Newtown Updated: Obama wins the public debate but loses the Senate vote. NRA wins the battle but may yet lose the war

By Charles Hayslett

CEO, Hayslett Group

                In the wake of the U.S. Senate’s failure last week to pass an expanded background check law, I’ve been looking for an opportunity (and the time) to update my running commentary on the way the gun control debate has unfolded since Newtown. 

                This is one time I’m glad I dragged my feet, because it’s only in the last 24 hours that I’ve seen a couple of pieces of commentary that I think are useful, and they speak to two of the five topics I said would be important to watch in this debate.  The first is sustained political leadership.  I wrote following the Sandy Hook massacre that President Obama would have to put the issue front and center and keep it there, and initially it looked like that was happening. 

                But after the Senate failed last week to muster the 60 votes necessary to keep Manchin-Toomey moving forward, the country rightly asked who dropped the ball.  In Sunday’s New York Times, Maureen Dowd gave us the right answer with a scalding column that fairly placed the blame at the president’s feet.

                “It’s unbelievable,” she wrote, “that with 90 percent of Americans on his side, (Obama) could get only 54 votes in the Senate. It was a glaring example of his weakness in using leverage to get what he wants. No one on Capitol Hill is scared of him.”

                But if Obama was unable to channel an inner LBJ and strong-arm 60 votes out of the Senate, that doesn’t mean the fight is over or that the issue is settled.  Indeed, other powerful actors – New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg and former Congresswoman Gabby Giffords – look like they’re in it for the long haul, and there were a handful of comments on today’s “Morning Joe” on MSNBC that seemed salient, maybe even prescient.

                U.S. Senator Bob Casey (D-Pennsylvania), who ordinarily opposes gun control measures but flipped after Newtown, had this to say: “I do think the next election, the next election cycle, will create a dynamic we’ve never seen.  You won’t have a one-sided argument.  You’re going to have funded television ads, you’re going to have funded campaigns against candidates, and that will change the dynamic as much as the tragedy and the intensity of the moment.”

                That same exchange on “Morning Joe” generated a couple of comments that go to one of the other issues I identified in my original Newtown blog in December: How the NRA and its allies respond.

                This from program co-host Joe Scarborough, a former pro-gun GOP congressman from Florida: “By the way, this is going to be a perfect case study 10 years from now.  You overreach.  You go all in on an issue you should probably let go pass.  Sometimes you’ve got to let issues pass … you’ve got to choose your fights.  And the NRA didn’t do it, and they lied, time and time and time again.  And it’s not just 90 percent of Americans that they offended, they offended … a majority of members of the NRA.”

                To which Richard Haass, president of the Council on Foreign Relations and a Morning Joe regular, added:  “We’ll look back on it one day and people will question whether the slippery slope fit into the wedge argument, which basically informs everything the NRA does.  Whether that was the right strategy, or whether it would have been smarter to say, look, we agree to this kind of gun control, but that’s where the ceiling is.  Whether that in the long run would have been a smarter tactic, because ultimately by basically saying any gun control is unacceptable they could lose control over the debate, and if and when that day happens they may rue their strategy of their all or nothing approach.”

                

Spitting in the eyes of Yankees

By Charles Hayslett

CEO, Hayslett Group

Somewhere in Jackson, Miss., today there’s a PR manager for the state government who’s banging her head against a wall and seriously considering having a stiff drink before lunch.  That’s a fairly common professional response mechanism after you’ve spent the first few hours of your work day responding to media calls asking you to explain your client’s latest bone-headed stunt.

            The client, in this case, is the Mississippi state legislature and the bone-headed stunt was the passage of a so-called “anti-Bloomberg” law prohibiting local governments from regulating the marketing or sale of sodas and fast-foods.  The law, which Governor Phil Bryant is expected to sign, was a reaction to New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s attempt to outlaw the sale of supersized soft drinks as a public health strategy to curb obesity and slow the rise of healthcare costs in his city.

