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Barack Obama, Don't Go to War With the Republicans With a Peashooter

Submitted by BuzzFlash on Fri, 07/04/2008 - 12:27pm.

Barack Obama, Don’t Go to War With the Republicans With a Peashooter


By Richard A. Stitt

I have often quoted George Carlin's remarks which he made on the Charlie Rose show interview in late November 2004. Rose asked Carlin why he thought the Democrats lost the 2004 election. Carlin told of the advice his father gave him years earlier, paraphrasing, "When the other side has you talking their language, they've got you."

I will probably use this quote from now up until the November election because right now we are seeing Barack Obama holding only a slight lead in the major polls over John McCain. It is far from insurmountable by the likes of John McCain's powerful allies and smear mongers in the Republican Party. The 2008 election is probably just as important, maybe more so, to G. W. Bush as it is for John McCain.

It will be, as Bush pointed out in the aftermath of the 2004 election, "We had an accountability moment, and that's called the 2004 election. The American people listened to different assessments made about what was taking place in Iraq, and they looked at the two candidates and chose me, for which I'm grateful."

G. W. Bush will interpret a John McCain win in November as a choice that the voters had between Barack Obama and Bush’s policies. If voters choose Bush’s policies that McCain wants to continue, it will be a huge victory for Bush.

Considering the breadth and scope of the Bush legacy of depravity, abandonment of Afghanistan, unending Iraq War with over 4,110 U.S. fatalities, budget deficits in each and every year of his administration, record national debt of $9.5 trillion, a weakening dollar, record balance of trade deficits, skyrocketing price of oil and gasoline, rising unemployment, scathing attacks against individual liberties and freedoms, Barack Obama should be 20 to 30 points ahead of John McCain. However, he is not and as a matter of fact, John McCain is gaining traction while the infamous Republican smear machine is just getting wound up.

Barack Obama claimed recently that once he meets with U.S. military commanders in his upcoming visit to Iraq he will "refine" his strategy for withdrawing troops and ending the Iraq War over time. He is accused by the McCain operatives of changing tactics and coming around more to John McCain's position. The mainstream media obediently disseminated the Republican propaganda that Barack Obama has shifted his position on ending the Iraq debacle and has now become a centrist.

When General Wesley Clark made the statement that he didn't think being shot down over enemy territory and spending 5-1/2 years as a POW were qualifications to become president, McCain's propagandists exploded and screeched on Fox News that Clark dissed McCain's war record and military service.

Why do they get away with these incendiary, dishonest remarks? In two words: Stupidity and Gullibility. Republicans rely on the public's gullibility and how easily they can be deceived. Exacerbating Obama’s problems are the timorous mainstream media who regurgitate the Republican propaganda as if it were Gospel.

As long as Barack Obama is put on the defensive over inane charges by the likes of Franklin Graham and James Dobson who insist on spouting the lie that Obama is a Muslim, he will suffer John Kerry's fate -- close but no cigar.

I am not angry with the Religious Right so much as I am at Obama for naively thinking he can talk to people as myopic, hateful and depraved as Dobson and other Evangelicals who have become a political arm of the Republican Party. They are one of the biggest reasons why our country is in decline on the world stage. I am angry with Obama for making the same mistake that Democrats continue to make. They don't understand the simple and stark truth that the late George Carlin articulated so well -- when the other side has you talking their language they've got you.

Barack Obama, by drifting away from his message of hope and inspiration that got him to the Big Dance to begin with, will go home alone in November because he mistakenly thought that the extremist factions of the Republican Party and its Evangelical base cared about ending the devastation to our country caused by G. W. Bush and the toxic tone that allowed these autocrats to define all the talking points.

Barack Obama, if he wants to win in November, can't go to war with a peashooter. For every hit he takes from the Republican propagandists he needs to fire back forcefully with bigger and louder guns.

Richard A. Stitt

Austin, Texas

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Republicspeak

Submitted by andyod on Sat, 07/05/2008 - 7:54am.
I thought I had heard it all when Republicans introduced the words Miss-Speak for lying. Now Obama has topped that with Fine-Tuned.Live and learn
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The American audience is

Submitted by Atmost11 on Sat, 07/05/2008 - 12:16am.
The American audience is un-sympathetic to the authoritarian sales pitch, to pay attention to this same old kind of BS. Civility rules must be updated for the Republicans of today. The winning frame is stand up and talk down to these authoritarians.

Fan the flames of these demands for an apology like this Wesley Clark comment. Say, okay I am going to apologize. At the apology ceremony, apologize for not taking your supposedly offensive remark further than you did.
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If he starts using the word "Homeland" I'm OUT!

