The ghost of Lee Atwater is back as the Conservative movement tries to tear the country apart
I wrote a post on election day which talked about the politics of personal destruction that Lee Atwater created and used in the most vile way imaginable. It was so successful that it spawned his heir apparent, Karl Rove who has carried the mantle proudly. They play on the prejudices of Americans in such a way as to bring out the dark underbelly of society. I said that if Obama had won the election then not only did America rise up to vote for the better man, it also repudiated the Lee Atwater school of campaigning, at least for now.
Has a real crisis beaten the Lee Atwater school of smear politics?
So today is the day we all get to find out if the Lee Atwater school of politics has been defeated by the reality of our economic situation.
It has taken a real crisis to combat the very successful campaign strategy that Atwater championed to win George H.W. Bush the White House in '88. The same techniques that Karl Rove mastered and implemented in beating McCain and then Gore in 2000 and Kerry in 2004. Will truth and reality finally win out?
I wish I could tell you that Americans henceforth will never be influenced by scurrilous personal attack ads and campaign smears in the future, but my hope today is that finally this great nation has been shocked into actually using their brains to decide who should lead us out of the wilderness that came upon due to the negligence of Conservatism. I think Americans unfortunately have a short memory span and these dirty tactics will always be with us. If Obama wins, then I do think that America have no excuses any more if they do get taken in by these cowardly tricks. So I say to you now:
Yes, We Can.
I believed that it wouldn't end with Obama's election and those who thought so were a bit naive. Well, now it's come back with a vengeance and it's sick and it's ugly, but it's real. Everything that has come out of the mouths of the conservative movement and transmitted by their conduits to the public has been targeted at racial elements in our society.
Sonia Sotomayor? Oh, she's an affirmative action choice. Doesn't that make you white people so mad? President Obama? Oh, he's a racist who hates white people. He's uppity and wasn't born here anyway and isn't he really a terrorist planning to bomb American cities?
Fear and racism is being used to rip this country apart and President Obama has only been in charge for six months. Hold on to your seats because this is the tip of the iceberg. Remember the nut in Pittsburgh named Puplowski, who shot three cops in the head because he was afraid that Obama was going to take his guns? That was a prelude of things to come. And the old white supremacist who shot up the Holocaust museum was part of the warm up act.
Bush and Cheney left this country shattered both financially and in the workforce and we would have hoped that the country would try to heal itself with the help of republicans and conservatives. Instead they only care to operate in chaos and degradation in an attempt to rip the country apart. The show has just started and "you ain't seen nothing yet."
Well...if they're trying to destroy the country...shouldn't they be considered enemy combatants?
Certainly traitors at the minimum.
what's the difference between these assholes, and the asshole mullahs screaming "death to America?
English only?
Diabolus est Deus Inversus
I knew there had to be at least ONE diference, lol!
They're preaching the one, true faith!
Thanks for speaking the truth. We must not let the crazys hold the stage.
Silence is deafening and the Dems are soooo quiet about all of the charges launched against them.
Time to stand up to the nuts and call their crap-talk for what it is...bullsh*t!!!
From the land of 10,000 lakes
It is time to go here:
FOX NEWS CHANNEL STUDIOS
1211 Avenue of the Americas,
New York, NY 10036
Here's how to get there from Penn Station:
http://www.mapquest.com/maps?1c=New+York&1s=N...
The word needs to go out to all the activists in New York City and the surrounding Northeast areas that we need to go to Fox with our signs and start making a PUBLIC STINK about the HATE SPEECH coming out of Glenn Beck's foul mouth.
Just an idea....
"The US has an army of 90,000 soldiers in Afghanistan and is spending $100bn a year, but has still been unable to defeat 20,000-25,000 Taliban who receive no pay at all." - Patrick Cockburn
... a protest won't necessarily peel the scales off of other people's eyes, or steer FOX News onto a sensible course.
It will grab the headlines though.
A totally peaceful presence could have a positive effect...
"Government by organized money is just as dangerous as Government by organized mob"
-= Franklin Delano Roosevelt =-
..they call the police and instruct them to wear riot gear & incite the crowd to give them an excuse to move in and arrest the whole lot..