            The result was a media bonanza for Mississippi, and not in a good way.  NPR apparently set off the deluge with a story headlined “Soda Wars Backlash: Mississippi Passes 'Anti-Bloomberg' Bill”.  The International Business Times followed suit with “Mississippi, Most Obese State In Nation, Passes 'Anti-Bloomberg' Law Against Food Regulation”.  CNN, National Review, Fox News and others quickly chimed in.  “Mississippi comes to defense of large sodas with ‘anti-Bloomberg’ bill,” added The Washington Post. 

            I’ll have to confess that I’m conflicted about how to come at this subject.

            First, I’m a communications professional.  I look at this and see one more self-inflicted wound on an already badly damaged brand.  Tell me how this helps the state of Mississippi in any way whatsoever.  What public interest was served?  What public good was done?  Aside from the substantive issue, the bill’s passage tells you there’s nobody in a position of power in Mississippi who gave a single thought to the bill’s impact on public opinion beyond the state line.  In most states (including, I would like to think, Georgia), this is the kind of legislation a sentient governor or moderately alert House speaker would have shuttled off to a study committee, never to be heard of again.

            Second, as part of my work, I spend a lot of time working on healthcare issues and public health in particular.  Here in Georgia, we manage the Partner Up! for Public Health campaign, funded by Healthcare Georgia Foundation, and as part of that work we focus on a variety of public health challenges, including obesity.  Make no mistake about it.  Obesity is a bona fide public health crisis in this country and especially in the South, including Georgia; Mississippi may be the fattest state in the country, but Georgia isn’t doing much better.  If this anti-Bloomberg law was a public relations disaster for Mississippi, it may prove over the long haul to be an even bigger public health debacle.

            Third, I am, to boot, a native Mississippian.  I have been gone a long time, but there are still things I miss about home.  More often than not, though, I am left slack-jawed by political shenanigans that would be comical if they weren’t so consequential.

              So the Mississippi legislature’s passage of the anti-Bloomberg law was a triple whammy for me.  Beyond being one more embarrassment for a home state that seems to revel in them, it further damages the state’s brand (if that’s even possible) and undercuts public health efforts to encourage healthier eating habits among a population that desperately needs them. 

            Mayor Bloomberg may well have been wide of the mark in the specific way he has gone about trying to limit access to super-sized soft drinks (a New York court struck down his regulation last week), but the issue he raised is one of the most important facing our country.  Beyond the health effects on individuals who struggle with obesity, it holds profound implications for everything from our national economy to our national security.  It is the single largest driver in rising healthcare costs and has for years been recognized as an impediment to military recruiting and readiness.

            As a response to Bloomberg, the Mississippi legislature’s action was nothing more than a pointless act of raw demagoguery.  It was lousy public relations and worse public health.  Spitting in the eye of yet another Yankee no doubt satisfies some primal urge at the Mississippi state capitol, but it comes at a dear price to the reputation of the state and health of its people.

Wayne LaPierre’s terrible, horrible, no good, very bad interview on Fox News

By Charles Hayslett

CEO, Hayslett Group 

In a blog a few days after Newtown, I laid out five factors to watch as a guide for judging how the ensuing debate over guns would play out.  One was how the National Rifle Association and its allies responded.  I’ve since written that the much-feared gun lobby has seemed to me to be a little off stride, but NRA President Wayne LaPierre set a new standard for disastrous interviews yesterday on Fox News.

Watch his public deveining by Chris Wallace here: http://thebea.st/Vz2Zeh

You read it here first.  One of the major casualties of this debate will be Mr. LaPierre himself.  Retirement beckons. 

Newtown, Continued

By Charles Hayslett

 CEO, Hayslett Group

It’s been right at a month since I wrote a blog about the fact that the Newtown massacre appeared to have changed the dynamics of America’s gun control debate.  In it, I identified five factors that would determine whether the altered debate might produce meaningful changes in state and national policy.

