After Kerry wins, we are going to declare war on the vast RW conspiracy

[Bozos for Bush]

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x2552518

On November 2nd, we take back the White House.
On November 3rd, we start to take back our country.

Please join us as we go after Gary Jarmin, the Ridenours, Response Dynamics, Harlan Crow and Club for Growth, Bob Perry and his Swift Boat liar-buddies, Moonie funding, Jack Abramoff and the College Republican National Committee, Progress for America, the Rutherford Institute, Ron Kanfer and his Young Americans for Freedom, Scott Reed, Frank Donatelli, George Terwilliger, Joesph Farah and Rush Limbaughpig, the Coors empire, Scaife and Lahaye, Eagle Publishing, L. Brent Bozell III, lots of other bad guys, and the entire CNP and it's shadow government.

[aquart]

1. You are going to be so disappointed.

Kerry's goal is NOT to declare war.

And he's going to be real busy with the one we have.

[captainjack]

3. who asked Kerry to do it?

JK is awesome, but he can't do everything - he's going to be fixing the mess Bush made and we'll be fixing the mess the RWingers have made.

WE will do it! These fuckers are our servants and they aren't doing a good job - time to whoop some ass!

[Nordic]

2. don't forget CNN, NBC, MSNBC and, yes, POX

the entire corporate news spectrum needs to be purged.

It is the #1 problem facing our country, and thus the world, today.

This democracy HAS TO HAVE a press that TELLS THE TRUTH and actually QUESTIONS AUTHORITY.

It is their job, it is their repsonsibility, and we have to figure out a way to hold them accountable.

If that means a huge class-action lawsuit that we are guaranteed to lose, so be it. If it draws attention, fine.

We have to figure this out NOW or our democracy is done.

[MisterP]

20. Pox News!

I don't know why I find that so funny.
kick

[CAcyclist]

4. I'll help!

I'm really impressed with what you've done so far.

[Bozos for Bush]

19. Thanks CAcyclist, we need everyone's help to shut them down

When they sent scam letters to my 83-year old mom, telling her she would lose social security if she didn't sign this stupid card and send in a donation, that was the last straw for me.

I have seen my calling now...and I'm going to do everything I can do to stop these people.

Thanks,

John

[AmandaRuth]

5. Ann Coulter

i am a middle aged female rural liberal homemaker and i want to fight Ann Coulter. Let me at her. :evilgrin: :evilgrin:

[Hello_Kitty]

7. I got your back sister. n/t

[Carla in Ca]

13. I'm a middle-aged city liberal homemaker/writer

May I be invited to participate? Let us at her!:spank:

[Nordic]

24. hey, those who live by the sword are free game

if she thinks that the best way to talk to liberals is with a baseball bat, well, she's just inviting the same upon her.

I would have absolutely no problem with someone cracking her in the face with a baseball bat.

Because she's invited it.

[flygal]

54. 30 something SAHM here - save some for me!!

[Wapsie B]

6. We have to find a way

to neutralize this death star of politics, to take away their influence.

[Nordic]

9. I think it's the most pressing problem in the country

if our media had spent 1/10 of the time and energy they've spent on "rathergate" and Cheney's lesbian daughter, the Laci Petersen case, Clinton's cock, etc. etc.etc.

we probably never would have gone to war. And/or GWB and Co would be in jail.

Every citizen of the country would know about PNAC.

Every citizen would know that Saddam Hussein used to be a CIA asset.

Every citizen would know that there is no connection between 9/11 and Saddam Hussein.

Every citizen would know that Halliburton was doing business illegally before 2001 with Iraq, Iran, and Libya.

etc. etc. etc.

It is so utterly disgraceful.

[Carla in Ca]

15. What ever happened to the photo of

rummy and saddam? Would add a nice touch right now.

[Nordic]

23. it's in this lovely little piece from ericblumrich.com

http://www.ericblumrich.com/thanks.html

If you haven't seen it, you gotta see it.

[Carla in Ca]

38. I had not seen that, only the photo

That is totally fabulous. Thanks.:hi:

[crickets]

48. Blown away

Pardon the awful pun. I was aware of most of the facts, but that is the most powerful encapsulated visual presentation of where we stand re: Iraq and how we got there I have ever seen.

Damn our media to hell. They could and SHOULD be presenting the facts as powerfully, and they don't.

[flygal]

56. Man, first F 9-11 now this. I need a drink.

[SleepingDragon]

67. That was something...

I was aware of the facts, but to see them all together is quite powerfull. Why hasn't this gotten more exposure?

[Ani Yun Wiya]

43. How true...

The media is a huge part of the problem.

What do you think would happen if the broadcast networks went black?

Would people then get out and talk to each other again?
Would town hall style meetings be a source of information and a place for decision making?

