Comments are moderated. Please stay on topic.
"Now, I would hesitate to say that the right does not understand irony and therefore, are brain damaged. That would be very rude. Still, you have to admit that this proves my point:"
Digby, that's brilliant! The study you cited could explain a lot, including how the religious right can claim to take the bible literally. They just don't understand anything unless they can take it literally.
I've wondered before how much of the difference between liberal and being conservative depends on how much you can empathize with other people's feelings. This sheds some light on that difference, albeit from a slightly different angle.
I loved this: "George Bush is a slow-talking hillbilly from the old confederacy who is more racist than Strom Thurmond."
I think we just have to force them to get used to it. I don't see any other way.
I don't think we can play by their rules -- the deck is stacked. I figured that out when I was fourteen, and Larry Flynt published the Flynt Report -- which detailed the sexual dalliances of Republican members of Congress that had called for Clinton's head on a platter for getting blown by an intern. Marital infidelities, arrests, children out of wedlock. Shoulda been red meat for the media.
But none of them cared. It was all Monica, all the time.
Even when we sink to their level, we lose.
"we've made a grave error in not better understanding it and using the same methods to equalize the playing field."
We can't. Liberals don't have their own Noise Machine. To do what the right has done for the last 25-30 years you need your own media organs.
The right has completely co-opted the mainstream media. They enter right wing talking points to MSM bloodstream like a virus through the massive right wing echo chamber they own.
But basically, folks, the right wing IS ridiculous -- credulous, ignorant, petulant, hard-done-by -- Joe Btfsplk personified
http://www.lil-abner.com/other.html How can anybody take them so seriously?
It wasn't just Mississippi Senators, either. Oregon Senator Gordon Smith -- often cited as a "moderate" Republican -- pushed the "Kerry looks French" theme in campaign calls for Bush/Cheney (in addition to calling Kerry a socialist appeaser). Personally, I think the only reason Smith's got a rep as a moderate is that he has to maintain a veneer of non-wacko in order to keep his cred in the western part of the state intact. I often wondered how he'd have liked it if people started making jokes about the Mormons.
http://www.darrelplant.com/blog_...php?
ItemRef=105
The bedrock of American political thought is liberalism. It is a shared understanding of what and who we are as Americans. Because this monolith is so high and wide, it makes a tasty (and simple) target. Where conservatives have to "message" their propaganda "just so" in order to either enrage or cow the electorate and sow confusion, Liberals already won the culture war long ago (it's just a few battles remaining - civil marriage, medicinal marijuana and decriminalization, reproductive rights) and remain somehow apologetic about it. Snark all they want, the right is aware their passing influence is limited and shrinking. Whereas new conservatives have to be coerced (evangelicalized as it were), progressive liberalism is more about waiting for the citizenry to come "home." Yes, caustic taunting does make the media pay more attention, but, we'd still be down in the sewer with the GOP - better to discuss and defend issues without shame. As to holding the media accountable for what they print - be willing to get angry. Have you ever seen a member of the GOP afraid to look foolish while spewing disapproval...we progressives are just too damn polite. Critizice the press and scream and insult them - over and over without fear of alienating them. It works.
Maybe the left has to take a page from W's playbook and just laughingly refuse to talk about this sh*t.
"Ha, ha, ha. That was so long ago, I'm surprised you remember it. Of course it has nothing at all to do with policy or what's good for the country, but I suppose it's a bit too difficult for you to wrap your head around serious discussions of policy. Why don't you go on and cover the latest voting scandal on American Idol. I think that's more your speed than the voting scandal in Ohio."
As a resident of the San Francisco Bay Area, I'm used to the scathing insult of "San Francisco liberal" along the lines of "Massachusetts liberal."
Not only does it make me want to scream "We're Americans, too. And we deserve representation just like those in-bred yahoos from Mississippi" but it makes me look to Pelosi office for a riposte. They need to have a staff member contact every news program on which someone utters this nonsense with that kind of reply. Or something like "When a Mississippi reactionary calls me a San Francisco liberal, I compare where we live, and I just thank God."
The GOP: ignorant, incompetent, and immoral.
After all, if fucking an intern is immoral, fucking an entire country (or two) is even more so.
But Carrie and Nan are right: the Broders and Russerts of the world have already chosen which side they're on, and it's not ours. Hence the importance, which Gore latched onto early, of building up our own media. Ditto net neutrality, to keep the PTB from choking off free speech in this medium.
i just find it astounding, as a card carrying hollywood liberal, that we in the creative/hollywood community have been unable to make this happen. it's weird how we are capable of crafting billions of dollars worth of entertainment but can't get a clever anti-republican meme into the mainstream.
maybe our focus has been lost because of all the money out here. just a thought.
"Republicans are stupid." Or words to that effect. Rinse. Repeat.
In re: today's MSM: It's very hard to make someone understand something they are paid not to understand. [via Jane Hamsher, I think]
All we can do is respond with our own drumbeats. Right-wingers consider "Bush lied" just that and they consider it unfortunately successful.
They don't buy it (or say they don't buy it), but they know it's irresistibly defining the zeitgeist.
Pick a meme. Rinse, lather, repeat. That's how it seems to be done nowadays. We're all that much worse for this level of dialogue, but until these screamers are totally and utterly discredited, it's going to have to be the way the game is played.
We are making progress. I believe that. I.F. Stone said that (paraphrasing from memory) the battles most worth fighting are the ones you know you will lose. Keep fighting them and one day you win.
KLEIN: Gag me with a spoon.
Maybe we can start calling Joe Klein Mr. Bu-Fu.
I'm talking, like,Lord God King Bu-Fu.
If you want more proof that conservatives have a problem understanding irony, just take a look at the "50 top conservative songs" list that someone at National Review came up with recently. Exhibit one is the number one "conservative" song: "Won't Get Fooled Again" by the Who.
If, after all that's happened, the media can slip so effortlessly into both the Clenis and Crazy Gore memes without even a moments pause, then a bold new strategy is required.
So far, the lazy media's new, bold strategy is called The Cintoris™.
Does that make you happy?
.
Tom Toles in the WaPo today nicely takes on the Gore is a liar meme.
(Link in URL)
Over the weekend one of our brilliant bloggers said the media have become nothing but nannies and groupies. It's pathetic that we have to filter important information through them and hope they get it right. Usually they don't. What to do about this situation? I don't know. It's nice to stand on principal and know we are "right" but not if we keep getting trashed because of it. We need a way to break through and maybe that's by finding atriculate, charismatic spokespersons/candidates who will say Cut the Crap!