Izzit losing it's effective yet beyond the fringe?
Unfortunately, deficit numbers are turning on Obama.
Diabolus est Deus Inversus
It's a lily-WHITE, flabby, flaccid --but well-armed-- underbelly.
My flabby, flaccid underbelly.
Divine Right of Kings (1600's); Divine Right of Corporations (2011)
a catfish belly.
John, I wish I could dispute what you are saying, but sadly I can't. The republicans are so desperate for support that they have to continue to pet their base and right now that petting comes in some really ugly forms. They are much more concerned with party and power than they are about the future of their country and ours. People like Beck appear to be getting paid to rile up the base and then just sit back behind their plush desk when all hell breaks loose. They don't give a tinker's damn about tea baggers or birthers, but they sure as hell will do anything to get their votes. They want them all stirred up so that next year they will hit the voting booth in swarms. That's their only hope and it scares the shit out of me.
Say what you mean. Mean what you say. But don't say it mean.
The GOP - no longer "the party of NO", but the "party of open racism".
Sad, but obama's election has reignited, or at least brought to the surface, overt racism.
Too bad the MSM is a major party to this alarming trend.
that it's been proven that Obama is the anti-Christ.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sgHUZXgNAWo
It is not "air apparent" it is "heir apparent", as in "I am the son and the heir (to nothing in particular)"...
cheers.
It's called the American Dream because you have to be asleep to believe it.
-George Carlin
Maybe John meant to say, "hot air apparent"...
Which would be a good pun as well as true...
The interesting thing is that if we used the Bad Tendency test and the Grave Tendency test of Justice Learned Hand, favored by conservatives, we could do something about these electronic yammerers, but not only are they hiding behind the I Amendment, but also Justice Oliver Wendell Holme's Clear and Present Danger test favored by liberals.
I wonder if, however, we can use the test as developed in Dennis v United States (1951).
Diabolus est Deus Inversus
We should use the test as demonstrated by Indiana Jones against the guy with the scimitar.
use the gullible to do their bidding. Works for both political parties, as they both make off like bandits with the corporate cash. Political distractions, with collateral damage meaning nothing, as long as they get power, retain power, and help out all their political and corporate buddies. They don't want to tear the nation apart. They want to create enough opposing views as to guarantee their grasp of the power reins. Even the batshit crazy are allowed to vote!
of voters that it takes to win? If you separate them enough into groups with differing views and mentalities, it increases your chances of being re-elected. Must work. How many years have some of these politicians been in Washington? What are really the odds of that happening over and over?
Who cares what the country thinks as long as there are more electoral votes for "R's" than "D's"?
Mickey: "It was an epiphany. Do you know what an epipany is?"
Keoni: "NOT NOW MICKEY!"
..
As always, Beck makes himself out to be more of a racist than anyone else. What got me was when he mentioned Obama's statement that the police acted stupidly. Beck then tries to make that statement out to mean that Obama hates white people. So are we to conclude from Beck's assertion that police departments are made up of only white people? I don't think so. He tries to make it appear that this is the case when in fact most police departments are very diverse. Beck's racial arguement doesn't hold water.
Beck can also make fun of "the beer summit" but I think that event alone did more to patch up racial relations than anything else. Besides, as I understand it, the suggestion for the "beer summit" was Sgt. Crowley's idea.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GH7bjIajc0A
Diabolus est Deus Inversus
Pervert!
Beck's comments never hold water. That's the bizarre thing about him, he creates his own facts and reality. He placates the insane people who believe in him and what he says. They're nuts so he acts nuts and it's just one big happy movement. Of course he gets paid big bucks to do this and you'll never find him in the middle of the action, he's a cheerleader on the sidelines. He'll cheer for the team when they score but if someone gets hurt, he'll be no where around.
Say what you mean. Mean what you say. But don't say it mean.
I don't know if all the publicity is good or bad. If we ignore them they might or might not go away, but if they continue to get so much publicity that might give them a feeling of power. Nothing worse than an ignorant angry person with a gun and a feeling of power.