I personaly think that the Internet is an excellent place for such meetings among people.

[jdj]

57. yes the media is the problem and the internet is the solution.

and diversification.

[Name removed]

8. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Fusions_Minion]

10. The Bush crime family

have plenty of crimes to pay for.

[Nordic]

11. Hm, but the constitution guarantees a free press, so doesn't that

mean they have a responsibility?

And we kind of like our "little forum". Why are you here if you don't?

We attack people who LIE, by the way.

The truth hurts. Are you in pain?

[Carla in Ca]

17. Can we change the wording of the first amendment?

Change from 'free' to 'free and fair'.

[m berst]

27. see my other post

Hi Carla - the misuse of the public airwaves and the first amendment are two different issues. I am being picky about it because the Republicans are mixing these issues together to confuse people.

Fox can say anything they want, but not on our public airwaves. The purpose of the Fairness Doctrine was to prevent the airwaves from being used for partisan political purposes because of the very real danger of that leading to totalitarianism. It isn't a free speech issue and it isn't a free market issue.

[m berst]

25. first amendment

(Just arbitrarily jumped in Nordic at this point in the thread, not necessarily to respond exclusively to your post)

The Constitution doesn't grant or "allow" any freedoms or rights. It restricts the government. The government is restricted from doing anything that would interfere with rights that are presumed to already belong to the people as a matter of birthright.

So the idea expressed above that "freedom of speech allows" you to do anything is a distinctly un-American idea. Obviously, anything that a government grants, a government can take away. Our government doesn't grant us rights, it is restricted from enfringing upon them.

Regulation of the media is a different issue. The government awards private companies with monopoly power - the exclusive use of a certain broadcast frequency on the publicly owned airwaves - and then enforces that monopoly on behalf of the private company at gunpoint if necessary. Since the airwaves are a public resource. and since the government grants and protects a monopoly, it is a no-brainer to see that the public's interests must be served in return for the broadcast license.

[Nordic]

35. nice post

I'm glad you jumped in.

Yes, just like you can't yell "fire" in a crowded movie theater, you shouldn't be able to use the public airwaves to spread propaganda.

And here's what I believe and here is what I think we need to deal with: The cable television spectrum should be given the same legal qualifications as the public airwaves.

Things have changed. The public "airwaves" are only a tiny bit of the public information spectrum anymore.

And THAT is where we need to begin.

[m berst]

39. GREAT point

"The public 'airwaves' are only a tiny bit of the public information spectrum anymore."

Indeed. Same thing applies though, since government agencies grant monopolies to cable companies in communities. Beyond that, you are right that broadcast TV is no where near as important as it once was. As we all well know, the Internet is very powerful and still in its infancy. We all know that using the Internet is more rewarding than sitting in front of a TV screeen and better entertainment as well.

Here is where brain power comes in - we could easily be dominating the Internet. There is no reason why we could not replace the corporations as a source for everything people now do online with open source software and a democratic ethic.

What makes the Internet a better experience is that it is not passive. The big corporations want to control the ISP end - the delivery - and make the Internet more passive (pop-ups, animation, flash, etc.) and raise the entry barriers. But they haven't yet, and they can't if we can wean people off of AOL, Yahoo, MSN and the rest of the trash. One way to wean them is to provide a superior product on the open source model - thousands of talented volunteers working cooperatively.

Just thinking out loud here, Nordic. I was stuck in a rut thinking it was still 1970. That's what having Republicans running the country can do to your brain! So glad to be around liberals so they can slap me around a little and snap me out of my coma. Thanks. :-)

on edit - trying to get subject and verb to agree and stuff like that.

[Nordic]

44. could you imagine how screwed we'd be now without the Internet?

We'd be like, well, most of the people in the country who still think the media is "liberal". And who think that CNN deserves its self-imposed title of "the most trusted name in news". People who take it all for granted.

We would be behind the new iron curtain of corporate media.

We in America ARE behind that curtain, but we're part of the unhappy few who know about it. Most people don't know because, well, they expect the media to tell them the truth about stuff.

[Hobbit]

45. True

But if the government doesn't take them off the air, who will?

As long as a media outlet can make money, it's there to stay. The only way you can shut down places you don't like is to not watch/listen to/read them. It's our power as consumers to do this. If enough people don't like it, it goes out of business.

You can't just kick people off the air in a free market economy. If there are to be rules for the public airwaves, you have to lay them out, first, which is why I think the FCC's attacks on Howard Stern are uncalled for. I, personally, am for letting all views be known over the airwaves...just as long as the people expressing them can pay for the broadcast themselves.

