Tuesday, June 16, 2009

Can't Defeat the Idea? Attack the Person!

That "Party of No" line is meaningless, of course, but it is part of a larger project.

Except the larger project is straight out of Alinsky's Rules--in this case, 'personalize' the thing.

Barack Obama and his political advisors have proven themselves to be a most ideologically liberal administration practicing the politics of personal destruction against anyone who dares to challenge them — even their own. They would have us believe they are defending the country from Rush Limbaugh, Congressman Eric Cantor, and a relatively unknown private citizen named Rick Scott.

(You could add Dick Cheney; Panetta's absolutely gutter-ish comment that Cheney 'hopes the US will be attacked' is a perfect example of "personalizing.")

...The character assassinations began less than a week after Barack Obama moved into the White House. Obama told Congressional Republicans “You can’t just listen to Rush Limbaugh and get things done”. John Podesta then attacked Limbaugh, distorting Limbaugh’s statement the he wanted Obama to fail if Obama a socialist agenda. Next, Americans United for Change ran advertisements declaring Rush Limbaugh the “real leader” of the Republican Party

This gambit is now playing out in the ObamaCare campaign:

Now Obama’s minion have begun attacking private citizens. Obama promised to lower healthcare costs. His preferred policy is to drive up private healthcare costs so public healthcare looks cheaper in comparison. Rick Scott, the former President and CEO of Columbia/HCA, founded Conservatives for Patients’ Rights to defend the free market healthcare system from the White House’s policy prescription. Instead of attacking his arguments or advancing their own arguments, the left coordinated an attack against Mr. Scott personally

...The coordination began on one of Mr. Podesta’s 8:45 a.m. calls.

On March 3, 2009, Jonathan Cohn wrote at the New Republic that Scott is “public enemy number one.” Ezra Klein, who also coordinates attacks against the right with journalists on a private email list, then took to the American Prospect to attack Scott for business practices at HCA. Two days later, John Podesta, on Fox News, tried dodging a question Rick Scott had raised about the costs of Obama’s program by smearing Scott. On March 11th, Christopher Hayes parroted his left-wing brethren at the Nation writing, “Having Scott lead the charge against healthcare reform is like tapping Bernie Madoff to campaign against tighter securities regulation.”

Never mind the argument, or the principles, or all that innerlekshul stuff. Just get down and dirty.

It's the (D) way!

3 comments:

RAG said...

I don't know that I would necessarily characterize Obama as liberal.

A true liberal has a philosophy that is articulated, consistent and founded on principles. We may disagree with the logic espoused and principles relied upon but nonetheless there is some form of intellectual and personal honesty among classic liberals.

I point this out because it's very convenient to engage in "liberal bashing" but isn't what Obama-mia has been doing over the top? And, if so, just calling it "liberal" may actually trivialize the severity of their actions.

Frankly, I'm not sure what to call it because it's been so inconsistent. Wacko? Socialist? Totalitarian? Gangsterism? Chaotic?

Government works best when there are checks and balances. I think one reason it's been difficult in part for Republicans to come up with a cohesive response to Obama-mia is that it it's often chaos devoid of any intellectual or other integrity.

Dad29 said...

How to define it?

I still think the Fascist (Mussolini-style) model is instructive.

But that's purely from the economic point of view.

It is useful to recall that 'classical' Liberalism and 'classical' Conservatism have roots in theologies which are markedly different.

What you have with Obama is post-Liberalism IF you define that as "absolute relativism."

Even the 'classical' Liberals granted the existence of truth and falsity.

This guy doesn't.

Anonymous said...

I agree with dad - what we have here is the Mussolini-type Fascism that FDR admired so much when he created most of the New Deal by taking over business, using thuggery to implement the National Recovery Act, fixing prices, and trying to stack the Supreme Court.

Its all about power, because they really do think we are all too stupid to take care of ourselves.