I don't have the stomache for this task.
And I don't believe it would work anyway, and I do believe in the fine lessons my momma taught me which included "don't stoop to their level."
This has as much to do with stupidity as it does with the ignorant human tendency to side with a bully when he's not bullying you. Even if he's bullying your friend.
I'm not a bully by nature, and even though the Jeff Goldsteins and Deb Howells of the world seem to equate angry accusations and denunciations with bullying, the real bully is of course the one who does it for no reason, or who does it when he knows it's wrong.
And he's the hardest to stand up to, because everyone else knows it's wrong and yet it has broken some kind of taboo, a fragile bond that holds society together, the idea that we're all acting in good faith. It's the reason nobody could handle Reagan in the 80's, because it was so blatantly obvious that he was a lying, dishonest bullying prick and so was his entire administration. It's hard to call that out in public.
Why do you think it took several years of lawbreaking and the holy, immensely unlikely coincidence of two spunky young reporters and one insider with a bone to pick to bring Nixon down? And that was in a time when society still at least outwardly maintained some kind of standards of decency in public life.
Anyway, I don't see us trying on the bullying liar mantle being the answer. People will come around again, we just need to (choke) stay the course...
that's the key word. EMPATHY.
Typical repugs can't for an instant put themselves into anothers place. They expect oodles of mercy, but wouldn't offer a scrap unless they thought it would get them something else they wanted..
The SELF is a solid whole to them and it doesn't connect to anything unless they say so. Their only invisible connections are to God and he wants them to KICK ASS on hippies, muslims, pansies and liberals..
If I were king I would take all the money spent in schools on sports and give the kids Theatre and Arts training instead. You won't care about or want peace and beauty if you can't recognize it.
The kids can play ball after school like their grandparents did if they want sports..
Ask Americans if they would rather you cancel the SuperBowl for good or close every art museum for good. Guess which would happen..
How to fight the media slant? You can't fact check them into line because they use emotions intead of facts and you can't argue with how someone 'feels'..
This is their sneakiest tactic, ignoring issues, focusing on peoples feelings... Millions still 'feel' like Bush is trustworthy though he has proven this to be false.
Insist every serious discussion be based on provable facts with all the rhetoric turned off.
Facts are why Democrats sound like ROBOTS.. It's a feature not a flaw...
RT: F*cked three nations (U.S., Afghanistan, Iraq) quite thoroughly.
Tried, is trying, is in the process of, or has failed at f*cking Iran, Venezuela, Marianas Islands, Iran, most of the rest of Central America, etc.
F*cked through negligence SE Asian (tsunami, earthquake), Sudan, the U.S.
And of course, f*cked the world as a whole (Global Warming, Kyoto, Terrorism, pre-emptive war, destabilized Middle East, etc.)
"George Bush is a slow-talking hillbilly from the old confederacy who is more racist than Strom Thurmond."
What kind of braindead bullshit is this? This approach just plays into their hands, cementing Bush with the smellier parts of his base. Do this and you do Karl's work for him.
In point of simple fact, George Bush is a yankee, not a hillbilly. The hillbillies are just his bitch. If they didn't have some carpetbagger to play them, no one would know they were there, or as I like to say, "ain't nuthin' left of Dixie but some Yankee's nigger."
Exploitation is the meme. Poor people getting suckered by people they should be all rights be lynching is the fucking meme, people. The solid south ain't breaking up. The best you can hope for is to leave them with nothing to vote for. Let them know that their one achievement in life is being suckered by the people who fuck them.
.
"Here at the Spawn of Satan convention in Boston, conservatives are deploying a series of covert signals to identify one another, much like gay men do."
So that's what Bush meant about missing those red ties last THURSDAY. I thought it might be something like this.
In the 1930's, Huey Long famously said that no political speech should ever be pitched higher than a fourth-grade level. Communicating in this way, he became Governor of, and then Senator from, Louisiana. Considering that he was the first one to successfully run a modern media campaign, and considering that the GOP has been running this way since Nixon, we might want to consider reclaiming Long's insight. It is no shame to do so, considering that it was, originally, a tool for real populism, rather than its phony, Republican counterpart.
I'd like to point out the strain of "elitism" in this thread. For anyone who wants to try throwing that accusation around, I will say that this hasn't stopped the Right from using these exact theories. In fact, they use their schoolyard bullying tactics as proof that they are NOT being elitists.
I'd like to point out the strain of "elitism" in this thread. For anyone who wants to try throwing that accusation around, I will say that this hasn't stopped the Right from using these exact theories. In fact, they use their schoolyard bullying tactics as proof that they are NOT being elitists.
John Stuart Mill --
"Although it is not true that all conservatives are stupid people, it is true that most stupid people are conservative."
Many notable exceptions to be sure, but overall, liberals are way too nice and don't have an instinct for the jugular. I came from the labor movement and nether regions of the left where we'd always had plenty of experience getting our teeth kicked in, so have no illusions about the necessity to start kicking hard whenever we get an asshole down.
When Kos went after Bill Keller the other day (Philanderer!), there were many in the comments who chastised him for getting down into the gutter with them. Far from the majority, though, so maybe there's hope.
.
I'm a little uneasy about calling our opponents stupid or brain-damaged, when we're losing.
Second, the Republicans make fun of "Taxachusett liberals" because they don't ever expect to win a presidential race in the state, and they don't need to.
Is there any state Democrats are ready to write off for perpetuity? While Mississippi might be a good choice, others might disagree, and it's not a good strategy to insult the intelligence of those whose votes you are seeking.
It's almost too depressing to contemplate, but I think the answer was already posted below:
give these folks a
reason to hate the Republicans. You've got to give
them a "Them" to be against--stop telling them they
can't have a Them to get het up about. Like it or not,
they need it on some primal level--live with it. The
Dems have to figure out how to stop being the "Them."
And that won't be easy.
LJ/Aquaria | Homepage | 05.27.06 - 2:48 pm | #
Become like them, in other words.
we might want to consider reclaiming Long's insight.