[Centre_Left]

51. Government can regulate whatever it nationalizes?

If the first amendment does not apply to media nationalized by the government, what is preventing the government from simply nationalizing and regulating all forms of media, thus making the first amendment irrelevant? Your logic paves the way for totalitarianism. My personal belief is that the first amendment must always prohibit the regulation of speech, via public or private resources and whether we like the content of the speech or not.

[xpat]

53. Corporations are not persons

"Regulation of the media is a different issue. The government awards private companies with monopoly power - the exclusive use of a certain broadcast frequency on the publicly owned airwaves - and then enforces that monopoly on behalf of the private company at gunpoint if necessary. Since the airwaves are a public resource. and since the government grants and protects a monopoly, it is a no-brainer to see that the public's interests must be served in return for the broadcast license."

In addition to this very valid point, we must not forget that there has been more than a century of court rulings granting corporations increasing degrees of "personhood". That means that they can benefit from the constitutional rights as if they were human beings.

In fact, there is no provision in the Constitution to grant corporations any rights at all. They are chartered entities that can, in principle, be made to appear and disappear at the whim of state legislatures.

A fascinating account of how corporations have taken over America can be downloaded at http://www.google.com/url?sa=U&start=1&q=http://www.gangsofamerica.com/&e=912. I recommend it highly. Know your enemy better to destroy him.

[Bozos for Bush]

12. Hey neo-con worshipper, come visit on Wednesday for proof of illegalities

[Nordic]

14. your president has a personal response for you:

[Seldona]

16. Bye!

[Nordic]

21. Hobbit has pooped upon us all and left

cowardly as usual

[GingerSnaps]

22. I was too busy taking a dump on the Bush/Cheney sign instead

[Carla in Ca]

26. Excuse me?!?!?!?!

"You don't see the repugs attacking Moveon.org" (Sorry, used my r word, not yours...and no CAPS, either!)

Are you kidding me?!?! They have done nothing BUT attack Moveon. Do you not remember Moveon's ad contest. They posted an entry of the */hitler demo, but quickly took it down. And what do the repugs say? They say that Moveon ran an ad that compared.....

It was not an ad, but over and over and over they said it was.
You are not being honest.

[m berst]

29. interesting sentence there

"However, I do agree that there need to be federal regulations that penalize innaccurate reporting by the media."

That WOULD violate the first amendment. Are Republicans confused or what?

I went to school a long time ago, but we had civics classes that everyone took both in middle school and high school. Do those exist anymore? I keep hearing adult Republicans say things that we would have known better than to say when we were 13 years old, because they are illogical, or anti-American.

[Nordic]

34. I know, it seems most GOPers like this failed every class they ever took

either that or a big part of their cognitive dissonance (they're just fucking nuts) is that they live in a fantasy where they just don't want to accept any kind of truth that doesn't jibe with their beliefs.

And they simply want to burn at the stake anyone who says otherwise.

[Swamp Rat]

31. Pffft!

[tsuki]

40. That's the problem...

too many "commentators," and not enough journalist. I saw that picture of Al Pieda attacking Ann Coulter. The CNN caption stated that two men attacked JOURNALIST Ann Coulter. It is time to make a distinction between journalist and talking head.

[MadHound]

49. Sorry, but that doesn't fly friend

Sad to say there is a murderous rage on both sides of the fence, at least in a small number of people. We need to return fairness and accuracy to our media, we also need to learn how to play a little nicer in politics. Granted, it has always been a rough and tumble, but in the last twenty years the bar has been set higher.

Politics isn't the be all and end all of one's life. There are too many people who need to learn that lesson.

[Media_Lies_Daily]

55. Why don't you just go back to Middle Earth where everything is....

...just ducky?

You don't see the Far Right attacking any of the people and organizations supporting liberal causes??? WTF????

Where the heck have you been since WWII???

[jmowreader]

68. You have GOT to be crazier than a shithouse rat!

Go back to freerepublic and look for threads about attacking DUers. You'll find plenty.

Then come back here and look for threads about threatening e-mails individual members have received from freepers. There are a bunch of them.

These so-called conservative commentators and the Republicans attempted to overthrow the Clinton administration. They reversed the will of the people in 2000 and put Bush in office. They overturned several elections in 2002--how in FUCK did Saxby Chambliss win the Georgia Senate race?--and may have murdered a sitting Senator, Paul Wellstone.

We have no qualms with freedom of speech, unlike your side, but Ann Coulter recommending speaking to liberals with a baseball bat and Gordon Liddy recommending shooting federal agents in the face is incitement to violence.

[Kanary]

18. The DLC also belongs in your list.

Those turncoats must GO!

Kanary

[bvar22]

30. Get Corporate money out of DC,

...and the DLC will die on the vine, as will the republican chokehold on our Democracy!

In order to accomplish the goals listed in the Thread Header, serious reform must occur in the way business is conducted in the USA and the World.

