Maybe democrats should take a play from Bush's playbook

[Parisle]

---The play is "fear," ... but in the case of the democrats' goals, fear may be a legitimate tactic.

--- Bush tried to use fear of terrorists to whip the nation into a war mentality and grab dictatorial powers for himself. But the real fear now is that Bush is going to deliberately start a nuclear war with Iran in perhaps only a matter of weeks. That's the REAL fear. Surely the vast majority of Americans, when confronted with that very real possibility, would prefer a different tack. So the democrats ought to be making sure that all Americans ARE confronted with this possibility,.. so that they can see it, feel it and believe it. Much the way we felt during the Cuban Missile Crisis in '62. They have to make Bush's envisioned war a real threat in the minds of all Americans. How?

--- Get out of Washington. Take a break. Every single democratic representative and senator should go back to their home states and spend a couple of days in their state legislatures, and in private meetings with state democratic legislators. Make as many local speeches as possible. The goal is to transplant the issue to the state level. Every single state legislator should be screaming their heads off about the looming danger of a unitary executive ignoring popular will and usurping control of the military. Bush must be portrayed as a dangerous loose cannon. Each state legislature should at least vote on a resolution within a week.

--- Hell, give it a Revolutionary War slant: "Annihilation Without Representation" BE the Minutemen, eh? Bring a 3-master into Boston Harbor loaded with a few Diebold machines, and have a few democratic senators and congressmen go onboard and throw the goddamned things overboard. (Too bad it can't be oil) Hang the PNAC in effigy. Quotes from Jefferson, Adams and Paine should be plastered everywhere.

--- Then, back in Washington, stop being polite. Break the unwritten political industry code, and tell the truth about how we got to this point. PNAC, Leo Strauss, "Follow the money," Cheney's secret energy meetings, Downing Street Memo, Constitutional encroachment,.. the whole nine yards. Put together an infomercial. THIS IS NOT BUSINESS AS USUAL. You sons of bitches have got to save this country from a dangerous lunatic, and you can't do it by routine methods.

--- The pure fact of the matter is that, in spite of all that has happened, a lot of people are still complacent,... still timid,... still "wait & see." You've got to make them sit up and pay attention.

[PresidentObama]

1. No thank you.

We don't need to steal their game plans. Then we'd be no better then them.

The fear tactic doesn't seem to work with the American people anymore. They've begun to wake up, and smell the coffee.

I'll pass...

[Parisle]

2. I think you missed the point

--- The "war on terror" was a semantic word-trick. Impending nuclear war with Iran is real. Paul Revere wasn't using an invalid "gameplan" on the night of April 18th,.... he was WARNING people of a real threat. My reference to the "fear tactic" obviously made it seem disingenuous to you, but that is not true in all cases. Sometimes it's best to be alerted to scary potentials, so as to finally get motivated to do something about them.

[FormerDittoHead]

3. Fear can not and NEVER HAS helped Democrats to win!

(LBJ Daisy Girl)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IkWAhuXtalw

[Parisle]

4. Whew,.... semantics will get you every time....

--- Ok,.. I'm surprised, but I'm also willing to admit that perhaps I should NOT be surprised ... at the almost-Pavlovian response to the word "fear," .. now that that emotion has been thoroughly co-opted as the Bush rhetorical vehicle for manipulating the public.

--- Fair enough. Touche... my mistake. Now,.. let's see. What should I have said, instead?

--- The Bush "tactic" of using fear was effected through lies, manipulated intelligence and boogeyman rhetoric,.. all in the opportunistic fervor attending 9-11. And yet it was done in the pseudo-spirit of a function of government which is nevertheless a very real one,... that of keeping the people honestly informed. They just weren't honest, eh? Consequently, "fear," "fear tactics" and "fear-mongering" have rightly become the terms we most often associate with the Bush methodology. He did it to get people to do what he wanted them to do,... NOT what they needed to do.

--- And thus my grievous choice of a too-simplistic term in my original post. Please don't salivate on my account. I was in error.

--- Now,.. that much said, let me further assure you that lies, manipulated intelligence and boogeyman rhetoric were not among the strategies I had in mind. However, the essential "tactic" still embraces that important function of keeping people honestly informed. No need to scare people. The state of being informed should be sufficient.

--- If my neighbor was about to step on a rattlesnake, and I were to say, "Hey! Look out. You're about to step on a rattlesnake!" ... then I would expect my neighbor to think along the lines of, "Oh wow! Whew! Hey, thanks for watchin' out for me." I would not, in any event, expect to be cited for playing on his fears. (And I would also expect his reaction to be in appropriate proportion to the degree of the threat,... and most of us understand rattlesnakes, eh?)

--- Ok,.. Back to the Present. Some pretty persuasive people seem to think that Iran is already in the crosshairs,.. perhaps even the nuclear crosshairs, of the ideologically-insane remnants of this beaten and embattled administration. Now vastly outnumbered, they still have their finger on The Button, the Strangelovian Option at their disposal and a bunker mentality in their twisted minds. All salient evidence suggests that things are moving in the direction of an attack on Iran. But the information received by the population-at-large does not depict these circumstances so that popular response can be in that "appropriate proportion" to the degree of the threat (cataclysmic). They're getting both sides, but nobody's giving odds,... which, by the way, aren't very good.

--- How many times has a particularly poignant article on the DU been followed by comments that it should be printed in every newspaper in the land and read from the pulpits? All the time,...... and they're right.

--- The traditional heroic proxy of the people,... namely the media, does not appear willing to take care of this oversight. But somebody's gotta do it. (Degree of the threat, eh?) That means us,... democrats,... progressives,.. the middle class,...oops, semantics again.

--- Call it what you will. The State of Being Informed would seem to warrant a reaction akin to that of my neighbor dodging the rattlesnake. Nervous? Alarmed? Anxiety-ridden? Whatever. The democrats have to re-trace Paul Revere's route and properly warn their countrymen that fucking King George is coming. If it scares them, we can apologize after Armageddon is averted. Ok?

[FormerDittoHead]

5. I guess you didn't watch the video in the msg above. I was being sarcastic...

The LBJ ad was fear incarnate.

Others may want to motivate by desire, but fear is simply the flipside of desire. One only fears the loss of something they desire (life, liberty, etc). Fear crystallizes desire. Without desire, fear has no power.

Desire can be equally perverted and misdirected as fear.

Sorry for getting so "Krisnamurti" on you, but my point is to agree with you that fear is as much of a motivator as desire, and in many cases, yes, is a more viable commercial choice for immediate reaction and universal understanding.

Those who reject the successful lessons of the Roves, and who do not learn the failures of the DLC / Tom Dashels will be doomed to repeat them.

Like you, I believe we can learn successful campaigning techniques from the Republicans without "becoming them"...

MY PERSPECTIVE is that fear and desire, like punishment and reward, should BE COMBINED rather than having one favored.

[Parisle]

6. You're right,..... I didn't realize what you were posting

--- I apologize for the knee-jerk reaction,.. although that first reply already had me a little peeved. When you came along,... and given that what had been a very serious proposal had elicited virtually no comment here, I was flat out disgusted. Evidently it DID make a lot of DU'ers nervous. But I am glad that I ended up further explaining the two-sided nature of the suggestion. (In modern sales & marketing terminology, it would be called the "disturbance cycle" of a sales pitch) Maybe someone will speak up now,......