Hear, hear. That was my subject last Saturday:
For the Democratic Party in other states and on a national level, you've got bright people making the same STUPID mistake. I know they are brilliant with real degrees in real subjects from fine universities. I know they love the feel of those words coming out of their mouths with perfect diction. I know that if they close their eyes they see C. J. and Toby. But remember all of those plots where these brilliant, jargon fluent, policy wonks got into trouble when they tried to speak in public? There is a reason for that. It's because anyone who takes five minutes from their frantic schedule and looks knows that policy wonkery as public relations is guaranteed to do three things:
1. Confuse the public that would like the program if they understood it,
2. Embarrass them and make them hate you for it.
3. Provide the decisive opportunity for the lying servants of your enemies to master the debate.
For the love of Mike, stop it. You've got to use plain language, you've got to finish talking about step one before you jump to step 49 no matter how much of an inter-relationship there might be. Train two people on your staff to speak English on the subject, on that subject alone and let ONLY them talk on that subject to the public. Come up with simple accurate words and phrases to replace the industry terms that no one understands. If you want to know what those are ask the experts. The janitor, the lunch counter person, your doctor who has only been pretending to understand them all these years. Don't use the words the insurance industry invented to confuse their customers in the first place.
You have made a noble choice to serve the public. You have decided that the sacrifice is worth it. But if it is worth serving the people you should have enough regard for them to explain things. Getting them to understand isn't an exercise in vocabulary building. They've got all the words they want to know. Use those and show the world how smart you really are.
Before I go digby, "Last Train To Clarksville,"? You just had to do that, didn't you?
The Grand Moff has it right: the line is "liar, liar, pants on fire". Repeated ad nauseum.
Republicans are corrupt con men who lie like breathing. Everything they say is a lie. They're selling out their supporters, they're selling out the South, they're selling out the nation.
If "liar" gets boring, "loser" has a nice ring.
There's no secret recipe for talking at a fourth-grade level. It doesn't take a genius. The reason it never happens is that liberal politicians are so afraid of the media's Gore/Dean/Clinton/Kerry/Michael Moore/ Jack Murtha treatment that they prefer to preach directly to their own choir, using Secret Irony Code, rather than come out and use the four-letter L-word.
Russ Carter's point up-thread is the key to understanding our situations, and should inform all our thinking. The truth is that the right can give a taunting and not take one. The reason? They have the inferior position. Their ideas have lost. Their voters support them only out of confusion. Right and left are not equals. We are stronger; they are weaker. That's why it seems sort of wrong or mean to make fun of their hillbilly asses: they're the party of the unsuccessful, uneducated, unenlightened. And why it's ok to make fun of overacheiving, over-educated egg-heads. (It's why Colbert, hero that he is, didn't pull a lot of laughs: it seems mean to make fun of the President as an idiot when we all privately think he is an idiot).
I think among people that have been increasingly outraged since 2000 but are not quite articulate enough to blog about things regularly (or have a large media mouthpiece), there is a guttural attitude that, when expressed, projects the liberal disdain for this administration in a crude but confident way. There is simply too much of a media machine to bend whatever words or votes of a Democrat's record to have any sort of simple rhetoric from our side be presented unfiltered. If procedural votes of defense weapons systems can be twisted and discussed with even a shred of honesty as 'voting against protecting our troops', then you could definitely expect any attempt at honesty or just a Democrat politician being themselves to be altered by the press (with God knows what elitist agenda) to be negative or condescending to "regular Joes".
I have to argue that it is grade-school level taunts that drives the talking points of those on the right. One thing I tell my companions is that to justify such of the corruption and lies that are rubbed in our faces (that of course go beyond having sex with an intern, etc.) right-wing apologists and their mainstream pundit filters have to develop the most convoluted, post-modern interpretations of reality and truth. If Clinton was sharply criticized for asking "what is is" than there should be equal or more criticism for Repubs instilling doubt about "what torture is", "what lies are", "what competence is", "what accountability is", "what 'moral values' are", "what corruption is" do I have to go on? You would need to major in advanced philosophy to try to get a grasp of an idea of what consistent interpretation of reality they put forward through their actions.
Because the arguments they make are so inconsistent and pandering, you have media figures flailing around trying to make soundbites. Rather than a discussion of constitutional rights, you have the Fox Newsies talking about not having any constitutional rights when you are dead.
To sum up, there are mechanisms in place that will interpret any articulate speech by Gore as condescending, any straight-talking speech by Dean as reckless, and any emotional appeal by a Democrat as wussy. These mechanisms are only in place because traditional media pundits allow them to be. The one-two punch of the Daily Show / Colbert, plus the blogs, tie all the message failures of Democrats to these media mechanisms, but basic cable satire shows and the Internet have yet to become as dominant in influencing discourse as traditional media does. Perhaps a pessimistic view of things is to just wait until an entire voting generation becomes absolutely sick and outright disrespectful of the narratives put forward by the lazy media and begins to look for different more honest information sources. The desperate stupidity of the writing of many print media opinion columnists is showing that this particular column is already falling, due to the ability of blogs to give everyone a right to a widely read political opinion. It's time to speed up the fall of a few other media columns through creative means in order to get our message to the masses.
Just out of curiousity, did anyone else show the Cultural ID post as the newest post on this site until this afternoon, i.e. May 30?
Digby,
I think the reason the Republican spin on Dems resonates with the press is less because it's lower brow and they find it more amusing than it's because it makes their job easier.
They don't have to get bogged down in details like the number of times Jack Abramoff visited the White House or trying to calculate Bush's proposed tax cut in 2000 to figure out he was lying.
We need to find sophomoric talking points that make their jobs easier.
We would like to stop them by appealing to their better natures, but that hasn't exactly worked out...
So perhaps we should think about how to give them what they want: a Republican narrative that appeals to their seventh grade sensibilities.
In response to the recent NYT expose of the Clinton marriage, the FDL crew started to refer to the media as "panty sniffers." In the comments over there, someone suggested that everytime the media invades the private space of a Democrat with the use of their personal lives to embarrass them, that we send them panties to create and reinforce the "panty-sniffer" meme.
I like that idea. I think that it would embarrass a guy like Broder or Russert to be bombarded with panties. The name "panty-sniffer" is very shaming and really, the media needs to learn to be ashamed of what they are doing.
Just a thought.
Republican humor-- and the "humorous" themse they put out to undermine Democrats-- really is at the 7th grade level. It's like the stories you hear about Bush's jokes-- e.g., making fun of a reporter's baldness (which is bad enough) and not even being particularly creative about it. Like, "hey, look at that guy, he's bald!" I mean, who the fuck thinks that is funny, much less appropriate? It all makes sense once you realize who the target audience is-- dummies and bullies from all economic strata, from rednecks to Yale frat boys. Who think calling a guy a "flip-flopper" is the height of "burning" someone.
But one thing that Republicans have figured out that Democrats never have is to not worry about insulting potential voters with their insults. You simply make the insults so pervasive by repeating them over and over that people disassociate themselves from the attributes being insulted, instead of taking offense. For example, Republicans don't turn off potential voters by attacking "liberals" because they have so successfully made that a hateful term that only hardcore anti-Republicans still claim it, and they were never going to vote Republican anyway.