Corporate Personhood withdrawn.

Corporate size limited.

No corporation should be allowed to OWN another corporation.

Complete public transparency of Corporate Board Members, owners, and investors.

Corporate lobbying of public Representatives should be completely transparent, public, regulated, and limited.

Utilities, Energy, Communications, and Transportation need to be heavily re-regulated, perhaps Publicly Owned.

Return of Fairness Doctrine in Communications.

If we can achieve reform in these areas, there will be no need to go after the individuals listed.

[m berst]

41. you are correct

It was once called "bribery" - give a politican money and get favors in return. That bribery effectively takes the government out of the hands of its rightful owners - the people.

Doesn't seem too complicated to me. Step one - start calling it bribery every time "campaign financing" comes up in a conversation. That is what it is, after all. Start calling it "pay off" everytime someone is shuttled from industry to government and back again.

[Kanary]

62. Naaaww, it's only "bribery" when Michael Moore gives away underwear and

Ramen noodles to people who promise to vote!! :)

Isn't it really strange how people have come to accept so much graft???

We have some *serious* work to do!

:hi:

Kanary

[m berst]

42. dupe, sorry n/t

.

[mike_c]

64. that was my first response too....

The only way to truly fight the "right wing conspiracy" is with a political entity that doesn't have one foot in their camp, and that doesn't hobble the opposition. The dems will NEVER be an effective opposition party until they throw off their corporate masters. This election is a case in point-- the democratic candidate is running neck and neck with the WORST PRESIDENT in a century. The "opposition party" won't really make any inroads toward changing the American political landscape until it finds the cajones to articulate real alternative liberal policies.

[kokomo]

28. Like Teddy Roosevelt, JK needs to do some "trust busting"

Would be a good job to delegate to his lawyer Vice President.

First, bust up the giant media corporations so we can return freedom of the press to the people. Die Murdoch, Die Sinclair, Die Clear Channel, Die News Media Group, Die Hearst, Die Cox, Die Scripps-Howard, Die Gannett, Die Disney, Viacom, AOL Time-Warner.

[m berst]

32. let's not declare war

Let's declare resistance. War they know. War they want.

They need our complicity and participation to continue on the path of destruction, and we can withhold our resources from them.

The Republicans are provoking a civil war. Let's not be provoked. I do not mean that we shouldn't be strong, but war is the wrong metaphor - see the war on drugs, the war on terror, etc.

We are weak spiritually, and spirit is what we can use and they can't. By spirit I mean true courage, wisdom and compassion. Wisdom, courage and compassion are sure to win and always have throughout history. Violence rarely does.

The Democratic party is dominated by a new class of the comfortable ones - suburban, white, educated, corporate. The Bush adminstration motivated them because the terror and oppression that the rest of the world has been experiencing for a gerneation started to lap at the doors of suburbia. The suburbanites will reject the idea of resistance, because they are comfortable. That is the coming challenge for us IMHO.

[Nordic]

36. okay, this thread is really getting interesting now

You make a really good point.

I saw that Daily Show with Bishop Desmond Tutu. I don't know if you saw it. But when that man spoke, there was a hush throughout the crowd. Stewart was speechless and finally said "you know what, you are the nicest man I have ever met".

The man had a huge amount of personal power because he didn't express hatred or anger, he expressed pure love.

I've been trying to get my head around this for a long time now. I am very serious about the corporate media being the biggest enemy of our democracy, and therefore the world. That is not hyperbole.

How we go about fighting them (or changing them, or resisting them) is the real mystery.

Starroute, in a post just below this one, makes some excellent posts. They simply need to be exposed. We need people pointing out who these people are, and why they're saying what they're saying.

For god's sake, we simply need people brave enough to wave the faxed "talking points" in the air and say "okay, the White House sent us the talking points for the day, and here they are" and read them out loud and make fun of them.

I mean, who does that? Most Americans don't even know this occurs.

How do we resist?

[m berst]

46. How do we resist?

It is always a source of wonder for me when I watch how thoroughly liberals participate in the corporate economy, and how vehemently they defend their "choices" as consumers.

Credit cards are a scam. The stock market is a scam. Real estate is a scam. New car purchases are a scam. I just don't get it. Shopping at chains, buying processed food from corporate agri-business, throwing money into the entertainment industry, buying goods made in China, using dangerous, wasteful and overpriced household chemicals and cosmetics.

Why would a liberal watch CNN? Why would a liberal do business with AOL, Network Solutions, Yahoo and Microsoft? Why would a liberal buy produce from halfway around the world at the supermarket instead of from a local farm family or farm market?

There are good, solid, quality, local alternatives for everything we need. Often these alternatives keep the money in the community, are better for the environment, are more economical, safer, healthier...

