Sadly Accurate

Posted on February 11, 2010 by Jeff Fecke

Discussing a hypothetical stipend increase for Americorps volunteers — so that they don’t have to receive food stamps as many now do — John Cole pretty much nails exactly how things would go down:

Wanting to negotiate in good faith, having never learned a lesson ever, the Democrats like Baucus and Conrad would slow down the debate to give the Republicans time to participate. Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe would work for a couple weeks with Senate leadership, get a couple things they want in the bill, then sigh and utter their public regrets that they just can not support the bill. Chuck Todd, the Politico, and other dullards in the beltway media would run a few pieces wondering why Obama hasn’t reached out more to moderates. While this is happening, the wurlitzer’s media blitz starts.

First off, we all know who loves Americorp- the Clenis. From there, it is all downhill. Breitbart would seize upon the bill, and claim that the anonymous stipend is just President Obama seeking to pay off his campaign volunteers- just like the KHMER ROUGE, POL POT, STALIN, AND DUVALIER! They would find some innocuous aspect of Americorps and turn it into something that is no doubt worse than Hitler.

[…]

Somewhere around this time, Randy Scheuneman and Meg Stapleton would post a bunch of nonsense on Palin’s facebook page, maybe declaring that Americorps is just like Hitler Youth Corps. This would get picked up by the Weekly Standard’s resident Palin fluffer, Matt Continetti, repeated by the increasingly loathesome Michael Goldfarb, and mainstreamed into CNN by Stephen Hayes in one of his typical fact-free appearances. Bill Kristol would pick up the ball and run with it, and before you know it, Fred Hiatt’s fishwrap would have 20 editorials railing against Americorps.

At this time, we would have tea partiers packing guns to town hall events, terrified of a socialist takeover of, well, something, carrying racist signs and chanting “Keep Government out of Americorps!,” and the rest of the MSM can start their coverage. Sensing an opportunity, shitheels like Ben Nelson and Blanche Lincoln and Mary Landrieu sense the bill is in trouble, and would start to pack the goodies into it for their home state. Lieberman and Marshall Wittman would sense that liberals really want this, and then start voicing grave concerns about the bill, and Marty Peretz and company would call anyone who noted Lieberman is just being an asshole an anti-Semitic Jew hater. Evan Bayh and other “fiscal conservatives” would then start mugging for every camera they could find, and would make appearances on all the Sunday shows with mean old man John McCain talking about the need to cut government and why war should always be off budget.

The read-the-whole-thing level of this post is off the charts. And deeply depressing. And accurate as all get out.

This entry was posted in Conservative zaniness, right-wingers, etc., Elections and politics. Bookmark the permalink.

2 Responses to Sadly Accurate

  1. nobody.really says:
    February 12, 2010 at 8:12 am

    Quite a quote.

    In that spirit, here are three more quotes on the role of public discourse in shaping public policy:

    The deadliest enemies of nations are not their foreign foes; they always dwell within their borders. And from these internal enemies civilization is always in need of being saved. The nation blest above all nations is she in whom the civic genius of the people does the saving day by day, by acts without external picturesqueness; by speaking, writing, voting reasonably; by smiting corruption swiftly; by good temper between parties; by the people knowing true men when they see them, and preferring them as leaders to rabid partisans or empty quacks.
    * * *
    Democracy is still upon its trial. The civic genius of our people is its only bulwark.

    William James, Oration upon the Unveiling of the [Robert Gould] Shaw Monument

    That community is already in the process of dissolution where each man begins to eye his neighbor as a possible enemy, where non-conformity with the accepted creed, political as well as religious, is a mark of disaffection; …where orthodoxy chokes freedom of dissent; where faith in the eventual supremacy of reason has become so timid that we dare not enter our convictions in the open lists, to win or lose…. The mutual confidences on which all else depend can be maintained only by an open mind and a brave reliance upon free discussion.

    Learned Hand, Speech to the Board of Regents, University of the State of New York, October 24, 1952.

    Let’s be plain here: We are NOT impressed with the civic genius of our people; we DON’T have a brave reliance upon free discussion. We frankly think that the public are asses – and some of us will even acknowledge being part of that public.

    Depressing. And even more so in the context of the last quote:

    There was no point in seeking to convert the intellectuals. For intellectuals would never be converted and would anyway always yield to the stronger, and this will always be “the man in the street.” Arguments must therefore be crude, clear and forcible, and appeal to emotions and instincts, not the intellect. Truth was unimportant and entirely subordinate to tactics and psychology.

    Joseph Goebbels, The Goebbels Diaries, (H. Trevor-Roper, ed.) at p. XX.

    Whatever Goebbels’s shortcomings, he knew a thing or two about motivating the public. As much as we love intellectuals – and as much as we want to distinguish ourselves from Goebbels – I fear we dismiss the work of propaganda (“marketing,” “messaging,” “framing”) at our peril.

    I hate bullshit propaganda, much as I hate physical coercion. I just don’t know of any reliable substitutes. We must master these subjects or be mastered by them; I don’t see a third alternative.

  2. MomTFH says:
    February 14, 2010 at 11:48 am

    Don’t forget that some truth activist will do an amateur expose’ video of a single AmeriCorps participant being coerced into saying something incriminating, release an edited version to multiple conservative outlets, and claim it is an indictment of the entire organization, its mission, and its supporters.

Comments are closed.