Here’s a quick update:

•       Sustained political leadership.  The question was whether President Obama and others would remain engaged and put the weight of their offices behind a legislative push.  They have.  Obama charged Vice President Biden with coming up with legislative and regulatory recommendations.  That plan will be unveiled soon, and Obama seems committed to pressing the issue with Congress and the American people.  In addition, several major Blue State governors are moving ahead with local initiatives.  So check this box.
•        Whether gun control advocates can reframe the debate.  It seems to me that’s happening.  There’s at least as much discussion about public safety as gun control, with serious attention being paid to limiting access to guns by the mentally ill and strengthening background check requirements.  New polls out today from the Washington Post and Pew Research show big jumps in public support limiting the sales of assault weapons and high-capacity magazines, as well as closing background check and gun show loopholes.  Check this box as well.
•      How quickly things happen.  American media and public attention spans are notoriously short.  One risk in this situation is that some new calamity would knock Newtown off the front page and out the public consciousness before the political and governmental policy-making sausage machinery could be cranked up.  But not even the fiscal cliff could elbow Newtown all the way off the front page, and, as referenced in the first bullet above, Obama, Biden & Co. are about to unveil their recommendations.  So check this box too.
•     How business and markets react over the medium- and long-term.  The picture on this is less clear.  After some initial indications that businesses were shying away from the assault weapon business, I haven’t noticed as much news on this, which isn’t terribly surprising; some investors and retailers may still be quietly evaluating their options.  The biggest headline on this front went to the nation’s largest gun retailer, Wal-Mart, which at first declined to meet with Biden and his panel, but then buckled.  In other developments, Newtown seems to have triggered a boom market in bullet-proof clothes for children. 
•     How the NRA and its allies respond.  I may not be the best one to gauge this, but it seems to me they’re a little off their feed.  Wayne LaPierre’s initial press conference calling for armed police in all schools played to less than universal approval, and, just today, the NRA is out with a new iPhone and iPad app that, as the New York Daily News reported, offers “kids as young as 4 a chance to fire guns at coffin-shaped targets.”  The newspaper’s headline – “NRA spits on the graves of Newtown massacre victims with release of mobile shoot-'em-up app for iPhone, iPad” – is probably not what the NRA’s PR team was hoping for.  All that said, the NRA could well be prepared to lose in the court of public opinion and count on allies in Congress to quietly throttle any major legislation. 

                Bottom line, it’s still too early to know how things will turn out, but so far proponents of meaningful change are doing more things right than wrong.  And the pro-gun crowd seems to be off stride.  Stay tuned.

Newtown

By Charles Hayslett,
CEO Hayslett Group

                I’ll confess.  When news of the Newtown slaughter broke on Friday, my first cynical reaction was: it won’t matter.  Nothing will change. 

                Maybe I was wrong. 

                If public revulsion at the massacre of 20 first-graders and six educators might have been expected, the reaction of a political community in thrall to the gun lobby has been nothing short of stunning.  We may have reached a turning point, if not a tipping point.

                This is not, by the way, a blog about the pros or cons of gun rights in America – although, full disclosure, I am one who has long thought our country’s policies on this issue are, for lack of a more technical term, nuts.  Even Old West saloon keepers had the good sense to make customers check their guns at the door.  A couple of years ago the Georgia General Assembly made it legal for Georgians to pack heat in bars.

                But already I digress.  This is, rather, intended as a brief disquisition about what may be a unique moment in the history of managing public issues and crises of this type.  Rarely if ever has a single event so clearly and dramatically changed the dynamics of such an important public policy issue.  When the smoke finally clears, there will be books, seminars, speeches, polls, case studies and op-ed columns aplenty about what happened and why.

                How will it turn out?  I don’t know; it’s too early to tell.  Until Newtown, it was pretty much game over and the National Rifle Association and the pro-gun lobby had won.  As New York Times columnist Gail Collins noted after the Aurora massacre in July, the NRA long ago reached a point where it had to make up things to lobby for – “like the right to bear arms in airport lobbies.”

                And, indeed, public opinion has clearly been shifting away from gun restrictions for quite a while.  In his current post, Gallup editor-in-chief Frank Newport lists many of the all-too-familiar shootings between 1999 and 2012, and adds: “Despite all of these incidents over the past 13 years, Americans have, in general, become less likely to say that the country needs stricter gun control laws. In February 1999, the last poll before the Columbine shooting, 60% of Americans said the nation needed stricter gun control laws (this was in response to three options given to respondents in Gallup’s basic trend question: more strict, less strict, or kept as is). Within days of Columbine, an April 26-27 survey showed a slight increase to 66% in 1999. From that point on, the “more strict” percentage began to decline. It fell below 50% for the first time in October 2008. Last year it was 43% in October, the all-time low.”