It is a mystery to me. Resistance would be so easy, and rather than having to sacrifice anything, our lives improve when we disconnect from corporate culture.

People in the rest of the world are forced to give up their lives and homes fighting global corporatism. We won't give up a little imagined comfort and convenience?

:shrug:

[mike_c]

65. excellent points, MB....

Remember Cheney's sneering response to the suggestion that energy conservation was the best immediate strategy for dealing with energy shortages and high prices? "That's not the American way of life!"

We need a cultural change even more than a political change. Our politics are ultimately based upon corporate/government domination and manipulation of much of the rest of the world in order to supply our fraction of the global population with a HUGELY disproportionate slice of the Earth's resources (and I include the labor of its citizens among those resources).

[Kanary]

63. Beautiful post, Nordic! I could cry that I couldn't see that show!

Yes, he's a beautiful man, and I wish I could have seen it, or knew someone who could tape it.

We've lost our leaders of non-violence in this country, for the most part, but we CAN do it. If we make up our collective minds that we want to follow inthe footsteps of Tutu, Martin Luther King, Ghandi, we CAN.

The first step, is that it starts *here* at DU!! If we just start practicing non-violence here at DU, it would make a huge difference.

There are books and articles about non-violent communication, and that would be a good start. There are seminars for those engaged in non-violent protests. There *are* resources.

I just got a book from the library that says much about it, but don't have the title handy right now.

I'm so glad you posted..... it's encouraging when there is even ONE more person who wants to go in this direction!

Because if we don't, whatever violence we allow at this point in order to regain our party and our country, we will still have that much more to reform.

Kanary

[Media_Lies_Daily]

59. So many false statements, so little time to answer them all...

"Declare resistance"???

How many cheeks do YOU have to get slapped? I'm personally fresh out of cheeks.

"Weak spiritually"???

Do you believe that because the Right told you it was so?

"The suburbanites will reject the idea of resistance, because they are comfortable"???

Where are you getting this garbage? If you're defining "surburbanites" as the disappearing American Middle Class, where the heck do you get the idea that they're "comfortable"??

[m berst]

73. ok

I would be interested in hearing your point of view, and your response here is not very clear. Passive and non-violent resistance to tyranny is an effective strategy as shown by many noteworthy examples from recent history. Are you advocating against this strategy? The "cheek" reference - Christianity? Turning the other cheek is not good you are saying? Not sure. I didn't mention cheeks, nor was I thinking about Christianity. I was thinking about the work of Ghandi and King.

The word "sprirtually" seems to have bothered you and you associate it with the "Right" somehow and then called my observation a "belief" suggesting that the issue here is religion somehow for you? Not sure.

"Suburbanites" is another word that was a problem, and I could refine that to make my meaning more clear if that would help. Suburbanite and middle class do not seem to me to be interchangeable terms.

I am just guessing here as to what your objections were to my post, which you called "false" and "garbage" because as I said your meaning is just not clear.

You are opposed to passive resistance, you imagine that I am opposed to the middle class, and you are opposed to the idea that there could be any problem with people's attitudes, and you suspect that I am influenced by right wing or fundamentalist propaganda. Is that it?

Not turning the other cheek here in response to your post....

thanks, Mike

[m berst]

79. hit and run I guess n/t

[starroute]

33. Excellent Robert Parry interview explains where all this came from

Two parts:
http://www.buzzflash.com/interviews/04/10/int04054.html
http://www.buzzflash.com/interviews/04/10/int04055.html

If you go back to the Watergate period, and the period right after the Vietnam War, you had a very demoralized Republican Party. And you had an essentially shattered conservative movement. They had lost not just the White House; they were the minority in the House and the Senate. They’d lost a lot of seats in the '74 election in particular. They’d been faced with a popular movement there that they could not really deal with, and they felt it undercut them. They felt that the press was hostile to them. But they decided the world they saw was a very weak environment.

Now what they did about it is very important. They started building in their own institutions. A person who was the Treasury secretary under Nixon, William Simon, plays an important role here. He starts pulling together these conservative and right-wing foundations, and they begin making strategic investments in media, in think tanks, in attack groups. They build effectively their own establishment in Washington and make it heavily focused in Washington, which is their key point.

So they begin to counteract very aggressively what they see as this hostile situation. It starts relatively modestly by some standards. It's in the tens of millions of dollars, but then it accelerates. After the Reagan-Bush victory in 1980, the Executive Branch gets behind this effort.

There is coordination that we find in documents that came out -- especially during Iran Contra hearings -- about the role of the Reagan-Bush White House in helping to build this infrastructure. So you had this development of this counter-establishment that has more and more magazines, more and more commentators and supporters, larger and larger think tanks. And suddenly Washington begins to react to it. And reporters who try or tried to do their jobs in disclosing some of the negative information that existed about the Reagan-Bush operation -- those reporters find themselves under heavy pressure.


