A PRESCRIPTION FOR DRIVING THE FASCISTS OUT OF POWER

James J. Kroeger wrote an interesting piece recently at AmericaBlog on how Democrats can win. It's well worth reading; the name is The Republican Nemesis. I'll summarize it here but I want to point out a couple of obvious flaws first. Kroeger keeps talking about how the Democrats keep losing elections (and how they will never win any elections unless they follow his prescription). I like his prescription but I think it's important to note that even with massive Republican vote fraud, Gore won almost a million more votes than Bush in 2000 (including a clear plurality in Florida) and it was only the successful post-election Bush campaign maneuverings-- first with his Florida campaign chairman/Secretary of State Katherine Harris and later with the U.S. Supreme Court-- in keeping a lawful recount from being conducted, that took the presidency away from the lawfully elected president and awarded it to the corporate pawn and doofus who still sits in the White House. And in
2004 Kerry also won the election and the precise and very specific documentation for what the Republicans did in Ohio is readily available in the Conyers Report for anyone who cares to read it.
That doesn't negate the article's points exactly but the Democrats' main problems are that the Republicans are fascists and criminals not (just) savvier marketers. Add to this that the corporate powers behind the GOP own-- like in bought and completely control-- the mass media and have been very successful in preventing Democratic candidates who have the ability to effectively answer GOP smears from getting ahead (like Dean; they knew Kerry would be easier to handle) and their media never lets the Democrats' message get out anyway.

Kroeger's main point is that the GOP's "cunning and marketing savvy" dominate the political landscape and that Democrats keep trying to politely argue ideas while Republicans just smear away. "Republican strategists have been able to blend their astute grasp of marketing principles & human nature & social psychology into a formula that delivers almost guaranteed success at the polls.   While Democrats knock themselves out every election cycle trying to talk to Swing Voters about The Issues, Republicans have calmly focused their attention on winning THE Image Campaign.  Quite simply: Democrats lose because they don’t understand what moves their target audience."

Swing Voters eventually get sick of hearing charges and counter charges and arcane, nuanced issue-oriented arguments and, confused, tend to make their decisions based on impressions of the candidates. Republicans have successfully understood this and acted on it by creating doubts in the minds of swing voters about the CHARACTER of Democratic candidates (and about the Democratic Party in general). If there are no real flaws to work on, they just make up something-- "accusations, insinuations, & innuendo will work just fine.   They hope to encourage voters to question the motivation and dependability of The Democrats.  They try to create the perception that Democrats are “defective” in a disturbing way." Kerry was painted by the Right Wing Echo Chamber as an indecisive and shallow “flip-flopper” the moment it was clear he would be the nominee.

Kroeger points out that right-wing economic policies clearly hurt the interests of the VAST majority of voters-- and what their environmental and social policies do to our nation have become abundantly clear-- so that the only way they can win elections (other than my suggestion above-- ie- steal them and, in effect, abolish democracy) is to win the Image Campaign. Their mass media wing then makes the Image Campaign paramount in the minds of swing voters. "That is why they are committed, now and forever, to negative campaigning.  Republicans have never forgotten a key stratagem they perfected during the Reagan Era: DEMONIZING YOUR OPPONENTS WORKS.  It works because Swing Voters are essentially 'headline readers' & 'sound byte nibblers.'  When they see in the headlines that Candidate A accused Candidate B of having a certain personality defect, they tend to believe it. (Unless it is effectively answered.)" Kroeger makes a big point in how the Republicans create a positive impression in voters' minds of themselves by contrasting themselves with defective Democratic candidates. The more viciously they smear the Democrats, the more desirable they are as an alternative. At the same time, they know that the sensationalistic and lazy media will give priority coverage to their personal attacks, distracting attention away from their weak points: issues, wwhich are often difficult to understand, not just for busy citizens but also for the really stupid breed of news readers and incompetent mass media analysts (not to mention dishonest partisans masquerading as journalists-- be it George Bush's cousin at Fox or Scotty McClellan's male prostitute/fake reporter lover.

Koeger suggests Democrats can win by aggressively "defining back" and forgetting about subordinating our campaigns to civil discourse. They fight to the death. We don't seem to care as much if we win or not. Gore sure didn't. And neither did Kerry. I sure had the idea that Bush would have been willing to tear the country apart to hold onto his stolen electoral votes in Florida. Gore was a woos. Kroeger says it's essential for Democrats to learn how to "create an image of The Republican Politician that is threatening to Swing Voters, one that they will not ultimately want to identify with."

