Is The White House Losing The Stim Spin Wars?

Republicans may not be winning the stimulus spin wars -- something's going to get passed eventually -- but they're changing the way the White House will fight future battles.  The White House was looking forward to today's new Gallup poll, hoping that Gallup would focus on the more than 70% of the country in favor of passing a stimulus package.  But Gallup broke that category down: 38% want the bill as conceived of by Obama and the Democrats, and just as many want the bill passed with "major changes." 


During the past week, two checkpoints seem to have been crossed. One is that, even as the line items of the bill remain a mystery for most Americans, they're beginning to see the bill as a regular bill subject to partisan pressures. For that they can thank (or blame) Democrats who added in (tiny bits of) unnecessary spending, Republicans and Democrats (like Ben and Bill Nelson) who called them out, and the show of Republican unity against the House bill. 

The second checkpoint is that individual trees seem way larger than the forest. There's no evidence that Americans actually object to the Obama-Democratic plan in toto. What they're upset about is the very marginal (in terms of dollars) spending on pet liberal projects. There's no evidence that they buy the GOP spin that the bill isn't stimulative, or that it doesn't contain enough tax cuts, or that it doesn't provide enough spending for infastructure. These are the real debates; the American people seem to be reacting to other things entirely.

Bottom line: the communications challenge for the White House is to redirect attention to the bill itself ("Look at me, Simon"). They're going to do this by unsheathing the the biggest sword in the cabinet, namely, the President himself, who will be very visible. Mr. Obama will be armed with the message that the stimulus package is one part of our economic recovery, a vital part, and that Americans need to see it as integral to the solution.  Oh, and that recovery will take a very long time -- even longer without the stimulus.