Digby, you said:
Here on the blogs we have some masterful voices of ridicule and Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert are liberal heroes for the same reason. Wr have tons of biting, dizzyingly precise take-down artists on our side. But none of these themes seem to capture the mainstream media as do the wingnut themes and I have concluded that it is because they are too sophisticated.
No, it's because the press was bought off and/or scared off decades ago. Read On Bended Knee: The Press and the Reagan Presidency to get a feel for how long and how deeply the US press has been in the RNC's back pocket.
Upton Sinclair.
Andy and others have the right idea -- be tough and target intelligently. The left blogs are a medium making this possible really for the first time -- to thoughtfully concentrate fire with an eye to its effect. I take the anti-Lieberman campaign as the top level initiative along these lines, and have been increasingly impressed with its sophistication and success. And it already is successful, whatever comes of it. Really knocking this pig off is secondary to having an effect -- waking up the press, gathering experience, building your movement, and so on.
It is amazing the uniform sensibility found at Atrios, Kos, MyDD, Digby, FDL, and the rest. These are thoughts and feelings shared by millions of pissed off people and they are being turned into consequential politics.
.
I feel that we don't need to pull the juvenile insults. Rather, we should play to our strengths; the moral high ground and shame. And yes, guilt, but not too much. Put Republicans on the spot to repudiate their smears, or explain what it is they mean by a smear.
I love it when Long gets brought into the discussion. For a great read, find yourself a copy of the Pulitzer Prize-winning biography "Huey Long" by T. Harry Williams. It's got everything you could want in a political book in the current era, including how he building a national following in just a few years, income inequity, fighting oil companies, references to Venezuela, and enough about Louisiana to just make you weep.
http://www.moshplant.com/prob/pr...rob01/
long.html
The insults have mostly been hurled at "liberals", not Democrats, a clever way to indirectly attack, without insulting all Democratic voters. After all, I've heard registered Democrats sneer at "liberals". So what is it: mock conservatives or Republicans or both? If there's a way to roast Republican politicians specifically that's the way to go. Brainless Repuppetlicans? Dancing in the boardroom for supper, selling out us regular folks.
I think we clearly have to play gutter politics. That is obvious. And that is what the blogs can do in a way that mainstream media sources can't, or won't. The blogs have to be the attack dogs of the left. We have to humiliate the mainstream media into adopting our narrative out of fear of becoming a laughing stock.
With that said, the "Republicans are stupid" line may not work. The problem is that it too easily slips into the "I'm an elitist fuck" meme which the right has perfected. The "Republicans are corrupt, rich scumbags" is a much better line.
Digby_ give it up, the press is bought and sold just like the Repubs. We'll never get respect from them because they won't give up their jobs for the truth. They'd rather be rich and famous than be a real journalist any day.
For the love of Mike, stop it. You've got to use plain language, you've got to finish talking about step one before you jump to step 49 no matter how much of an inter-relationship there might be.
One answer only EVERY TIME:
I'm a member of the Democratic Party because WE'RE ALL IN THIS TOGETHER, and – that’s what progressives believe.
And what do conservatives believe? Well, they believe that you’re all on your own, and They’re all in it for Themselves and what they can get for them and their friends.
Proof: tax cuts for the rich. Drug bill for Big Pharma, war for oil
We need soundbytes like the one of DeLay saying he wanted to get rid of the dept of education, in all of the dems commercials this year.
Interesting thesis about Republicans not grasping irony – could you vote for Bush a second time if you did?
But I think that the problem with the media (as well as many uninformed non-partisan voters) is much simpler. They have been inculcated with the “pusillanimous Democrat” meme mostly in the absence (as you suggest) of a counter narrative. And when it comes to public policy, regardless of the unseriousness of the language of the attack, the slightest hint that it might be true is deadly serious and a complete disqualification for leadership. At this point, mainstream media insiders who view themselves as the kool kids and the ultimate cynics, are hard-pressed to see themselves as unsophisticated dupes of right-wing propaganda (especially if Democrats keep reinforcing the frame).
What can Democrats do?
One, they need to attack. Relentlessly. They can do so in a completely adult, liberal, semi-sophisticated fashion (I think most people are about ready to look for some grownups to run government). The important thing is for them to be seen as fighters, with the courage of their convictions – convictions that directly challenge Republican movement orthodoxy.
Second, they should assiduously avoid talking about politics and process. Force the politics-as-sporting-event-media to report on ideas and policy. Make every soundbite a critique of the Republican movement.
If you want to take on the taunts of schoolyard bullies, you have to first take them on. If the taunts are better, they will piss-off and flummox the bully. The kool kids will notice and, being desperate not to be seen as unkool, they will turn on the bully.
Democrats must attack Republican ideology, policies and leadership and never back down. Attack. And. Never. Back. Down.
That is their only salvation.
The word "brilliant" gets tossed around too easily at times, but this post was ab-so-fucking-lutely brilliant!
The idea that we could provide a seventh-grade-level narrative that would appeal to them is a bit ludicrous -- it's just not in the realm of our sensibility to play the game that way. It's not the way we see the world. So, unfortunately, the brain-damaged press takes its cues from the brain-damaged right-wingers, and thus it ever may be. Once upon a time things were different. I don't know what can be done to repair the damage to the prefrontal lobe, but it's killing all of us. So we argue on -- whatever is substance (i.e., reality and facts) is on our side. But our sensibilities are very different -- it's true you can usually tell a person's politics long before you ever talk about issues, pols, etc. -- and they really don't "get" the world the way we see it.
Bloated.
Corrupt.
Treacherous.
Think Boss Tweed.
I don't know if it's seventh grade stuff or not, but we have to keep hammering on the "chickenhawk" theme until we force the press to pick up on it.
And of course the "liar" theme as well.
These are easy for ordinary folks to understand, and I think they are potentially just as capable of distrusting the R's as they do the D's.... and once the press has to acknowledge that fact, they won't be able to dance around it anymore.
a serious msm boycott seems like the only thing that would wake them up...
This really isn't that hard, people. We just need politicians on our side who are not afraid to use ridicule as a rhetorical device on an everyday basis. Dick Gephart, of all people, got it exactly right during the 2004 primaries. During one of the first debates he came out swinging at Bush, called him a "miserable failure" and kept on calling him that until he got his ass kicked in Iowa and New Hampshire. By Kerry, who, of course, fit right into all the wrong boxes.