Most sane people would be embarrassed to be seen in public or elsewhere supporting such things as the birther movement, which tells me these people are, to some degree, insane. I mean it is possible that these people have some sort of mental deficiency. To me it seems almost necessary.
Say what you mean. Mean what you say. But don't say it mean.
global warming, and bad water? Or parents that are first cousins or closer!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nYSYipouABI
Diabolus est Deus Inversus
Black helicopters, spy balloons and predator drones are said to be in vast abundance on the border nowadays. Seems strange this border obsession, when it is US officials that keep letting in terrorists in the open. Guess you never know when some terrist is gonna steal a canoe and smuggle in some boxcutters and cigarette lighters to hijack planes! ;-)
I think it is about minds that are so narrow and shut tightly from birth. The only thing they can do well is act mean and ugly.
Say what you mean. Mean what you say. But don't say it mean.
Along the lines of the 'we cannot hate what is not a part of ourselves' quote mentioned in the Israel shooting thread, it's also postulated that a child who fears something often becomes an adult who hates that same thing.
So a childhood insecurity about sexuality becomes a hatred of gays/lesbians. Being distrustful and afraid of black people (or any minority) becomes a hatred of that group.
But it also makes me wonder if it's not that far from being an addiction. An addiction is basically self-medicating oneself to compensate for a disparate reality (they all hate me, my boss is out to get me, etc.) or to feel better about oneself and one's circumstances.
So are these people unknowingly addicted to hate? They have to hate in order to feel normal. And then the bar keeps going up, just as with alcohol and drug use - you have to use more to attain the same feeling of normality. Take away the drug, hatred, and they go through withdrawal.
That sure does give me something to think about, and at first blush it sure does make a lot of sense. I've always wondered if some white people hate people of other races because it makes them feel better. No matter how down and out they are or what losers they are, they take comfort in saying to themselves, at least I'm not one of them. Plus there is the jealousy factor. They see black people as well as let's say gay people moving along and becoming successful while they are stuck in the shack with the rusty pickup truck and not much hope for their future. Maybe they are angry because they see people who they feel to be lesser then them doing and having more than them. In many ways I thing this was the factor in my own father's attitude toward others, especially black people.
Say what you mean. Mean what you say. But don't say it mean.
Living proof that there is a God.
"Anyone that makes less than $150K in this country, has no business voting Republican."
He died of brain cancer, age 40.
From Wikipedia:
In a February 1991 article for Life Magazine, Atwater wrote:
"My illness helped me to see that what was missing in society is what was missing in me: a little heart, a lot of brotherhood. The '80s were about acquiring — acquiring wealth, power, prestige. I know. I acquired more wealth, power, and prestige than most. But you can acquire all you want and still feel empty. What power wouldn't I trade for a little more time with my family? What price wouldn't I pay for an evening with friends? It took a deadly illness to put me eye to eye with that truth, but it is a truth that the country, caught up in its ruthless ambitions and moral decay, can learn on my dime. I don't know who will lead us through the '90s, but they must be made to speak to this spiritual vacuum at the heart of American society, this tumor of the soul."
He started this hate that exists today, but at least he seemed to realize what he had done. If only the likes of Beck would realize what they're doing....but, no, that would take someone with intelligence and someone who isn't a greedy pig like Beck, Hannity, Limbaugh, et al.
He started this hate that exists today, but at least he seemed to realize what he had done.
Yeah...I know many so-called Catholics and Christian who suddenly find their morality when the grim reaper is staring them in the face.
Don't cut this deceased asshat any slack. Yeah, I know all about his being "born again" once he saw that he was dying. Born again, my ass.
I hope he's roasting in hell. He is as much to blame for the horrific mess in this country as that other cretin, Rove, is.
"Anyone that makes less than $150K in this country, has no business voting Republican."
There's a black man in the White House. (Sounds like a Little Feat song, nest paw?)
That's their primary issue, central complaint, and the casus belli.
... coke-addled, Bible-thumping dry drunk we had for the past eight years was really the best God could manage?
And his idea for a follow-through was McCain/Palin?
I shiver at the thought of McCain and Palin being in the white house right now. Of course Palin would have probably already quit, but still.