                While it may be too early to speculate about the long-term impact of Newtown, it’s not too early to think – from the perspective of issues and crisis management – about the major forces and factors that will shape whatever that outcome is.  Here’s my short list:

Ø  Sustained political leadership.  This is obvious but still needs to be listed first.  President Obama has signaled his intention to press the issue, but he already had a full plate before Newtown and there are practical questions about how much time, energy and political capital he can afford to invest in the issue.  He’ll have plenty of help from New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg and others, but it’s hard to see anything happening if he steps back.  I don’t think he will.  Look for the issue to come up in his second inaugural and the State of the Union.

Ø  Whether gun control advocates can reframe the debate.  As the polling data cited above and recent public policy trends make clear, the fight for “gun control” has been lost.  The challenge now is whether it’s possible to reframe the issue and the debate.  We’re already beginning to hear political pundits and others talk about “gun safety” and see thoughtful discussions about balancing Second Amendment rights with legitimate public safety concerns.  In this morning’s AJC, Jay Bookman has an excellent column suggesting that the policy path we’ve taken on drunk driving in recent years can be a blueprint for gun safety.

Ø  How quickly things happen.  As horrific as Newtown was, it still has a limited shelf life as a news story and as an important public issue.  It’ll be interesting to see how long it takes before it falls off the front page and out of the national consciousness – and that will happen.  If President Obama and his allies can’t get the ball rolling by the time that happens, nothing will happen.

Ø  How business and markets react over the medium- and long-term.  This is perhaps the single most interesting post-Newtown development.  The private equity firm Cerberus announced yesterday that it will sell its stake in the company that manufactured the Bushmaster .223 used to kill many of the Sandy Hook first graders, and I caught a blurb on the news last night to the effect that a major sporting goods store near Newtown was taking down its gun display.  Here you have businesses putting brand considerations ahead of the bottom line. 

Ø  How the NRA and its allies respond.  It bears mentioning that these folks know what they’re doing.  They’ve successfully pressed the expansion of gun rights for decades, and they will not go quietly into the night.  For now, they’ve gone into bunker mode; they’ve gone dark on social media and have made no substantive comments about Newtown, except to say on their website that they’ll hold a “major news conference” on Friday.  They may not have faced a firestorm like Newtown before, but this is not their first rodeo. 

               

                Again, it’s too early to predict how events will unfold from here.  But these are some of the topics you’ll be reading about as it does.

HG Wins IABC Awards for Public Health and Healthcare projects

By Dori Mendel
Senior Account Manager, Hayslett Group

Hayslett Group took home three IABC flame awards at the 2012 IABC awards gala, including two Gold Flames and a Bronze Flame. One of the Gold Flames was for a quarterly healthcare event for Gwinnett Medical Center titled “Take the Pledge for a Healthy Heart,” and the other Gold Flame was for Partner Up! For Public Health’s student video contest. The Bronze Flame was awarded for Partner Up! For Public Health’s 2012 Health & Economic Power ratings.

“It’s always an honor to have your work recognized, especially among other successful peers,” said Charlie Hayslett, CEO of Hayslett Group. “These awards underscore HG’s ongoing commitment to our clients and our constant effort to create innovative and compelling work.”

For more on the IABC Golden Flames, visit http://atlanta.iabc.com/awards/.

What all budding orators can learn from Bill Clinton

By Charles Hayslett
CEO, Hayslett Group   

I actually remember the first time I saw Bill Clinton give a speech.  It was in late 1991 or early ‘92 and I was working for BellSouth Corporation.  At the time, I was managing one of the company’s communications organizations, but my first assignment, nearly 10 years earlier, had been as its senior speechwriter.  It was work I enjoyed and seemed to have a fair knack for, and it had left me with a deep appreciation for good speechwriting and speechmakers.

