Straw Cows

June 9, 2009
The Milkman’s Son
By Tracy C. Baker
Straw Cows #135

Set ‘Em Up, Knock ‘Em Down
The G.NO.P are at it again. They are practicing their favorite sport, Straw Dogging. The rules are quite simple:

1. Find an issue, any issue, which the American people are inclined to agree with…or not give a tinker’s toot about.

2. Make up something out of thin air that has the probability of pissing people off.

3. Put that “something” out as FACT to “Fear and Fact-Challenged” Fox News, “Corporate Tool” Limbaugh, Bill “The Shill” O’Reilly, “Insanity” Hannity and any other far-right nut job you can find.

4. Make sure they repeat it over and over and over again while your propaganda machine sends it out to what passes for the mainstream media these days.

5. Make sure all your “bought and paid for” Politicians get on the Sunday morning talk shows so they can wave “proof” and embellish the lie even more.

6. When the public finally catches on that it was a straw dog, an out and outright lie, throw out another one for the next news cycle.

7. Repeat as needed. Hell, repeat even if it is not needed.

Oh, My God…She’s A…A…LATINO…AND A WOMAN!

The latest from the G.NO.P. is the attack on Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor.

“She said she could do better than a White Man! Oh, My God! She’s a racist!” Yeah, Rush, Savage, O’Reilly, Hannity, like you guys aren’t. By the by, that isn’t what she said at all. Read the WHOLE quote.

“She’s not so bright, you know. I know a lot of stupid people who went to Ivy League schools.” (Side note: That came from our favorite public enemy, Karl Rove, to which I respond…Are you talking about George Bush?” Just to set the record straight, she graduated from Princeton summa cum laude and went on to Yale Law School.)

“She’s one of (strike that)…She IS the most liberal judge on the bench!” (I’m sure they had that one waiting in the wings for whoever Obama nominated, but again, for the record, she was first nominated to the Federal bench by George H.W. Bush (R) and was sent to the Appeals Court by a Super Majority in a Republican controlled congress. Hmmm.)

And on and on.

Now, not a single one of these things are true. In fact they have absolutely no basis in fact, which would make them bald-faced lies. Once the media finally grew a pair and began to confront them with their lies, most of them quickly changed their tune. Then the G.NO.P went on to the next news cycle issue…Healthcare!

“Oh, My God! Do you know that a couple people had to wait six weeks to get a hip replacement in (insert your favorite country that has single-payer public health plans)!” To which I say, “Oh, My God! Did you know that thousands of people that need hip replacements can’t get them EVER because they have NO HEALTH COVERAGE!”

“Public Health Care is socialism and I will not allow the Democrat Socialist Party to bring communism to America!” Wait, isn’t Joseph McCarthy dead? Isn’t communism dead? Public Healthcare has nothing to do with Communism anymore than funding the Police department with our tax dollars is communism. You want true socialism; take a look at all the big banks and financial firms who were just fine with free-market capitalism right up until they began bleeding billions and trillions of dollars. Then it was “Oh, please, Mr. Taxpayer, help a billionaire out. I’m too big to fail!” Privatize the profits, socialize the losses.

“Do you want the government telling you which doctor to see and which procedure you can have?” Frankly, that is fine with me; much better than some billionaire CEO of my HMO telling me the same thing because he wants to give himself a raise.

Again, complete and utter lies; nothing but straw dogs. I saw a member of the G.NO.P. on television quoting a study showing how bad a public healthcare option would be for America. What he didn’t say was the study was made (up) by a right-wing think tank and funded in whole by that paragon of corporate virtue United Healthcare (the same United Healthcare whose CEO took home 1.6 BILLION in pay!)

So, why? Why would you keep putting out lie after lie as the truth? Well, two reasons. If you say a lie loud enough and long enough most people will start to believe it. That has been the Republican mantra for decades. (They picked it up from Joseph Goebbels’ playbook. No, really, look it up.)

The second reason is they are intellectually bankrupt. All their economic, social, diplomatic, and military ideas have failed (unless you are Haliburton and their ilk) and brought ruin to our country. They have absolutely nothing to offer…zip…nada. Well, they do say “NO” a lot.

And if you have nothing to offer when the American people want something, then all you can do is try to stir up fear, obfuscate the facts, block progress at every opportunity and hope the game of Straw Dogging works one more time.

Fini

Copyright 2009 The Milkman's Son, Tracy C. Baker