Anatomy of the RW negative proof tactic.

[Touchdown]

Recently, I got into a lively discussion on another non-political site about the "Birth Certificate" thing, and a few still believe this crap, despite being relatively intelligent people. What follows is my little rant in two threads about it. Trying to channel Brock's Republican Noise Machine as much as I can, I thought I'd share this with you guys, for some critiques of what I missed. I mixed the two for this post. It may not flow as well as the two separate posts at the other community.

Ok, here's a lesson in Right Wing smear tactics.

First, scan over and read this site... it's not big.

http://glennbeckrapedandmurderedayounggirlin1990.com/

To not use Obama is a muslim/a fuuriner/a Commie/a Nazi/a dictator/ a dildo fetishist/a terrorist/a pisces/a meat eater/a *GASP* Steinbeck reader, lets go back a few years when some other people seemingly had "something to hide, where all they had to do is produce documents to prove their innocence...and THIS WHOLE CONTROVERSY WOULD JUST GO AWAY!"

"Some People Say" (A Fox News favorite line. It makes the 'I pulled this out of my ass' statement I'm about to make sound legitimate) that John Kerry shot himself just to get those purple hearts. If he would only release his entire military (he did) and medical records (did that too), then this whole question of his legitimacy to receive these awards will just go away. Of course it didn't, and Bush got a second term.

SOME PEOPLE SAY that The Clintons were involved in fraud with the Whitewater investment deal. We know that the investment and project lost money and went bust, but We're not sure if we have ALL the information. There must be something else the Clintons have not released that is the smoking gun.

The list goes on...
Sandy Berger stuffed 9/11 documents from the Library of Congress in his socks. He didn't.
Nancy Pelosi lied when she said that the CIA was lying to her about torture. The CIA confirmed they didn't tell Congress about the torture policy 3 months later.
Bill Clinton had Vince Foster murdered because Hillary was having a torrid affair with Foster. He committed suicide because he couldn't handle the job he'd been given in the cabinet. He even left a note (which Clinton supposedly also forged)
John McCain had an illegitimate black baby. In fact he had adopted a vietnamese girl, and was a good father to her.
Ann Richards is a lesbian
Bill Clinton was profiting off of cocaine deals when he was Governor of Arkansas, where a secret (not so secret) airfield was used as an entry point for US distribution from Colombia, which is why there is a "trail of bodies" surrounding him.
Hillary Clinton is a "Card Carrying Lesbian". Who knew they needed cards? But, she had an affair with Vince Foster. So which is it? Is she a floozy or a dyke? She can't be both.

The big irony in this is that it's a tactic that's been going on ever since Lee Atwater came on the scene and started whisper campaigns. It proved effective against Michael Dukakis, Tom Foley, partially to Clinton, who was impeached over a blow job, Al Gore, who never said he invented the internet or that he was the inspiration for 'Love Story', but stupid people still believe it, John Kerry, not only with the "shooting himself" lie, but also that his wife, Theresa was financing Hezbollah through the Ketchup company, which she didn't even partially own anymore. Oh' yeah back to the irony. ... That people still fall for this bullshit. Meanwhile, Dan Rather gets fired because he dared question whether or not George Bush actually showed up at his National Guard post in Alabama (No evidence has been produced that he did).

It's the standard MO for the right wing. Pull something out of your ass, get Drudge to "wonder on the development", pass it through the AM radio talk show circuit where it's "just asking questions", get someone from the NY Post or Washington Times to write up an innuendo laden "some people say" article, then re-circulate it through Drudge Report, which he uses said articles as "sources", which are then picked up by AM talk radio hosts, who use Drudge as a source, which starts the viral "moral outrage" e-mail spams on said subject, then it's picked up by Neal Cavuto and Fox & Friends to yap about endlessly on TV, all with the veneer of being above it all with weasel words like "Some People Say" and "How much do the Democrats hate America?" in which Snopes is never checked, but is said it was. Lather, Rinse, Repeat.

It's easy to play dumb, above it all and claim "Non-partisan" by saying that both sides engage in this, but if you are truly honest, you know that it's only prominent Democrats that supposedly are "hiding something" and only need to produce this mythical (and sometimes impossible) piece of evidence to "Make this whole controversy go away"... The Republicans are masters at fake controversies, and they know how to frame their arguments, create just the right amount of outrage to make for good TV (witness the teabag parties and the town hall disruptions) that get the most mileage out of partisan mud-slinging. The Democrats are rank amateurs in comparison.