So it was, that after tossing and turning and unable to sleep in a hotel room in Birmingham, Ala., where I had gone for a meeting with some South Central Bell colleagues, I finally turned on the TV and began scanning the channels until I came, believe it or not, to C-SPAN and a rerun of a speech by this young governor (and presidential hopeful) from Arkansas to a business group somewhere in Ohio.

Now I don’t know what this says about me, but I was almost immediately captivated – by a C-SPAN rerun of a speech at two o’clock in the morning by a small-state governor whom I had heard of but didn’t know much about.

Did I mention that the speech was about Medicaid?

That recollection came back to me last Wednesday night as I watched now former President Clinton deliver the nominating speech for President Obama at the 2012 Democratic National Convention in Charlotte.  Politics aside, I think even Clinton’s harshest critics would agree that he is one of the premier political orators of this or any other era. 

Obviously, the Clinton I watched at the DNC was older, thinner and grayer than the pudgy Southern governor I first noticed in the wee hours of a Birmingham morning 20 years ago.  But elements of his Medicaid talk to that group of Ohio business people two decades past echoed in the Charlotte convention hall Wednesday night, and I found myself thinking about lessons we could draw from Clinton’s speechifying.

True enough, Clinton comes to every podium with a level of natural oratorical talent that few can ever hope to match.  But that doesn’t mean he hasn’t had to work at it, or that more mortal speakers can’t draw useful lessons from the master.  I point to three.

Know your stuff.  The thing that really captivated me early that morning in Birmingham was Clinton’s command of his subject matter.  He was speaking without either a TelePrompTer or a printed text.  I couldn’t even see evidence of a stray envelope with notes scribbled on the back.  (Old speechwriters learn to look for these kinds of things.)  Yet he worked his way deliberately and energetically through what we would all come to recognize as one of his patented multi-point policy speeches (and, yes, he could go on too long at times; I didn’t say he was perfect).  Who knew Medicaid could be interesting at 2 a.m.? 

That same ability was on display Wednesday night in Charlotte.  I know he was working from a TelePrompTer this time around, but after a few minutes I realized I couldn’t tell that he was using it (you usually can, and I could with most other speakers).  What’s more, he clearly ad libbed at several points in the speech – and sometimes at length.  But because he knew the subject matter, he could make it work.

Draw power from your audience.  As a newspaper reporter covering politics many years ago, time and again I covered campaign events where candidates were able to establish a visceral connection with their audiences that had a literally energizing effect on the speaker; I’ve seen political candidates who I knew were bone-tired grow stronger and stronger as their speech went on.  That may be easier to do in a friendly political setting than, say, a corporate business forum – but it needn’t be.  Good speakers understand – whether naturally or through experience – that part of their responsibility is to engage their audience on a human level.  That’s easier to do, obviously, if they’re not having to pour all of their mental energy into reading a speech or presenting a text-heavy PowerPoint presentation; to the degree that they “know their stuff,” they’ve got that much extra psychic energy to put into establishing a human connection with their audience – to talk not just to them, but with them.  Clinton managed that at several points Wednesday night; at moments it seemed he wasn’t just delivering a speech to the thousands of people in the convention hall, he was having a personal conversation with each and every one of them.

Then give some of that power back.  This is probably the hardest of the three Clintonian lessons to learn and apply.  I know it’s the most difficult to articulate and explain, and maybe you’ve got to see it to believe it.  But the best speakers understand that generating energy in an audience – and then absorbing it in ways that strengthen the speaker and elevate the speech – is just the first part of the deal.  The real payoff comes when a speaker learns how to return a measure of that power and energy – to engage and motivate the audience in ways that make them participants in a conversation rather than mere listeners.  For Bill Clinton and a handful of other great orators, that ability may be a natural part of their DNA.  But even they have to work on it.

Most of us may have to work on it a little more.  My hunch is you’ll find it’s worth it the first time you leave a podium to the loud applause that lets you know you really got your message across.  Then and only then will you understand that speechmaking is a uniquely powerful means of communication that no other tactic or channel can quite match.