By Loren Adams, 30 August 2009
It started November 2000. For the life of me, I couldn’t
understand why Gore was playing nice to an opponent determined to cut his
throat, win at any price, cheat, steal, kill, and commit any conceivable crime
known to man – which Bush’s surrogates literally did with impunity.
Playing the role of gentleman against a cheat allows the cheater to win in most
instances. Destiny focused on Florida – where the cheater’s brother was
gov and the campaign state co-chair was in charge of counting ballots and
certifying what she’d just counted. Then there was the other relative, Poppy. I
have no doubt – George H.W. Bush called his U.S.S.C. appointees to sway the
decision and the course of history. Democrats, as usual, didn’t have the
cajones to challenge.
History will record the damage wasn’t done to the Democratic
elite (who thought it more prudent to shy away from justifiable resistance in
order to maintain the fantasy of civility), but to the nation and its future.
Democratic politicians were more concerned with defending their personal images
than defending the country. Why would one want to dress up for a fire?
My mind drifted back to the 1988 campaign with the image of
tank-commander Michael Dukakis at the UCLA debate defending his opposition to
capital punishment by rationalizing he would not support the death penalty even
if his wife, Kitty, was raped and murdered right in front of his face. That
went over well in mid-America. His overall campaign was weak and did not employ
opposition research to know how to deal with such campaign strategists as Lee
Atwater and other notable dishonest characters on the GOP side. Democrats claim
to take the “high road,” but that misconception leaves them high and dry every
time. There is an unexplainable urgency disconnect.
Party leaders do not act with any sense of urgency even
though the world recognizes America is in a free-fall. Our house is on fire,
but the firefighters are more concerned with their personal appearance and
uniforms. And, crazily, they’re concerned how best to get along with the guys
that ignited the fire.
Fast-forward to 2004 when Republicans (through the infamous
surrogates “Swift-Boaters”) trashed John Kerry’s war record. Karl Rove managed
to turn Kerry from a hero to a coward in a matter of one day; so defeat was
irreversible. Given the gullibility of the American public, what other outcome
would one expect?
Kerry’s staff at first decided to ignore the Swift-Boat
campaign, dismissing it as “an act of desperation” – as if voters would
buy into word-heavy truth over carefully crafted, focus-group-tested,
million-dollar lies. Hey, ordinary Americans buy junk food and don’t allow time
for long-winded explanations – even from cheating spouses. Their
attention span is one minute; they want their sound-bites and they want them
NOW!
Kerry’s response was a no-show at the critical juncture and
wordy at the tail-end, and so the lesser was allowed to stay in power. We the
people suffered as a result, but the individuals who ran the dismal campaign
continued their plush lifestyles.
A premium is placed on ignorance in much of America today,
an inescapable fact. Thus, the “birthers,” “death panels,” and town-hall mobs
seem to come out of nowhere. Inarticulate speech gets more applause than words
of truth well spoken. Dumbed-down America identifies with the ignorant —
not the educated. Democrats must recognize this trap to go forward.
Kerry failed to shorten his sentences and we know how that
turned out. Taking the “high road” of good intentions is fine when the opponent
is honest.
Unfortunately, the 2004 DNC camp reacted the same way they
did mid-term 2002: passive. weak-kneed, slow-responding to attacks, and overly
concerned about getting down in the gutter with the opponent.
Logical Americans want to hear the truth — spoken in
crisp terms. Something they can sink their teeth into and repeat on street
corners and barbershops. TRUTH packaged in the spirit of Harry Truman, the fire
of James Carville, the humor of Will Rogers, and the leadership of Franklin
Delanor Roosevelt.
The problem isn’t with the GOP campaign operatives who lie,
cheat, steal, hack voting machines, eliminate and intimidate minority voters,
and storm and burglarize offices, etc. The problem is with the Democratic
Party. How many more decades will we have to suffer as a nation waiting for
them to smell the coffee?
The first rule in war is “Know thy enemy.”
Democrats on the Hill fail to see Republicans for what they
truly are: corporatists (neo-fascists) and certified hypocrites. Democratic
idealism gets in the way of reality like Republican religiosity forces them to
drink Kool-Aid. As a result, we’re all screwed. Barack & Company may WANT
Republicans to work with their team, but reality swears it won’t happen.
So why waste precious political capital?
After all, since when is our prime objective
“bi-partisanship”? It can only lead to failure. Because Republicans are going
to act as they’ve always acted: like sore losers and disruptive children who
view government as an entitlement rather than a service. Obstructing
constructive legislation and destroying the country if need-be are their
objectives; so, how can the Democrats compute the goal – moving the country
forward – with the objective playing nice with those who automatically
spout “NO” to every “YES” and “YES” to every “NO”?
The language gap is also an impediment. Democratic leaders
still haven’t learned how to communicate effectively while the right-wing owns
80% of talk-radio and their own cable news network. Whether the barrier is
Northeastern intellectualism or liberal elitism, Democratic leadership has
dismissed right-wing acquisition and dominance over the air-waves to the
nation’s peril. Lies and misinformation
thus go unchallenged or ineffectually contradicted, and the American public is
poorly served at best and totally deceived at worst.
It’s not that a sizable portion of Americans now hold low
esteem for those with Southern accents, because they do (especially after being
led by mostly Southern politicians and governors since 1963 with the exceptions
Reagan, Nixon and Ford). No, the language barrier – Democrats vs.
Republicans – boils down to a difference between clear, precise words vs.
verbosity, dangling clauses and unrelated terms injected to enhance the
speaker’s image rather than the audience.
Speaking truth to power requires one to keep it simple while
respecting the listener enough not to distract with tangent-issues. Keith Olbermann has the skills
necessary, as do Rachel Maddow and Randi Rhodes. On
her radio show, Rhodes explains the health-care crisis and congressional
proposals in easy-to-understand terms, as does Maddow on her MSNBC and Air
America programs. These women have balls! Unfortunately, Harry Reid and Nancy
Pelosi don’t. I wish all would listen to Keith, Randi and Rachel, the clear
voices of the new Progressive Movement.
Democrats need to learn how to talk the walk, while
Republicans need to learn how to walk the talk.
Meanwhile the Obama administration stumbles over the same
flaws the party carried for a generation. They know little to nothing about the
Republican Party and they know little how to deliver a well-aimed, effective
message. We all will lose if they do, all win if they win.
How will America survive if they fail to get it? 