The Gephart example is interesting. The 2004 primaries are when blogs really started to develop as an important piece of the media/political world. I remember distinctly that many blog writers and readers were taken aback by Dick's righteous stance. "He gets it!" we all thought. And he did. He and Dean got a lot of attention early in the process purely because they were confrontational, and provided a distinct alternative to Kerry and Lieberman's sonambulant stance. Gephart’s history eventually did him in. But for a few days, it seemed like the democrats as a whole were going to set a very nasty tone for the campaign. Didn’t happen, but it showed that the media is quite willing to disseminate this kind of stuff from our side of the aisle.
I don't necessarily agree that the press promotes the messages of right politicians over left politicians purely "for their own amusement." I think they do so because the press is in the business of getting attention. People like Rush and Anne and Michelle and Newt and Trifecta Bob Bennet and all the rest give the media what the media wants: invective, ridicule, "hardball" opinion, and outright hate speech that turns heads. Confrontational language is in and of itself inherently more watchable, and "newsworthy" than a sober debate on monetary policy. Again, we just need to get people out there who are willing to deride idiot George at every opportunity.
The forces of good have been losing steadily since 1914 when the scum learned to use advertising.
They hire peope like Ken Mehlman and we hire people like Bob Shrum. You can't beat raw talent and money with lack of effort.
Just listened to the great Gore interview on NPR Fresh Air. He was asked about being ridiculed, e.g. being called "The Ozone Man". I think his response is a good model for how to deal with such a playground tactic. He didn't sound fazed by it at all. He called it what it is, a deliberate political strategy and went on to make his points. A candidate could take it farther and point out that it is juvenile and a disservice to the country when we have very serious issues to consider. At the same time, he was not "stiff", displaying some grownup humor at appropriate moments. He tore the Bushies apart on many issues in a quiet dignified manner.
I couldn't believe that I was hearing such truth being spoken on the radio, even on NPR. Of course it does help having an interviewer who asks intelligent questions.
Grand moff,
I wasn't suggesting that we use that line about Bush being a hillbilly. it was just an illustration of something equally rude as what Lott and Coulter et al say. It's using negative stereotypes to ridicule and pigeonhole your adversary and it's very powerful.
The Republicans do it to Democrats without consequences. We get creamed if we try it, even by each other. It's a rigged game.
When Democrats win in 2008, you take down the enablers. You absolutely and totally destroy Joe Klein, Howie Kurtz, etc. and make it impossible for them to do their jobs. You give interviews to the LA Times (or whatever major paper you want to bestow your largesse upon) as opposed to the NY Times and the Post. And finally, you completely hammer those two papers EVERY FUCKING DAY while you're in office. You deny them access, you sue them, you destroy them. Those corporations have to know that media treatment of Democrats is completely unacceptable.
I think we already tried the seventh-grade insults. We've said that Bush is stupid and that he looks like a chimp. All it got us was evidence that the American voter loves stupid people and lower primates.
Calling them corrupt won't work. Everyone thinks all politicians are corrupt, and there have been just enough rotten Democrats willing to prove their point for them. Yes, the Republicans are way more corrupt, but that's not exactly a powerful campaign theme, is it? "We're not as bad as the other guy!" Yeah, that'll reel them in.
The problem is that the Republicans have glommed on to insults that really capture the major anxieties of the American public right now: sniggering accusations about manhood and aggressive fuck-you rebellion against the perceived "elite". Are we Democrats/liberals willing to insinuate night and day that our opponents are gay or feminized? Are we silling to scapegoat some constituency and heap abuse on them night and day to get the public in an angry froth? I doubt it. It goes against the very things we stand for.
Democrats need to just shut the media out. They are our enemies; treat them as such. Give them only scripted, controlled information. When they attack us, close ranks and watch each other's backs, no matter how you may feel personally about whoever is being attacked. And for God's sake, DO NOT talk to them about strategy or internal disputes. Meanwhile, a large chunk of our resources should be focused on acquiring and maintaining our own media channels.
Sure, the MSM morons will complain about it, but eventually they will submit. Look how easily they submitted when the Repubs did the same thing.
It's the money. Being an infantile Conservative Republican pays fine benefits. Money: the great motivator.
We need to show emotion. When reason is not available for having a discussion, then emotion is it. No need to call names. Just be emotional about the issue and the proposed solution. That is what bullying is: emotion. That's all the media is concerned with.
Understand, the neocon's rally the base by mocking those that have succeeded in becoming what the neocon's don't want the base to become. That is why we can't mock them. The neocon's mock the sucesses. Thus, the base can say Yah, those academic elitist or liberal (free spending rich) elitist. And now the base does not have to look at them self as to the cause of their unhappiness. They can put up defensive personas that support that their life is someone else fault but their life is free, and simple. IOW, I'm happy as a pig in shit.
The neocon base needs to see the emotion to the message to strive to be more (not necessarily more money because some of the new repubs are those who have moved beyond their original economic roots).. That they can be more and we will help you be more and how exciting that journey can be is the emotion.
We have to show them the emotion of living life beyond that short term simple immediate gratification. They need to see the emotion of a life beyond simple competition and survival. As noted above, they need more life experiences such as only the arts can provide. I mean, what do you expect to have in a society that has been told the lesson's of life can be learned from sports.
The progressives, liberal, what ever offer these people a fuller life. It was what education promised. It was what financial assistance promised, it was what union's promised, it was what government promised. It was exciting, it was emotional,it was endearing, it was coalescing, it was the hope that drove people to work and work hard. It was successful, it was the example. Being that we are the government it was what we promised our self.
Let's show them the emotions of success, of achievement, of the big payoff in personal well being.
Show the emotion of the application, the workings and success of the promise.
Here's a possible strategy to co-opt the media. Don't dumb it down. Smart it up, but not as policy wonkishness. Re-express everything with many references, explicit and oblique, to middle-brow literature such as Hemingway, Twain, or Shakespeare and to other stray tidbits you sort of remember learning in school.
My model here is the movie "Shakespeare in Love." I thought it was stupid. But almost all of my peers loved it. I think the reason (for both) was that so many of young Shakespeare's lines (in the movie) revived long-moribund memories of Shakespeare from literature classes, where we duly noted lines and speeches that we were told were classics.
We could then congratulate ourselves on being well-read and at least a little bit intellectual; I don't know, but I'm sure many of my friends and yours collected in Starbuck's after the show to play the "did you catch the. . . " game. More power to 'em.