Starting thirty years ago, the right began building this massive infrastructure which has attained incredible influence over the media. That's the bad news. The good news is that this infrastructure is starting to show its age. The people who created it are getting old and dying, and the younger generation doesn't have the same ideological drive -- they're motivated solely by greed and self-interest, not by the old anti-Communism and concern for traditional values. The most active right-wing organizations these days are all against taxes and against government regulations, and not for much of anything positive.

That means that for the first time in a generation, we *can* counteract them. We *can* expose their lies and their petty crimes and their contempt for democracy and the rule of law. But it won't be easy and it won't be quick, and it will take patience and dedication and courage. And lots and lots of self-education.

Once, years ago, I learned a little geology. Not much, but enough to realize that where someone like me looks at a cliff-face and just sees rock, a trained geologist sees not only specific kinds of rocks but million of years of history, laid out to be read like a book.

We have to learn how to do that with the political landscape.

When the names of certain people or groups crop up in a news story, we have to be able to tell who they are and what their past history is and what their hidden agenda might be. When certain attitudes are expressed that don't strike us as quite right, we need to have those little alarm bells going off that get us to check out who is saying those things and whether they're really as non-partisan as they claim. And when we notice things that aren't being honestly presented, we have to be prepared to write letters to the editor, or to our congressperson, telling them what is really going on under the surface.

Just saying to the public "These are bad people" won't cut it. Being able to say "These people are working against your interests in such-and-such a specific way" will. Supposed seniors groups that are really fronts for the drug companies, or political scams that take old folks' money and don't even send it to the causes they pretend to support, are the most obvious and easy to expose. But all of the groups are ultimately greed-based and most of them are crooked in one way or another and that means they are vulnerable to the light of truth.

[Nordic]

37. yeah, Harper's Lewis Lapham had a great article on this

a month or so ago describing the same phenonenon.

I guess we need to put our money where our mouths are.

Air America and The Daily Show are a start.

But we need more mainstream infiltration.

We need an entire network.

[July]

58. And we have to do what they did, only better.

Fascinating post.

I just want to add that our nascent movement must do better than the right did as we develop institutions and commentators to represent our views. We have to learn about reading the political landscape, as you suggest, and I believe we have to go them one better by producing something more than spin and media manipulation.

It cracks me up every time I read about "conservative think tanks." They are to serious thought as bubblegum comics are to literature. We've got a better product whenever we come up with "the light of truth" that you mention AND effectively disseminate it.

[JHB]

70. More from Parry on ConsortiumNews

http://www.consortiumnews.com/2004/102604.html

After Reagan signed NSDD-77, longtime CIA propagandist Raymond became the administration's "public diplomacy" point man. Soon, "psychological warfare" experts were deployed to develop propaganda "themes" that would influence the American public. Teams of "public diplomacy" officials made the rounds of news offices in Washington pressuring editors and bureau chiefs to rein in or remove troublesome reporters.

Through the dozen Reagan-Bush years, the conservative political/media infrastructure also expanded, giving Reagan and Bush crucial protection when scandals, such as the Iran-Contra Affair, hit.

When Bill Clinton managed to wrest the White House from the senior George Bush in 1992, the conservative infrastructure -- sans White House -- quickly switched from playing aggressive defense to aggressive offense. Bolstered by a near monopoly in talk radio and later by Rupert Murdoch’s founding of Fox News, the conservative media put Clinton consistently on the defensive. In 1994, the Republicans won the Congress.

By the 1990s, the Republicans also had housebroken much of the mainstream news media, which was determined to shed the “liberal” label by going after a Democratic President harder than any Republican. The end result – compounded by Clinton’s own personal mistakes – was his impeachment in late 1998 (though he did survive a Senate trial).
------------
(and look up other articles on this subject in the ConsortiumNews archives)

[Jade Fox]

77. Thanks for this.

[The Minus World]

47. I'm in.

Bringing back Fairness Doctrine and undertaking some real campaign finance reform would do a good job at cleansing much of the corruption out of the political system.

Until then, we'll see popular sentiment shift further to the left, as the corporate media shifts further to the right - until the rift between pedestrian reality and propaganda is so undeniable that America just shuts it off altogether.

[Selatius]

50. You want a war?

I think the best thing is to use the Sherman Anti-Trust Act as a previous poster pointed out. We need some good old-fashioned "trust busting" going on. We need an organized progressive front to elect progressive politicians who have the balls to use such a weapon against corporations. We'll break up the media monopolies as well as the oligarchies that dominate many other industries.

