Oliver Stone - helping steer your votes

Wall Street 2, Gordon Gecko and "Greed Is Good" all courtesy of one Oliver Stone, are just about ready to hit theaters. Did this movie really need a sequel? Despite it's mediocrity (it wasn't bad, but it wasn't great that's for sure), apparently Oliver Stone felt the need to do a follow up. Considering the near total absolute, irreversible and catastrophic banking collapse that almost nearly just about destroyed America and the world, perhaps a sequel is timely.

Take a look at the trailer...

But really, this movie is more timely than it's following of the banking crisis. Liberal director Oliver Stone's release, which like it's predecessor will no doubt vilify bankers and Wall Street fat cats, certainly seems well positioned to dovetail with Obama's 2010 electioneering for Congressional Democrats. The President has chosen those exact same groups - bankers and Wall Street fat cats - to vilify in order to take the focus off of the Democrat super majorities and their foibles over 2009 and 2010. In essence, he's trying to shift the focus from bad government to bad banking. Ironically, it's the most transparent thing the government seems to have done during his tenure at the White House.

Still, it's a concern. Just as the media helped build up Obama in 2008, they and the likes of Stone, are likely to do the same repeatedly, over the course of this year. Expect A LOT of shouting and memes about the evil banks. The real culprits are the banks. We need to get a better handle on the banks. That's a lot of shouting for the GOP to overcome - they've got to keep the focus on the failed policies and bad ideas of the administration and not allow the public to fall for the misdirection.

What's worse, I can see this taking a specific and unwelcome turn over the summer against the GOP if the meme sticks. In July expect to see this argument;

The evil banks need better oversight. The Congress has enacted legislation to better regulate these companies. BUT either the GOP opposed it and clearly are still the party of corruption OR if the GOP supports it; we have listened, we've become post-partisan and the GOP agrees with our ideas - so we are fit to rule, therefore we deserve re-election.

That's a tough needle to thread for the GOP if they let the blame-the-banks rhetoric take hold this winter and spring. There has to be a concerted effort to keep the focus on the disastrous legislative year the Democrats had, and their foolish insistence on pressing ahead on a smarter-than-thou health care agenda the public does not support.

Another tool in keeping the focus on government is to point out that the Democrats have been vilifying other industries for the past year. Insurance companies were the scapegoats during health care reform. Now the attention is here. According to President Obama, you either work with him, or you are a special interest. That's the same as saying let's work together in one sentence and blaming Bush in the next one.

There are strategic implications to all of this for the GOP. That leads to my last point, and my next post - What does the GOP have as a strategy for 2010?