The big lie in all of this, is that Obama could produce a photo of him being born in a Honolulu hospital with Don Ho singing in the back of the delivery room, and these people still wouldn't believe it. No proof ever would. They wouldn't because their reality, the reality that they created for themselves apart from the rest of us, would refuse to acknowledge Obama's victory (It was stolen by Acorn), his legitimacy (No "darkie" is ever a real American), or his place in American history (He can't be the first black President, because he isn't an American).

To drive that last statement home, here's this from one of the founders of the Religious Right...

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/frank-..._b_284387.html

Protecting Your Children From Satan

A big part of the answer to understanding the heightened climate of outright hate and fear of the "other" is the home school and Christian school movement. It is a modern incarnation of the anti-federal government ideology of earlier firebrands such as John Calhoun who was the 7th Vice President and a Southern politician in the 19th century. Calhoun embraced slavery, states' rights, limited government, and said that Americans should secede from the union if it went against their wishes. (See: "Calhoun Conservatism Raises Its Ugly Head" by Mike Lux in the Huffington Post Sept 11/09.)

In the early 1970s the evangelicals like my late father and James Dobson decided that the our society had fallen so far "away from God" and so far from "America's Christian history" that it was time to metaphorically decamp to not just another country but to another planet:. In other words virtually unnoticed by the media and mainstream political operatives, a big chunk of American society seceded from the union in all but name.

What they did is turn the white race-based in "Christian school" movement of the 1950s into a countercultural phenomena. As tens of thousands of new Christian schools opened, it was no longer just about "protecting" white kids from minorities and African-Americans. It was about protecting your children from Satan in other words the United States government's long reach through the public school system.

To protect your children from Satan -- in other words mainstream, open patriotic and pluralistic America -- you either kept them at home where mom and dad could teach the children right from wrong or sent them to a cloistered private evangelical/fundamentalist school. At home or in school you used curriculum prepared by the likes of James--beat-your-child-and-dare-to-discipline-Dobson, RJ-slavery-was-a-good-thing-Rushdoony, or many and other right-wing anti-American activists. That curriculum presented "secular America" as downright evil. Hating the USA became next to godliness.

[FrenchieCat]

1. Well reasoned.....

The only error I found was this..."John McCain had an illegitimate black baby. In fact he had adopted a vietnamese girl, and was a good father to her."

His daughter was adopted from Bandeladesh, if I remember correctly.

[Touchdown]

3. Thank you. I admit I was hazy on the story

... but it was such an egregious example I could not have excluded it.

[BlooInBloo]

2. See also one of the "go to" Greenwald articles from awhile back...

http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2007/04/18/beltway_wisdom/

"Anatomy of Beltway conventional wisdom

(updated below - updated again)

We have been treated in the last 48 hours to an extremely vivid illustration of how conventional political Beltway wisdom is created. It all began with The Politico's in-house gossip, Ben Smith, who on consecutive days published a gossipy, petty article designed to fuel right-wing caricatures of the personality traits of John Edwards and Barack Obama, respectively.

...

Predictably, both Politico items were immediately trumpeted by Drudge, almost certainly the real goal of Smith's stories. Thereafter, the standard right-wing hacks then dutifully followed along, reciting the exact storyline manufactured by Smith and Drudge. The conventional wisdom-spewing internet gossip Mickey Kaus then joined in with an item entitled "Barack the Hack," which claims -- in an act of extreme projection -- that the speech reflects "a mindset that tries to fit every event into a familiar, comforting framework he can spoon-feed his audience without disturbing them." Kaus says the Obama excerpts are "not exactly evidence of a fresh intelligence, or even basic common sense" -- but that "Democratic primary campaigns will do that to you."

The Associated Press then does its part, churning out a story, published by CNN (among others), that begins with this sentence: "Looking pretty is costing John Edwards' presidential campaign a lot of pennies." The Associated Press then interviewed Edwards' hair stylist, and reported that he admitted this: "'I do cut his hair and I have cut it for quite a while,' Torrenueva said. 'We've been friends a long time.'"

All of that leads The New Republic, a day late but right on script, to lament the effeminate and vain Edwards and the shallow and empty Obama. Eve Fairbanks posts an item she headlines "He Feels Pretty and Witty and . . . ." in which she let's us know that she (of course) is far too sophisticated and serious to "give a damn that Edwards went to the Pink Sapphire." It is striking how they all use the word "pretty" to describe how John Edwards wants to look. She then links to the three-year-old You Tube clip of Edwards brushing his hair. Is any of this, at its core, any different than the oh-so-aberrational-and-universally-condemned Ann Coulter remark about Edwards?

..."

[Touchdown]

4. Kick for Monday

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