At the same time, we should work for election reform. Ban special interest/corporate money. That kind of money is giving a rich few a disproportionate amount of influence in our country, and it's time we limit that. Replace our current system with a fully taxpayer subsidized election system. The only money the politicians should be listening to is the people's money.

Oh, and don't forget to abolish the Electoral College and work to institute instant run-offs for all federal elections where there are more than two candidates running.

[quaker bill]

52. I understand the sentiment

But I disagree on the approach. What we need to do is shine a very bright light on the damage they caused. Investigations and criminal prosecutions should occur anytime the evidence warrants.

Beyond that, I would disagree with the administration pursuing the matter further.

Conservatives thrive on a persecution complex. They are at their strongest when out of power and a disgruntled minority. It is only when they are in power and their ideas are tried that their movement is exposed as intellectually bankrupt and morally deficient.

As we have seen, once they have to take responsibility for results, they unravel. We should detail the unravelling on the big screen in technicolor.

Conservatives cannot use power in a moral way. This is simply because their philosophy is grounded in the individual. Beacuse of this they have no vision the "greater good". The concept that the individual should make any sacrifice to the "greater good" is entirely antithetical to their world view. We simply need to use the evidence of the destruction that this belief system causes, which will be readily at hand, to drive the point home.

[Bozos for Bush]

60. Agreed - presenting Gary Jarmin for your pleasure

Gary Jarmin, of 208 S. Patrick Street in Alexandria, VA, is our enemy. Today, Gary (with the help of Response Dynamics) operates such illustrious organizations as the US Cuba Foundation, Christian Voice, American Christian Cause, and the American Federation of Senior Citizens - which mailed the scary social security letter to my mom, making her believe she had to sign a stupid card and send it back with money, or else she would lose her benefits. He is my first enemy, of many...

Gary Jarmin is so powerful, he can pick up a phone on a whim and obtain a letter from George Bush, himself. As a fellow member of the Council for National Policy (CNP), Gary interacts with a Who's Who of the neo-con/religious right alliance that we all now know as the VRWC. Gary co-founded the American Coalition of Traditional Values with Tim Lahaye, who is nothing less than perhaps the most powerful false prophet in America, the author of the Left Behind series of books, a leader of the CNP, and the man who interviewed George Bush for over two hours in early 2000 on behalf of the religious right, and approved him for President. To top it off, Gary was also a Moonie - and not just any Moonie, but one of the most beloved Moonies ever.

If we can bring down Jarmin, we can start to bring down his false prophet buddies, as well as Response Dynamics, the company that excels at scamming seniors...and just happens to assist other notorious clients such as the Ridenours (tied to Morton Blackwell, Richard Scaife, and Jack Abramoff), and the College Republican National Committee.

[Dark]

61. PNAC, Christian Coalition, Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell

All of these need to be investigated.

[FlaGranny]

66. Of course not, not me anyway.

But I'm certainly not against exposing them for their complicity in the events of the past 10 or 20 years, but only because I believe in justice and preventing recurrences of past mistakes. Otherwise, I don't hold a vindictive bone in my body - it's bad for my health. It's also one of the traits that makes me "liberal."

Edit: Expose, gather evidence, and put them on trial. Put them in jail if convicted. Every last one of them. But this is not war - this is only justice.

[JHB]

69. Paul Krugman Gets It! Make sure All Dems do!

TO: The day after the election, what’s the column if Kerry wins?
PK: Do not be magnanimous in victory. I hope the people around him understand that this is not politics as we know it. It’s not, “OK, well, we won an election. After the election we’ll get together and work in a bipartisan way to help the country.” They didn’t work in a bipartisan way when the United States was attacked. They immediately saw it as a way to achieve political dominance. Kerry has got to understand that he has a window of opportunity to expose what’s going on and to rock these people back to the point where we can try to reclaim the normal workings of democracy. Unless there’s a true miracle and the Democrats take the House—which is extremely unlikely—it’s going to be very bitter political civil war from Day One. The House leadership will try to undermine Kerry. I’m sure they’ll try to impeach him almost immediately. On anything.

We can go on and on about Tom DeLay, but the point is Tom DeLay is not an aberrant thing. He’s not an accident. The whole thrust of where we’ve been going for a couple of decades in this country has been towards putting someone like Tom DeLay in a position of great power. So, my column to Kerry, my open letter to him if he wins, will be: Do not be magnanimous. You need to expose and dismantle this machine.