Me, I'm such a far-gone cynic that I felt patronized by the very same gimmick. I'm no expert on Shakespeare, or anything else, but I do think I have a sense of when I'm being manipulated.
If you just flashed on, "Hey, 'Starbuck's' is from 'Moby Dick'," you know exactly what I'm talking about.
It's kinda like product placement in a movie. Prominent, but subtle. And the narcisstic drones of the MSM will tke it as flattery and miss the manipulation, just as they did when they saw "Shakespeare in Love."
"Republicans are liars" is a powerful story right now. If we could develop a presumptive scoff at everything they say, it could resonate.
Reagan invented it. "There he goes again." Perfect.
The press will go bananas and pillory the D's for going for it, but it may resonate with the voters. If the Republicans whine, call them whiners. Scoff some more. "How can they deal with Osama bin Laden if they can't handle a patriotic American who tries to get them to give up their fairy tales about how cutting taxes solves every problem?"
Also, as a good liberal I've always hated it when, for instance, Jay Leno disses the hick, but it may be time politically to go for it. I don't know, but it might help us win the suburbs.
One last thing: "Last Train to Clarksville" is about a guy getting drafted and wanting to see his sweetheart one last time. Monkees may signify junior high bubblegum, but it's a great song.
"We'll have one more night together till the morning brings my train and I must go, oh no no no! . . .
"We'll have time for coffee-flavored kisses and a bit of conversation. . . .
"Take the last train to Clarksville
Now I must hang up the phone
I can't hear you in this noisy railroad station
I'm alone and feeling low
Oh no no no!
Oh no no no!
And I don't know if I'm ever coming home"
It's the real deal. That's one lonely terrified guy.
Republicans are cowards.
George W. Bush hid out in the National Guard when his generation's war came and went, and fled to Nebraska when his country came under attack on 9/11.
Bill Frist lied to little old ladies to get kittens to kill because he was afraid if he told the truth, they wouldn't let him have the kittens and he'd fail in med school.
Don Rumsfeld and Condi Rice sneak into Iraq because they're terrified of the "dead enders" Dick Cheney swore a year ago were in their last throes.
Pat Roberts and John Cornyn are so afraid of dying that they'd rather live as slaves -- not for them the call of Patrick Henry, "Give me liberty or give me death."
Cowards, the lot of 'em.
Simple, really.
I don't think we can play by their rules -- the deck is stacked.
Has there ever been a DC equivalent to Private Eye or Le Canard Enchainé? Part investigative mag, half gossip/humour rag?
Because I'd really like to see a cheap DC paper that tattletales on the hos and pols, rather than leaving it for backstairs gossip. Let it all hang out.
And no, I don't mean Wonkette, which is to Private Eye what kosher wine is to Chateau Lafite.
Here's a response that includes "don't talk over their heads, they don't think, R leaders are serial liars" ingredients:
In response to talking point X:
"That's not true is it?" Followed by "In fact, Y"
Asking a question might inspire thought. Just sayin'.
Another topic: is citizen k saying that the lessons from the Progressive Era are moot because they happened before 1914?
The lesson I most remember from that time, from reading Lincoln Steffens a long time ago, was that it took a lot of time and persistence to overcome machine politics.
U.S. Sen. Trent Lott today told an enthusiastic Neshoba County Fair crowd that Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry is “a French-speaking socialist from Boston, Massaschusetts, who is more liberal than Ted Kennedy.”
This is so wrong. Kerry was born in Denver"
Robert Green has a point about the corrupting influence of money on Hollywood. The GOP figured out 25 years ago that they had to try to get control of the cultural symbols, and they have tried (and largely failed). Hollywood needs to tone down the violence and crassness, even if it means less money, and find a way to make movies and TV with Bogart-type heroes again--strong, principled in their own way, cynical but fundamentally decent, rather than racing to the bottom.
The strategy for dealing with the bad press should be to call them on their bs and engage with them. Mock them when appropriate, and go after a few of them when they go after the Clintons or Gore--a taste of their own medicine. But don't buy their products--read them on-line for free. The internet is better already and will continue to be better.
And laugh at their excesses. Laugh at the Ann Coulters and the O'Reillys. Make fun of them. Ridicule them back. It is the most corrosive thing there is.
It'd be great (entering fantasy world now) if we could get a lot of Dem press spokespeople to say, in unison, "The Republicans are proven liars. In fact, they lie about *everything.* so anything they have to say from this point on will just be dismissed with "Don't care. They're lying."
And then have them do it.
Former Vice President Al Gore referred to GOP activists as "brown shirts."
Newsday columnist Hugh Pearson likened the Republican National Convention to the "Nazi rallies held in Germany during the reign of Adolf Hitler."
Linda Ronstadt said that the
Republican victory on Election Day meant "we've got a new bunch of Hitlers."
Chuck Turner, a Boston city councilor, smeared National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice as "a tool of white leaders," like "a Jewish person working for Hitler."
You think the Republican National Committee could get this many people of color in a single room? Only if they had the hotel staff in here."
-Howard Dean
"Our moral values in contradistinction to the Republicans is that we don't feel that kids ought to go to bed hungry at night" - DNC Chairman Howard Dean
Cameron Diaz declared that rape might be legalized if women didn't turn out to vote for John Kerry.
Walter Cronkite told Larry King that the videotape of Osama bin Laden that surfaced just before the election was "probably set up" by Karl Rove.
Chevy Chase, hosting a People for the American Way awards ceremony at the Kennedy Center in Washington, slammed Bush as "an uneducated, real, lying schmuck."
A political flier in Tennessee, depicting Bush as a mentally disabled sprinter, bore the message: "Voting for Bush is like running in the Special Olympics. Even if you win, you're still retarded."
The St. Petersburg, Fla., Democratic Club took out an ad calling for the death of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.
British pundit Charlie Brooker, who ended his Oct. 24 column in the Guardian with a plea for Bush's death: "John Wilkes Booth, Lee Harvey Oswald, John Hinckley Jr. -- where are you now that we need you?"
"Conservative legal interest groups," says Atlanta Mayor Bill Campbell, "such as the Center for Individual Rights and the Southeastern Legal Foundation"—both of which oppose racial preferences and quotas—"are … a homogenized version of the Klan. They may have traded in their sheets for suits … but it's the same old racism."
Republicans opposing a minimum wage hike, charged US Rep. Major Owens of New York, are comparable to foreign leaders who support "ethnic cleansing"—i.e., mass killing.
