has not yet come was advanced and died.

The people who are going to vote next November on this issue are those that favor private accounts. Republicans, therefore, should let it come to a vote, lose, and reap the electoral success of political courage on an issue popular with those motivated to vote on it. Democrats in Congress, who as a group have no understanding of the political environment in which they are operating, would fall right into this trap. Of course, most Republicans in Congress are too stupid to understand this, so they'll never do it. The best we can hope for, I'm afraid, is that they do no harm.

Posted at 05:38 PM | Permalink

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