Getting hot at the end

In Iowa, it’s said the four-step path to winning the presidential caucuses is to “organize, organize, organize … then get hot at the end.”

Two years ago, Barack Obama’s team was closely hewing to that game plan, understanding the Illinois senator’s campaign would be won or lost by its ability to identify, persuade and mobilize a coalition of support that winter.

In early October 2007, Obama was polling in third place, with 22 percent in the respected Des Moines Register poll. By late November, he’d moved to 28 percent, capturing first place in the Register survey. Approaching New Year’s Eve, he stood at 32 percent. A few nights later, Obama won the caucuses with 38 percent, propelling him to the nomination, and eventually the White House.

Much has been written about the strength and discipline of Obama’s grassroots support, which carried his campaign through a mediocre summer, then capitalized on the candidate’s unique ability to generate heat when the weather turned cold.

But another key aspect of this president’s considerable political talent is his sense of timing — and that more than anything may determine the fate of health insurance reform as the legislative process enters the home stretch.

Obama’s rise in Iowa was propelled by a number of factors: a steadily improved performance in the candidate debates; a concise and powerful articulation of his final argument during the state party’s Jefferson-Jackson Day dinner; a skillful use of opponents’ stumbles to his tactical advantage; and an ability to define what the outcome meant to ordinary people.

On each count, those seeking to kill health reform have reason to worry, as echoes of that strategy will be audible come November.

As Americans view the choices on health reform side by side, Obama will be playing a strong hand.

There are two options. If reform passes, healthcare costs will stabilize, and insurance companies will be forced to limit what they charge consumers out of pocket.

If reform goes down, healthcare costs will continue to soar. According to The New York Times, small businesses are facing premium increases of 15 percent for the coming year, more than twice the rate of last year’s increase. More jobs would be lost. Workers who don’t lose their health insurance would be forced to dig even deeper to cover their medical bills.

When the president addressed a joint session of Congress last month, support for health reform rose. But you can bet that wasn’t his final argument. The American people will hear from Obama again about what’s at stake in this effort. And for all the news generated by legislative tinkering on Capitol Hill, nothing captures the public’s attention like a direct message from the nation’s chief executive.

The defenders of the current healthcare system have already made some serious tactical errors, with the fallout only beginning to take hold.
When the insurance lobby chose to launch a multimillion-dollar ad campaign aimed at stopping reform, it unwittingly energized the push to change the system. Core Democratic voters began to set aside differences on details of the final package and focused their fire on a common enemy — an industry desperate to protect billions in profits by denying coverage to Americans who get sick, change jobs or have a pre-existing condition.

The insurance industry’s apologists — right-wing ideologues who might otherwise have infected the national conversation with scare tactics related to “death panels” or a “government takeover” — were forced to fire their weapons very early in the process, only to see their bogus claims debunked by respected third parties this summer.

And don’t lose sight of how Obama best connects with ordinary Americans — whether it’s in the middle of a heated presidential primary or a national health reform campaign: He draws a straight line between the goal and its beneficiaries.

The night of his big victory in Iowa, Obama reprised a message he’d carried across the state for 11 months.

“I know you didn’t do this for me,” he told supporters. “You did this because you believed so deeply in the most American of ideas — that in the face of impossible odds, people who love this country can change it.”

That’s how candidate Obama sparked an Iowa fire in the dead of winter. And it’s why President Obama has a damn good shot at winning healthcare reform this year.

Del Cecato is a partner at AKPD Message and Media, the political consulting firm founded by David Axelrod in 1985. He served as media adviser and admaker for Obama for America and Obama-Biden 2008.

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