In the Los Angeles Times, Karen Grigsby Bates wrote, "Whenever I hear Trent Lott speak, I immediately think of nooses decorating trees. Big trees, with black bodies swinging…"
It's very simple to slam Bush and the Republicans. The only problem is that you need the will to do so.
Imagine this. A 1 minute commercial, broadcast in select markets and streamed on the Internet. A big title card reading "Bush's War on Terror". Then a split screen. On the left, footage from 9/11. All the fire, panic, smoke, mayhem, and chaos from that day. On the left, shots of Bush in the classroom after he was told and he's just sitting there blinking and not moving like the second coming of Terry Schiavo. A counter on the lower right showing these events are happening at the exact same time. No commentary, no other titles, nothing. Just a minute of Bush staring like an idiot while New York burns. Then, after a minute a second title card: "Repeat for 10 minutes." Have a blog swarm about it making it the most downloaded clip on Youtube and iPod.
And when Democrats are asked about it, they don't faint at accusasions of how "unfair" and "inappropriate" it is. It's not! You know what's "appropriate" for that situation? When Mr. Commander in Chief hears how we're under attack, to get off his fat ass and try to *do* something about it! The Democrat response shouldn't be any policy, any plans, any ideas about what they would have done. Just say, "Do you really trust *this* guy to protect you? Look at the video, and decide for yourself! Does that look like a guy you can trust with your safety?"
-L-
Anyone can write like Coulter or Goldberg, just like anyone can masturbate in public.
I don't want that attention, and I don't want to vote for a leader who does want it.
I write policy & procedure manuals for fairly well-educated people. Nonetheless, I aim for an 8th-grade reading level because I want to reach everyone who reads the stuff. It's not productive or effective for me to write in a way that just shows off my advanced degree. And likewise, it's not condescending to my readers to write in simple, straightforward terms, because I'm trying to help them. They didn't yell, "Facilitate the rendition of assistance!" when they needed help, so why would I write that kind of pretentious language to give it to them? Our efforts to take back the language from the rightwing have to do this as well. We have to use language that is meaningful, not show off how thoughtful and intellectually sophisticated we think we are.
When their side gets aggressive, people stand up and applaud.
When our side gets aggressive, people call the cops.
Just something for you to think about...
Our memes should be funny...look at Jon Stewart and Steven Colbert's successes.
"The man who can make others laugh secures more votes for a measure than the man who forces them to think. ---CHAZAL
Humorous ridicule is the best, I think, because it makes folks laugh while it diminishes its target.
We are never going to win over the MSM...Google "media ownership" sometime and see how many media conglomerates are owned by liberals.
Interesting observations,Digby. I hope I'm not being repitisious here. (I didn't read through the comments).
I've been a life long supporter of "liberal" democratic causes. And yet I find myself wondering: when are the people that I generally support going to get some "balls"? The reason why a lot of people won't crossover and vote Democratic is not becuase we don't stand for anything. It is because we allow ourselves to be defined by the oppositon without retribution. It is long past time that someone stand up for our values without apology. Define the oppositon as a bunch of whiny schoolyard bullies, and give them a good political bloody nose.
Three words on Repubs:
Cowards.
Liars.
Losers.
Call 'em this again and again and again. Hit 'im with the chair.
When our side gets aggressive, people call the cops.
Just something for you to think about...
There's a great joke about this topic (I may have read it on this site, in fact). Two guys are facing the firing squad. The first guy refuses to turn around to get shot in the back, wanting to face the bullets head on. The second guy says, "Come on, George - don't make trouble!"
Guess what? The "cops" are already here, hard at work snooping on your calls, threatening journalists, planting news reports, and detaining people without trial. It's long past time we can defer to authorities to do the right thing. And if we don't agressively defend our point of view, a right we just might still have in this country, then we've lost our ability to change the direction this country's going before we've even begun.
-L-
Marych: I'm not saying anything in the past is irrelevant, but I am saying that the modern-advertising era has been one where the right uses advertising technology well and the left/liberals refuse to - and lose. Advertising bypasses rationality and associates brands with emotions. It's impossible to argue someone out of an emotional association. But for some reason, the lefties won't play the game much anymore. So we have the sad spectacle of Soros payng millions for 2 page monologues in all the major papers while Ken Mehlman was doing scientific analysis of mailing lists and messages.
The big point is that, you know, hate works. Right wingers have proved it. Right wingers have managed to create workable hate-analogies and metaphors. As some have alluded to, Dems and liberals must learn to create good hateful metaphors. Or at least make them hard hitting. Dean missed a chance recently when asked by Russert about Hillary and Bubba's marriage. By golly he said it was all gossip. Sorta weak.
As for the opposite theme--taking the high road. Defeating the right wing is the high road. The longer the right wing holds power in the country, the greater chance we will see the rise of what I call the "Ann Coulter paramiltaries" and the advent of semi-sanctioned violence against the bogeymen enemies defined within the culture wars.
About the more effective narratives. I don't know if anybody has noticed, but Jay Leno has played on the theme of Bush's stupidity and has yet to lose share from what I can tell.
You know, I didn't understand how vital this how subject is until I saw a PBS show on Goebbels. It showed movies from the Nazi era narrated by entries from Goebbel's diary. I was shocked how close his rants against the Jews and Nazi oppenents paralleled the rhetoric of current right wing Americans toward liberals and Democrats.
Whether we like it not, since the attempted impeachment of Clinton, it's a new political world, and stakes are very high--more then we can imagine.
Wow, lotsa great stuff from Digby and from the comments. I cannot offer a strategy on how to overcome the various obstacles unfairly thrown in the way of Democrats and supporters of progressive candidates. But I know that for the most part these Democrats are good, decent people trying to offer real solutions to serious problems. In our lives, most of us probably avoid dealing with exactly the type of people we are trying to sway. People who do not understand sarcasm or irony, people who side with the bullies and so forth. Therefore it is really difficult to discuss strategy on how to deal with them. I am going to suggest looking at three people who I feel are very good at speaking to people who may not be nearly as articulate or well-educated as themselves, but who come across to most people as sincere and not condescending. These three examples are natural leaders in part because of this gift. And I will briefly suggest why they are received so well.
Wes Clarke is very good at explaining the complexities of many politically charged issues I think probably because of his years as an officer in the military. As an officer General Clarke was required throughout his career to communicate with diverse groups of enlisted personnel and officers. This experience (as well as other experience of course) is extraordinarily useful when trying to explain policy positions to people who do not have the time or perhaps interest in studying issues in detail.