Say what you mean. Mean what you say. But don't say it mean.
Palin would've... already poisoned Brutus and become Empress Ha Ha of the 3rd Wingnut Dynasty.
I just heard on tv that Palin spoke to a group of gun collectors in Alaska this weekend and the NRA gave her their biggest award for encouraging gun collecting. I wonder what the Republican women think about her speaking to gun collectors but refusing to speak at their meeting.
Say what you mean. Mean what you say. But don't say it mean.
I wonder what the Republican women think about her speaking to gun collectors but refusing to speak at their meeting.
They're GOPukes' wimmin. They know their place: they'll just shut up and move along...
make me a sammich first!
if you were to pull off his skin, you find just another political hack, and these people's leaders know it. Politics is like selling a used car. Lie. Lie. Lie. Someone will eventually believe it.
Appearance is all, especially with the race card.
We've all got some African dna in us, the crackers born South of the MD Line having even a larger component.
But that is 'science.' Booooo, science...
Just to play devil's advocate, how is this different that accusing ray gunn and boosh of being bigoted against gays and minorities?
Diabolus est Deus Inversus
I must have sand in my brain from being at the beach all last week, I'm not sure I know what you mean.
Say what you mean. Mean what you say. But don't say it mean.
and systemic racism, for one thing...
Well, you devil....Raygun thought AIDs was a gay problem, so he ignored it for awhile. That's a start.
Forgot....did we have the liberal equivalent of Beck and Hannity on cable shows nonstop, 24/7, spewing hate about Raygun?
me included...
When Raygun got shot I publically declared I was saddened and disappointed that the shooter was an incompetent boob,...
But there were no Raygun haters with the same kind of public exposure that the Hannity/Beck/O'Reilly/Limbaugh axis enjoys...
(Keep it civil...JA)
I think the control trolls who come on this site and ask such questions in all seriousness are actually conservatives who depend on such suicidal acquiescence.
Diabolus est Deus Inversus
It would be like the only complaints about Bush were that he gad put Bombs in the Towers and that(and similar) was the only noise being made. Then there would be a lot of similarity.
On the other hand actual facts would be a big difference.
Beck keeps saying that this country is on fire and it is going to burn. He keeps saying that Obama is the cause of this.
Every so often, when I see Beck's nonsense, especially last week with the "Obama is a racist" remark, I'll send Beck a scathing email and copy O'Reilly on it, telling the jerkoff that this country is going to die not because of Obama's policies but because of people like him who spread hate, fear, and division.
These jerks epitomize the meaning of "hate."
... and who was it who was laughing as he poured 'gasoline' over a guest and mimed lighting a match?
Oh, that's right: GLENN BECK.
Obama is the "NOW" War President and America is still at War!
Break out Bush's Patriot Act and start firing some of these Neanderthals on the public dole. Don't forget who pays for those satellites they use to transmit their diseased thoughts around the Globe --- US taxpayers.
I've just eaten.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ogBp8IAtSWc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VsiKOJOXMJU
Diabolus est Deus Inversus
Seriously, do we have to have a picture of Beck up this early in the morning? I just ate!
These Clowns on the right are haveing a field day and the GUTLESS wonders in both Houses say nothing and I am surprised. Why are these COWARDS on the Left so SCARED to standup to these Racist Nazi Anti Semetic FOOLS. As long as these Cowards keep quiet the more room they have to spread their lies, misinformation and twisted truths. Is it so hard to stand up and call these clowns on their own words, HEY dems I'll sell you a BACK BONE if you want.
Proud Liberal with his CROSS HAIRS on the COWARDLY RIGHT
Maybe they are being quiet because they are watching the right wingers shoot themselves in the foot daily. I think most repubs as well as dems view these people as a screwy minority. Hopefully the FBI is keeping a distant watch on what's going on and is ready to act if necessary.
Say what you mean. Mean what you say. But don't say it mean.
... carries the risk of turning us into Dick Cheney.
You're basically left with legislative/regulatory tools, and these nutjobs have been whipping up a good hate on the Fairness Doctrine ever since Rush the Pimple showed up on the radio in the 1980's.
