Reprise Post; At the Tomb of Couperin – Thoughts on a Centenary

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(For Veteran’s Day – a reprise post from 2018)

There is a lovely little classical piece by Maurice Ravel Le Tombeau de Couperin, composed shortly after the end of the war, five of the six movements dedicated to the memory of an individual, and one for a pair of brothers, all close friends of the composer, every one of them fallen in a war of such ghastliness that it not only put paid to a century of optimistic progress, but barely twenty years later it birthed another and hardly less ghastly war. Maurice Ravel himself was over-age, under-tall and not in the most robust of health, but such was the sense of national emergency that he volunteered for the military anyway, eventually serving as a driver frequently under fire and in danger. Not the usual place to find one of France’s contemporarily-famous composers, but they did things differently at the end of the 19th Century and heading all wide-eyed and optimistic into the 20th. Citizens of the intellectual and artistic ilk were not ashamed of their country, or feel obliged to apologize for a patriotic attachment, or make a show of sullen ingratitude for having been favored by the public in displaying their talents.

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The Midterm Election

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Well, that wasn’t much of a red wave. Why ? There was probably some fraud but that did not determine these surprising results.

Here is a pretty good analysis

* Fantasy vs. Reality. It turns out that there are a great many voters who don’t care much about what traditionally have been considered decisive issues: inflation, crime, illegal immigration, lousy schools, etc. Many millions of Democrats, confronted with these facts, didn’t conclude that they should consider voting for someone else. Rather, they seem to have thought, My team is in trouble! All the more reason why I need to support my team. This was an election in which, to an extraordinary degree, issues were subordinated to party loyalty.

I agree this was a party loyalty election. The issues we all thought would dominate were ignored. Why ?

Maybe Democrats are living in a fantasy world. Not phased by inflation or gas prices yet. Was Trump a factor?

* Donald Trump. I thought the Democrats’ endless yammering about “our democracy” and “fascism” was incredibly stupid, born of desperation, and would be ignored by voters. I was partly right: those themes were stupid, and they were born of desperation. But it turned out that they were not ineffective. To cite just one example, a young woman I know posted a photo of herself at the polls on Instagram, with the text, “I’m voting against fascism.”

Trump did not do well with the candidates he endorsed. I was not surprised when Oz lost in PA. I was astounded by the candidate who won. Fetterman is obviously not qualified and I assume his wife will serve in his stead or the Democrat governor will appoint some typical pol. Pennsylvania is also the home of vote fraud. In 2020, they changed the rules, violating the law and ignored a Supreme Court Justice ruling that they must sequester late mail in ballots.

This is probably the end of the Trump magic. It’s not fair but the left has taken control of the country and will not be displaced short of war or economic collapse. I think either or both are coming.

“Our democracy” and “fascism” were code for Donald Trump. At this point, Trump is a giant anvil around the neck of the Republican Party. In many areas, likely most, he is absolute poison. To be associated with Trump is to lose. Pretty much everything he has done in the last two years has been not just ill-advised but massively destructive to the Republican Party and to the United States. He has teased a “big announcement” in the next few days. I hope he announces that he is moving to Bulgaria.

I think that is too strong and it is unfair but Trump has been successfully vilified. His rallies did not seem to help his chosen candidates.

* Polls. We Republicans have gotten used to the idea that polls generally underpredict Republican performance. When liberal pollsters started reporting more favorable numbers for Republicans in the days leading up the election, it looked like the usual script was being followed. But this year, if anything the polls may have understated Democratic support, not Republican. Whatto cite just one instancehappened to the 26-point swing among suburban women toward the GOP, which led Steve to dub this the “Desperate Housewives Election?” They were desperate, all rightdesperate to vote in favor of abortion and against Donald Trump. But how could so many polls be so wrong?

DeSantis did outstandingly well in Florida and he is now the leader for 2024.

One consideration is that the things we thought would dominate the election as issues are not going away. I was concerned that the GOP Congress would get blamed for the troubles which will get worse. Inflation, oil prices and shortages, supply chain issues, school indoctrination of children, the “transsexual” fad. All these will get worse now. But Republicans cannot be blamed. As HL Mencken said, “Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard.” I suspect they will be getting it good and hard. Sadly to say, we will be getting it good and hard, too.

We will be lucky not to get into a war we lose in the next two years.

What is the Purpose of Holding & Expressing Political Beliefs?

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The late Clay Christensen, IMO one of the relatively few business academics whose books/articles contain ideas that are genuinely thought-provoking and useful, discussed the ‘job’ for which a product is ‘hired.’   An example: milkshakes, sold by a restaurant chain which wished to increase its sales of that product line.

The chain’s marketers segmented its customers along a variety of psychobehavioral dimensions in order to define a profile of the customer most likely to buy milkshakes. In other words, it first structured its market by product–milkshakes–and then segmented it by the characteristics of existing milkshake customers….both attribute-based categorization schemes. It then assembled panels of people with these attributes, and explored whether making the shakes thinker, chocolatier, cheaper, or chunkier would satisfy them better.

Marketing 101 stuff. But it didn’t yield much in the way of results.

A new set of researchers came in with a different approach–to understand what customers were trying to get done for themselves when they “hired” a milkshake. They spent an 18-hour day in a restaurant and recorded when the shakes were bought, whether the customer was alone or with a group, whether he consumed it on the premises or drove off, etc. Surprisingly, most of the milkshakes were being bought in the early morning. After analyzing the data, the researchers returned and interviewed the customers. Evidently, these were people who faced a long, boring commute and wanted something to eat/drink on the way. Milkshakes were superior to alternatives because they didn’t get crumbs all over (like bagels) or get the steering wheel greasy (like a sausage & egg sandwich.)

The most important thing is that the same customers, at different times of the day, would buy milkshakes in other circumstances/contexts…and the desirable product attributes would be different. For example, they might come with their kids after school. And whereas the same person in his role as a commuter might want something that is relatively slow to drink (thick shake, large container), when he reappears in his role as a parent he might want something that goes down relatively fast (less viscous shake, smaller container, maybe even a larger straw.) What matters is not just who the customer is, but what he is trying to do.

OK, the idea of milkshakes for breakfast is not something I find appealing, but then I don’t need to combine breakfast with driving.   Some people do.   More importantly, Christensen’s insight generalizes beyond the milkshake field, and I’ve wondered what applicability it might have to politics.

So, why do people have political opinions?   What ‘job’ are they hiring the opinion to do?

Is the opinion based on their analysis of which policies/politicians will benefit them, and/or benefit people they care about?

Is it based on their impression of which opinions they had better express, if they want to keep their jobs–friends–boyfriends–girlfriends–spouses?

Is it the ‘job’ of the opinion to make them feel better about themselves?   Is it to get virtual revenge against people in their past–parents, employers, Mean Girls, school buillies?

Is it based on a desire to avoid cognitive dissonance by not contradicting views that they have held previously?

What other reasons do political opinions get ‘hired’ for?…bearing in mind that several factors may influence the hiring of a particular opinion…and what are the implications of this angle on things for practical political marketing?   (if any)

(Christensen story is from his book The Innovator’s Solution, co-authored with Michael Raynor)