Three buttons, one image, same GOP lie on healthcare throughout the century!

[suffragette]

26. Great point about Operation Coffecup, especially given continuation of fake grassroots Tea Party

Last edited Mon Oct 7, 2013, 01:18 PM - Edit history (1)

And even the planned and scripted shut down.

The Coffee Cup action was designed to seem like a citizen's movement, though it was not:


http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rj-eskow/operation-coffeecup-reaga_b_45444.html


Reagan recorded an LP (or "long playing" record), "Ronald Reagan Speaks Out Against Socialized Medicine." The AMA sent it to the "ladies' auxiliary" of the Medical Association in each county (unthinkable as it is now, medicine was so male and gender roles so different that each county had a "ladies' auxiliary" for doctors' wives.)

The "ladies" were instructed to "put on the coffeepot," play the record for their friends and fellow physicians' wives, and then get out the stationery (scented, no doubt) so that each of them could write personalized letters to their Senators and Congressmen. (Yes, they were called "Congressmen" then, even if there had already been some heroic women among them.)

There was no public announcement of the recording, or of "Operation Coffeecup." The idea was to make it seem as if the letters were spontaneously written by distressed citizens. Portions of the recording were also reportedly broadcast as radio commentary.

(Much more at that link about this)

And now we have a planned and scripted shut down, with right wing think tanks and corporate groups like the Kochs funding, planning the actions and writing the scripts for what they should say or even tweet:

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/06/us/a-federal-budget-crisis-months-in-the-planning.html?_r=0

The current budget brinkmanship is just the latest development in a well-financed, broad-based assault on the health law, Mr. Obama’s signature legislative initiative. Groups like Tea Party Patriots, Americans for Prosperity and FreedomWorks are all immersed in the fight, as is Club for Growth, a business-backed nonprofit organization. Some, like Generation Opportunity and Young Americans for Liberty, both aimed at young adults, are upstarts. Heritage Action is new, too, founded in 2010 to advance the policy prescriptions of its sister group, the Heritage Foundation.

The billionaire Koch brothers, Charles and David, have been deeply involved with financing the overall effort. A group linked to the Kochs, Freedom Partners Chamber of Commerce, disbursed more than $200 million last year to nonprofit organizations involved in the fight. Included was $5 million to Generation Opportunity, which created a buzz last month with an Internet advertisement showing a menacing Uncle Sam figure popping up between a woman’s legs during a gynecological exam.

The groups have also sought to pressure vulnerable Republican members of Congress with scorecards keeping track of their health care votes; have burned faux “Obamacare cards” on college campuses; and have distributed scripts for phone calls to Congressional offices, sample letters to editors and Twitter and Facebook offerings for followers to present as their own.

One sample Twitter offering — “Obamacare is a train wreck” — is a common refrain for Speaker John A. Boehner.