What we've got is an uncontrolled burn, and because no one has had the good sense to trim back brush from their houses (freedoms), we're all at greater risk of losing them when the flames consume the land.
reaction.
We "lefties" rememb er the murders that went unpunished, the riots that were not subdued, the protests that were, the National guard shooting us, stabbing us, the cops' horses and tear gas.
The Right has never experienc3ed any of that, and never will.
The Cops will never fire on Righty/fascist rioters.
No, I disagree. The cops would shoot conservaloons if you put a bounty on them and fed the cops buckets of Hate Radio and Jim Jone's Kool-Aid.
They'll never fire on their fellows.
Lefties/Socialists/Hippies/Commies/Fags/Blacks?
You betcha!
But they won't shoot their buddies...
There is indeed a new Paradigm emerging... although it is not really one Beck or his Ilk can relate too... Because of that, we are seeing him and his ilk go batshit crazy over nothing...
When did Atwater's ghost ever leave? Hell, for the past 20 years the MSM has also been owned by the likes of Atwaters.
Their main purpose is to get Lee's message out to the morons and weak-minded. "I may be unimplyed, have no 'nsurance or home anymore, and my retirement is gone; but dammit, thurs' sum Mexkin's over thar, I'm a voten' GOP again!"
Rush Limbaugh is what a smart person thinks a stupid bigot sounds like.
Yes, they are racists, but isn't it more important to note that these people are actually anarchists?
They have no plans, no options, no alternatives to all the government policies they claim to hate - which is why they have to employ the politics of personal destruction.
Bill Clinton explained it well; when we let them control the dialogue, we lose, because they can only talk from the level of personal destruction, and once we engage at that level, it's automatically reduced to he said/she said mudslinging accusations.
When we control the dialogue and explain how their policies are so destructive to the very people they call their base, then we win, which is why they never discuss actual policies without calling disgusting names - because the policies being discussed are never as important as derogatory insults meant to distract.
But, the truth is, they are anarchists. They are willing to see the entire Federal government dismanteled or reduced to near invisibility. And what would they replace it with? Militia-controlled individual states with overarmed, undereducated masses eager to follow the Nazi model and blame all their economic and social problems on any minority group that can be scapegoated?
And as long as the people at the top of the GOP have their swollen bank accts, their garunteed health care, the best education for their kids and safe gated McMansions to hide in; they will keep feeding this deadly racist crap to their ignorant rabid base.
Here's the truly scary part: these idiots, (not the idiots at the GOP's rabid base - I mean the other end of the spectrum of GOP idiocy; the complacent, arrogant, greedy idiots at the top of the GOP and their funders), acutally think they have their base under control.
The occasional violent outbreak is probably celebrated as proof of how well they keep their base riled up - we know that these outbreaks are used to raise money.
But keep in mind that these are the very same people who thought Home Ec majors could handle the reconstruction of Iraq as long as they were ideologically pure.
They play a very dangerous game, egging on their base with thinly veiled exhortations to violence, all to ensure their own hold on power. But they have absolutely no idea what to do if they ever do win their battle for America, any more than they did in Iraq.
They want order.
They just don't want any black fella telling 'em what to do...
They don't want order - at least not for themselves - they want obedience from everyone else.
It's one of their primary distinguishing characteristics (See, e.g. Adorno, "The Authoritarian Personality").
They just don't want it to be no damn Knee-Grow who is giving them the orders...that jis ain' raht!
of how a white male can put on a suit and tie, go in front of a camera, and say ANYTHING, but say it emphatically, and a significant segment of our lame-brained population will believe it. This is especially true if his wild assertions are coated with stereotypical scare language which the target audience is predisposed to believe. Hence the Birther movement, the "Obama is a terrorist" movement, the "He plans to take away our guns" movement, etc. This American experiment in self-governing has been a nice 230 year ride, but it's unfortunate that the average citizen no longer seems smart enough or engaged enough for a system like ours to work. In short, we may simply be too stupid to govern ourselves.