By now we should all be familiar with what George Lakoff says about how good the Right is with manipulating images in the minds of swing voters and how talented Republicans have become at choosing words & associations that work for them. Kroeger points out that even more important are the emotions that are conjured up with these words. And it's the emotions that the Republicans use when using these words that deceive the voters. "Consider the phony outrage that Lynne & Dick Cheney expressed after the third debate. At a time when it was crucial for Kerry to continue to build momentum after a solid debate performance, his advisors ended up losing the post-debate spin.  They lost it because they didn’t understand how crucial Kerry’s response would be and they didn’t understand how a candidate absolutely must respond to an Angry Outrage Performance if she wants to win. The big story that Swing Voters saw on TV the next day (those who didn’t watch the debate) was that the Cheneys were really angry that Kerry had called their daughter a lesbian on national
TV. What turned this into a home run for the Republicans was Kerry’s unfortunate response; a written statement that sounded a lot like an apology. 
"Whenever Democratic candidates are the target of a Republican politician’s expressed anger, it is crucial that they respond properly if they want to win The Image Campaign.  Impressions formed during such confrontations are usually remembered on voting day.  John Kerry should have responded emotionally by calling for a televised press conference, and then using the spotlight to laugh at the Cheneys’ phony display of anger.  Laughter is the appropriate emotion for a candidate to feel and express when he is guilty of no wrongdoing whatsoever.  After laughing at the Cheneys, Kerry would then have been able to focus the media’s attention on the real story, which was/is the clever manipulations and deceptions that the Republicans always use to mislead voters." 
With this kind of response, Kerry would have told Swing Voters how they should respond to the reports they’re hearing, which is exactly what people want. Eventually all Kerry would have has to have done was to have pointed out with good-humored stabs of ridicule the many times that the Cheneys had, themselves, mentioned their daughter’s lesbianism to the public and then gone on to show how this incident illustrates perfectly what lying sacks of shit the Republicans are and what GREAT THREATS they are. Kroeger asks Democrats to always point out how "The Cunning Republicans" represent a huge threat to the average American. Kerry could have turned the whole Cheney-lesbian-fake-outrage episode into a complete disaster for the Republicans by focusing attention—with first hand evidence—on the characteristic duplicity of Republican politicians.  Swing Voters would have perceived that John Kerry appeared to be innocent of wrongdoing because he showed no fear in the face of the Cheneys’ obviously fake anger and attempted deception. Kerry could have taken the opportunity-- if he were sharp, which he clearly wasn't-- to present himself to voters as "their protectors & defenders from something that seriously threatens them.  Kerry’s advisors should have recognized that the overreaching Cheneys had actually given them a tremendous opportunity to further define the Republicans in the eyes of the Swing Voters as manipulative shysters whom they should fear."
 
Even if we find it distasteful, Kroeger points out that the only way Democrats can win against the modern (neo-fascist) GOP is by defining them as a group that is [morally] defective and threatening-- ie- demonizing them, as effectively as they demonize Democrats. "Swing Voters will vote for the Democrat if they end up with an image of The Republican Politician that they find threatening. He thinks we need to sharply define The Republican Politician as a shrewd, cunning, deceiving, manipulative, mean-spirited, Con-Artist who willfully and gleefully assassinates the character of any innocent victim who stands in his way.  We need to describe them in this way with palpable emotion.  In terms of basic, overall strategy, Democrats need to constantly remind themselves that IT’S NOT THE ECONOMY, STUPID! IT’S THE IMAGE CAMPAIGN!" (I wonder if he listens to Randy Rhodes on Air America. She does this every single day, as do many of the Air America hosts-- pointing out again and again how the Bush Regime smears every patriotic America who contradicts their ideologically-driven pronouncements.) Kroeger goes so far to insist that every time "a Democratic candidate speaks out on an issue like the economy, or the environment, or foreign policy, final comments should be made that refer to the Republican politician as a scheming manipulator, a threatening deceiver.  We must make our logical points on the issues, but then we must always bring it back to the image of The Republicans that we are trying to establish, the scary image that reflects the truth of who they are." He also warns that Democrats have been showing far too much respect for Republican politicians and that if Democratic nominees always show respect for their Republican opponents, on some intuitive level voters will wonder why and even assume that they are worthy of respect. (He points out that when a candidate is meeting a Repugly opponent face-to-face at a debate, he must be courteous (to show that you were “brought up right”) but as soon as he finds himself addressing others again, he needs to make it very clear—in moderate but detectable ways—that he does not respect his opponent because he does not respect his agenda or his methods. "Yes," Kroeger says, "show graciousness but feel condescension.  Be sure that you intently communicate your fear of the damage that these people can do to America."

He asks Democrats "to learn how to be openly 'two-faced.' It is a tactic that has worked well for the Republicans, one that we need to master, as well. It is important that we model the disrespect that Swing Voters should be showing & feeling for Republican politicians. Be superficially polite, but make sure that your fundamental lack of respect shows through. Show your disrespect more conspicuously whenever you have an opportunity to address The Audience directly.  Yes, it’s true that Swing Voters are likely to be turned off by a continuous exchange of angry charges and countercharges between the two parties, but the only other alternative for Democrats is to allow the Republicans to constantly savage them with impunity."

And most importantly, Democrats need to understand the importance of showing Swing Voters that they fear Republican rule. The more apparent it is to Swing Voters that a lot of Americans are truly scared of George Bush & The Republicans, the more they’re going to wonder if maybe they should also be afraid of him. (Typically, we first learn to fear things that we didn’t fear previously after seeing fear in the faces of others.) Some Democrats might think it would be better for us to emphasize our anger, but we need to be aware of the ways that this can backfire.  We do not want to be characterized as 'Angry People' who are always angry [in a threatening sort of way].  Voters need to see that behind our anger is a real fear for the well-being of the American People and for America’s reputation around the world.  We should never be reluctant to show our fear of Bush, but we need to make it clear in our tone that our fear is appropriate and that our anger is controlled & justified." Kroeger insists that "the ultimate truth of political competition is that Swing Voters ALWAYS choose a particular candidate or party because they fear the consequences of having the other candidate/party in office, the one they didn’t vote for... What Democrats need to understand clearly is that Swing Voters can be persuaded to fear either party.  Right now, too many of them fear The Democrats more than they fear The Republicans. They will return to their identification with the Democratic Party only after they have been persuaded that it is The Republicans whom they ought to fear, not the Democrats. It is the Republicans who are not like them, who are simply looking for yet another opportunity to play them for fools."

This all sounds like it should be a piece of cake, right? I mean it all seems so obvious that the Republicans are masters of the political smear and that more and more of the silent majority-- as reflected in Bush's sinking poll numbers-- are seeing how they lie and how truly worthy of fear they are. But nothing is easy and unless Democrats stand up and fight-- AND FIGHT HARD like our lives depend on it... well, I don't believe the Republicans will ever voluntarily give up power the way Gore did in 2000.