TO: Assuming they don’t shred everything beforehand.
PK: They can’t shred the people. The biggest thing would be to end the reign of terror in the agencies, so that the CIA and the Treasury Department—the civil servants—can talk about what actually happened. It’s obvious that there was intense pressure placed upon the agencies to come up with the conclusion that wanted. But very few people are willing to say that, because these guys play rough. There’s a lot of funny stuff involving the Justice Department, where officials who’ve criticized Ashcroft’s handling of stuff—which is disastrous, right? Not a single successful terror prosecution a lot of grandstanding—have found themselves subject to internal investigations. If we can get to a point where these people can speak freely, it will matter a lot. Homeland Security: I want people to be able to talk freely about the timing of terror alerts. You can draw a chart and it’s obvious that terror alerts increase when Bush is down in the polls and vanish when he’s up in the polls. But we need someone to go on the record and say that they’ve been used as a political tool.
----more----
http://www.texasobserver.org/showArticle.asp?ArticleID=1777

[Love Bug]

71. Best way to start is to restore the Fairness Doctrine

That's one of my personal goals for the next 4 years--to get the Fairness Doctrine reinstated. True campaign finance reform is another--no corporate money. None. Nada.

[Nordic]

76. yes, and then have it cover the cable networks as well!

anyone purporting to be a "news" organization should have to follow certain guidelines.

The cable networks are as much a part of the public domain as the airwaves.

Things have changed.

[Larkspur]

72. And we'll be going after the DLC and Repuke-lite Dems as well

[leftofthedial]

74. win or lose, it's a war we're already in

the bad guys have a thirty-year head start.

[GoneOffShore]

75. You forgot a couple

Scaife, Ed Koch, and Focus on the Family.

[Bozos for Bush]

80. We're not going to forget a single one of them by the time we're through.

And breaking news on CBS about Osama's new tape...

Meanwhile, we have a war on our hands, against Americans who scam seniors, Americans who deny others the right to vote, Americans who commit immoral and unethical acts against others, all for the sake of money and power.

Do not forget their names - Jarmin, Ridenours, Crow, Scaife, Lahaye, Perry, Bozell, et al. Do not forget a single one of them.

[lthuedk]

78. Bring 'em to their knees

If you want to bring CEO America to its knees, stop buying everything except food, meds, and gas. A general strike works.

Stephen Pitt

[starroute]

81. It's important to know the people behind the organizations

One reason the right has been able to operate so effectively is that they do so from behind the cover of hundreds of different organizations, many of them with innocuous-sounding names that often that conceal their true purposes.

For example, who would think there was anything wrong with "Americans for Fair Taxation" or "Citizens Against Government Waste"? But both of these are extremist anti-tax and anti-government groups. And who would suspect that something as respectable as the "National Center for Public Policy Research" could be in the business of scamming senior citizens?

There are even worse examples, like the American Civil Rights Organization, which is dedicated to opposing affirmative action. The United Seniors Association, the 60 Plus Association, and the Senior Coalition are all fronts for the drug companies. Students for Academic Freedom is devoted to shutting out liberal opinions on campus.

If you Google on the names of these organizationss, you see them described over and over as non-partisan, or as independent study groups. It can take real digging to find out who their officers and backers are and what they actually stand for.

But the names of people can't be covered over in the same way. "Americans for Tax Reform" or "American Shareholders Association" may not mean much, but say "Grover Norquist" and most of us immediately know him as the guy who wants to shrink government down to the point where he can drown it in the bathtub.

Then add in that Norquist was a leader of the College Republican National Committee in the early 80's, at the same time as Jack Abramoff -- that Abramoff is a director of the National Center for Public Policy Research, which is scamming senior citizens -- and that the College Republican National Committee is now also scamming seniors, using the same direct-mail solicitation firm as the National Center for Public Policy Research. At that point, a meaningful pattern begins to emerge.

This is why Bozos began this thread with names like Gary Jarmin, the Ridenours, and Jack Abramoff. These are some of the people behind the anonymous organizations, and their names are the ones we really need to know. Anonymity is their greatest strength, because most Americans would not agree with their true agenda if they knew what it was. Therefore, we must deprive them of that anonymity.

[Bozos for Bush]

82. And we will, starting November 3rd!

Starroute just nailed their greatest strength - anonymity.

When we get through with these people, hopefully they'll be household names.

Perhaps you've never heard of Harold Simmons and his Contran Corporation, but you'll know them well by XMAS. Harold btw has given the Swift Boat liars $3 million, as of October 15th.

You might have heard of Bob Perry, one of George Bush's best friends, but did you also know that he has given the Swift Boat liars $2.9 million?

Progress for America - what an innocent sounding name. In actuality, this monster 527 has spent more than $35 million in the last few months on behalf of Bush. But what you might not know is that they use Mentzer Media Services, Inc. to get their message out - over $23 million worth of messages in 2004, and the Swift Boat liars just happen to use them as well...to a tune of nearly $12 million.

We will strip away their anonymity, and expose them for who and what they really are. And then we'll shut them down.

[Catshrink]

83. Hell yeah!

I'm a warrior! Count me in!!! I want my country back. I want my flag back.