Which is a result of the years of cuts and changes in education which started with Reagan and accelerated with Dumbya--the conservative meme to dumb down the American people so that they will be willing dupes to follow the "outrage" perpetrated by the Rethuglicans in order to spread lies and discontent of their lot in life because of the Democrats that are in office. The lunatic fringe is rising and soon the inmates will be running then institution.
“The greatest evildoers are those who don’t remember because they have never given thought to the matter, and, without remembrance, nothing can hold them back,”
can lead to free thinking. We can't have that in America. Look at all the unrest it has caused.
"Anyone that makes less than $150K in this country, has no business voting Republican."
What can practically be done?
Sites like this seem to basically preach to the choir. Those who are ruled by fear listen to those who support their agendas and can't really be swayed. Confrontation only seems to serve further divide.
Other than large amounts of people boycotting businesses that support the various venues of vilifcation, followed by a huge letter writing campaign stating why they are being boycotted, I can't think of how to effectively silence the vitriol.
Even that is a band aid - the real goal here should be to change the culture from fear and exclusion to love and inclusion. That seems like an almost impossible task.
a Constitutional Convention can be called at any time by the citizenry during which they have the power to turf the occupants of all 3 federal institutions (Executive, Supreme Court, Congress). If 2/3 of the state legislatures support such an initiative, it's a "go". However, the teeming unwashed will pay dearly in blood given the powers recently put into place (Patriot Act, surveillance). But who said freedom is an easy ride??
"Secular humanism -- a fearless, realistic world view replete with doubt and scepticism that attempts to attain an unachievable state of equilibrium between and among the human qualities of reason, intuition, imagination, memory, ethics and common sense.
All of the nuts are on cable. The only reason Fox gets into my house is because to buy basic cable service, I have to accept the cable company's prepackaged bundle. It's not impossible for cable company's to offer customer-designed bundles for the same price as the prepackaged bundles. We have the technology. Of course, it won't happen until enough costumers start asking for it. Or if people would simply demand a "Foxfree bundle" alternative.
When did racism ever leave the base of the Right Wing-nut party??
Why do the ignorant, Reslug racists, except a bedwetting, paronoid, big crybaby, be their leader and speak for them??
Look what they have to choose from. A drug addicted bloated bloward, a lying redstate family values hypocrite that likes to go "hiking" on a pair of Argentine mountains, Sarah the Quitter or Bobby The Page.
How would you like to have to pick from that line up?
"Bush and Cheney left this country shattered both financially and in the workforce"
They also left a partisan divide the size of the Grand Canyon.
I'm 50 years old and have lived through the Nixon era and the Carter presidency let alone the Bush Family Plutocracy.Never,ever have I witnessed such pettiness and hatred for a Presidency still in its first year.It is truly frightening.The wing nuts worry someone is going to take their weapons away from them,but I've got news for them.That's the least of their(idiotic) problems.
The powers that be never have more control over our lives than when the populace is divided against itself.
"To me, truth is not some vague, foggy notion. Truth is real. And,
at the same time, unreal. Fiction and fact and everything in between,
plus some things I can't remember, all rolled into one big "thing."
This is truth, to me. "
-Jack Handy
all the GOP has to offer is fear, smear and division.
I'm afraid you may be "correct" Not "right". The idiots and fools seem to be in charge right now and that is a big problem. The truth is irrevelant and facts don't matter to the republics. Where I live is a republic strong hold even though most have no real voice in local issues, taxes are wasted on real estate deals our "representatives" have no business being involved in, so money has been wasted on interest payments. Good Grief! The fools keep electing the same worthless idiotd that have tried to bankrupt my county. I don't know what else to say...............
peace
The love you take is equal to the love you make. John Lennon Paul Mc Cartney
While the winger rhetoric and spates of violence are disturbing, I think your post is overdone, particularly the "you ain't seen nothing yet" bit. Holder, Napolitano et. al. aren't just going to sit back and do nothing if there's even a whiff of conspiracy to engage in violence. Violent wingers are going to experience the exact same fate of Tim McVeigh, Eric Rudolph and the rest, and media clowns who egged them on will find themselves even more out on a rhetorical limb as the vast majority of the country rejects their tactics.
Remember what FDR said about fear. I'm not scared of these assclowns, and no one else should be either.
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