Submitted by Ken duerksen on Fri, 07/04/2008 - 5:28pm.
...pretending that the FISA laws will expire and leave us defenseless if a "compromise" is not made; pretending that the telecom companies did nothing wrong, but still warrant legal immunity; sucking up to religious fanatics by promising to continue the unconstitutonal funding of "Faith Based Initiatives";.... Obama is losing as we watch - abandoning the excited, dedicated, and energetic electorate that secured his nomination and falling into the cowardly losing strategies of Bob Shrum and James Carvill. Write and call his campaign daily and emphatically demand his return to the rational and forthright progressive fold, and we still might save this country. Ken Duerksen Oxford, Ohio
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Couldn't Agree More

Submitted by drprodny on Fri, 07/04/2008 - 3:56pm.
I have to disagree w/Ard a bit - not in his/her feelings on the subject, but the devil is, as always, in the details. We can protest Right-Wing radio to our heart's content for all the good it will do us, b/c these assholes have a HUGE audience and the backing of major corporations who like the message of "LEAVE THE RICH ALONNNEE!!!".

How we counter that w/an even huger audience of young idealistic people looking for Something Not the Same Old S*%t - which is how Obama built the base that gave him the Democratic Nomination in the first place (as Richard points out). I don't know who he's listening to now that's convinced him that the "smart thing" is to back away from the new young (and new Black) voters he'd already brought in and "run to the Center" - which is DLC/Blue Dog Dem code for "Be a Republican Lite so we don't piss off our Corporate backers (many of whom sponsor Limbaugh and Faux Noize and Dobson and the like)!" The problem is, that strategy lost the Dems both the Presidency in 2000 and 2004 (and 1984 and probably 1988 as well), and control of Congress in 1994! They only regained a bare majority now b/c they ran on a strong anti-War, anti-Bush platform - which they promptly tossed out the window once they got Congress (barely) back, so I wonder just how well they're going to do this November.

In the end, we don't need a protest - we need a candidate we can coalesce around. I had thought Barack Obama was that candidate - but after his behavior since clinching the nomination, I'm no longer so sure.....
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It doesn't matter what Obama

Submitted by ard on Fri, 07/04/2008 - 3:34pm.
It doesn't matter what Obama says- until talk radio is demonopolized or obama supporters start picketing and boycotting the sponsors of the local talk radio stations that give a coordinated pack of liars the biggest soapboxes in the country this bushit will continue. Progressive candidates and causes will continue to get whacked with an invisible 2x4 while media and political analysts wait for the reading and viewing material that attributes the effects of rove's most important framing tool to political and social shifts instead of coordinated blowhards using the biggest soapboxes in every state. Since Reagan killed the Fairness Doctrine the Roves of the GOP have been framing with a nail gun while progressives have been using a rock. Talk radio has been the difference, even with other media consolidation (which was enabled to a large degree by the same TR monopoly). The biggest political blunder in the last 20 years, or longer when you factor the time lost dealing with climate change and implications of the bush disaster, was progressives ignoring the talk radio monopoly. Talk radio does the groundwork for the GOP.  It isn't a matter of how distasteful or inane it is- it is the uncontested repetition to an often captive audience that counts.  It is what makes most 'red' states 'red'- large areas with few alternatives to listen to on that ancient medium of information- radio.  And until America has some new form of Fairness Doctrine or some other way to limit the monopoly, bipartisanship is for liars or fools and democracy is just about impossible. Getting a Dem in the White House, even this year, will be made much harder because of the talk radio monopoly. The rest of the lazy celebrity talking heads will use it to set the bar for what they can do to Obama in getting Mccain into the White House. It was very useful keeping Clinton in the race. Most political and media analysis is done while discounting or even ignoring the effect of the Republican talk radio monopoly. Most media analysts read and watch. There are no talk radio transcripts to search to analyze to demonstrate the power of that coordinated uncontested repetition that reaches 50-70MIL Americans 24/5/365 and is used by the Roves and Norquists like an invisible hammer to whack their opponents in the democratic party and anyone in the media who would dare to criticize their annointed leaders and irrational policies. Since the Fairness Doctrine was killed by Reagan the GOP has had near complete free rein to frame and control the debate and the limits of the debate, to threaten and intimidate politicians without having to face those they threaten, to censor and to swiftboat anything and anyone progressive. The loudmouths lay out a smorgasbord of prechewed and tested one liners and talking points for the lazy celebrity media to pick from and most analysts only see the final result. Many of the political myths that dog progressives now could not have been created without the uncontested repetition of that talk radio monopoly. The Clintons, Gores, and Kerrys probably still don't know what really hit them. Those kinds of character hit jobs can't be done on TV and print alone, even with today's consolidation-- they have to put up an appearance of balance.
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this man speaks the truth

Submitted by godblessfdr on Sun, 07/06/2008 - 7:46am.
never have i agreed so much with an article.When Democrats or what passes for Democrates nowadays voted with republicans to let the news media combine so it fell in the hands of a few conservatives that is when we lost control.Face it,the American people are not that bright whoever speaks last or the most is who the American people listen to
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