Barak Obama likewise does not seem to be someone who is always trying to be the smartest guy in the room, even though he usually is just that. One reason I feel he is so impressive to many, is that he has a compelling story. He has a real life narrative that reads like a classic American story. Reagan had this as well, that is, the humble beginnings, local boy makes good kind of story that people eat up in the US. With Senator Obama, the story is not fiction.
Finally, I really like Russ Feingold’s public demeanor. He has that Wisconsin accent and speaks plain (not folksy) English. He does not tailor his words to every audience; he just says what he thinks. Senator Feingold has a lot of practice speaking to ordinary people, because he does, a lot. He holds town meetings in every county in Wisconsin at least once a year. How many D.C. politicians can make this claim?
The party needs more people like these men and I know you all have examples of women and men in your area that may not be so well known. These are the people we need to lead the Democrats and build a solid progressive movement in the US.
As for how to realistically deal with the 7th grader media, I do not have a clue. I'm an engineer not a slesman or PR guy.
You're right as always. I remember when Star Parker did an interview on TDS, I kept waiting for her to get mad and stomp off, but she kept agreeing with Colbert. I laughed my ass off.
Three labels that we should firmly affix to the Republican party through repetition:
- Chickenhawks
- Liars
- Pantysniffers
Very interesting analysis, but perhaps the answer is not that complicated. The GOP and their media allies are bullies. We all know that. So, why not treat these bullies the same way we counsel children to treat bullies on the playground? If you let them push you around, they only grow bolder, and you, the victim, more timid. However, if the next time the bully pushes you, instead of retreating, you break his nose and then thrash him until he's lying in a blubbernig heap at your feet, you've ended the bully's reign of terror against you. You discover your own power and lose your timidity, and the bully learns to fear and avoid you.
Democrats, liberals, and our allies should rhetorically beat the snot out of the GOP bullies every time they open their ugly mouths.
I agree - the right gets away with murder. And they have no understanding of irony. These two facts are more related than one might think. It is their sincere indignation that allows them to then make nasty cracks.
We need to kill the humor (Stewart and Colbert do it better than we ever could.) and work on our own indignation. For instance it appears that VP Cheney has no concern for Americans' lives: the Iraq war and the personal toll it takes is just collateral damage. Katrina was an annoying side-show. Americans need to realize that this government does not share in their lives, does not care if they die - this is the message we need to get out there.
I think you may have missed the point - those journos don't trot out those hackneyed stereotypes for fun, they do it because they're very, very skillful corporate whores who instinctively know which side their bosses' bread is buttered on.
Just call them what they are.
Incompetent.
A simple, accurate label that cannot be denied.
And no one wants to be a supporter of incompetence.
And the even the average pseudo-savvy self-described-moderate irreverent types just absorb the double standard, being all snarky along with the media and the Republicans about liberals and how fun it is to get those pc liberals' goat. And then coming down hard on any liberals who ever make fun of conservatives or bluntly tell the truth about how dumb they are.
It's part of the culture now. Conservatives can be as mean they want, but liberals can't say anything that isn't super nice and agreeable and avoidant of the truth. I for one am fighting back against these double standards.
I think incompetence is not a bad idea as a label. Its rich enough to allow both Clinton and Gore to run for President - she thinks the Iraq war was a good idea badly executed, he thinks those who wanted the war are incompetent. Yglesias is fond of pointing out that its a dodge when you're talking about Iraq. But its a big enough concept that you can have a telegenic discussion in the primary debates about whether the Republican leadership is stupid or just lazy and greedy, all on national television. Very quickly the meme propagates through pop culture, and it becomes a "when did you stop beating your wife?" kind of discussion. It gets taken for granted that the Admin is incompetent. And you can use something like "incompetence" to keep your big tent together.
But the positive side of this is, unfortunately for the superstitious, the same argument the Bush campaign made against the Clinton administration. They argued repeatedly that foreign policy wasn't serious, the domestic policy was poll-driven, and so it was time "to put the grownups in charge again." And we've seen how that worked out. But the positive aspect of the incompetence charge is this: you wouldn't put George Bush or Dick Cheney (or Rice or Rumsfeld or whoever) in charge of something at work, so why would you let the same gang keep running things? If Bill Frist was a coworker, would you have to work around him and hope he transferred out, or constantly cover his ass?
That's the impact of incompetence, on a personal level. Few of us would accommodate such stupidity in daily life, and we need to appeal to that. Americans know how to get things done, or at least they used to. "We can do better" isn't enough as a slogan, obviously, but when its paired with scorn it might not be so bad. It must be possible to work up some energy on the idea of the government as a service provider we all pay for being run by people who couldn't be trusted to keep a 7-11 safe and solvent.
Dredge up all that old populism from the 30s and before. Huey Long as has been mentioned. Still works.
The average american is barely literate, can't think coherently from step to step, and engages in a lot of picture thinking and magical thinking. Things really do have to be pitched at a 3rd or 4th grade level to get through. Simple ideas that a child could understand, repeated over and over. And the visuals are even more important. Run a guy for president that looks like a farmer and he'll beat a guy who looks like a Yalie. (Even if they're both Yalies).
"'We can do better' isn't enough as a slogan, obviously, but when its paired with scorn it might not be so bad."
No, it's horrible. It suggests an incremental difference between outcomes when Democrats should be emphasizing a monumental difference in philosophy and ideals. Republicans don't believe in government the common good (and are therefore mendacious when they pretend to) and Democrats do.
Only to prove your point further: the nutter(s) over at johnstarkreview.com have declared that "PeeWee Herman ID'd The Enemy- 25 Years Ago!"
In 1980, “Cheech and Chong’s Next Movie” featured a memorable scene in which actor Paul Reubens, aka PeeWee Herman, played a wimpy, whiney desk clerk at a dingy hotel. Soon after the arrival of Cheech’s cousin, Dwayne 'Red' Mendoza, complete with a duffel bag filled with “illegal substance” slung over his shoulder, the hotel and its guests found themselves in a classic slapstick uproar. The hilarious scene showed a panicked PeeWee on the phone trying unsuccessfully to get the local police to respond to the mayhem. He then shouted his famous line from that movie, “I think they’re Iranians!” Suddenly the movie showed hundreds of police cars, including SWAT and paramilitary units, helicopters and all, converging on the seedy hotel. Such was the atmosphere in Jimmy Carter’s America in the summer of 1980- Iran was public enemy number one.Then they go on to whine about what a wuss Carter was. But seriously - getting your political ammo from Colbert is bad. Getting your foreign policy from PEE WEE FRICKIN HERMAN via a Cheech & Chong movie?
Commenting by HaloScan
