Some of the most bizarre (and hilarious) comments ever posted to this blog came in over the last few days in response to Glenn Reynolds’ Carville denial. The facts of the story are pretty straightforward, and supported by Kausfiles and NRO: Lott sucked-up to Strom Thurmond for years about his failed presidential bid, but it wasn’t news until Sid Blumenthal, James Carville, Josh Marshall, and Gene Lyons (Clinton operatives one and all) made it news through an e-mail and CNN campaign. So the bloggers who made the Lott Pandergate story a big deal in Blogistan were in fact doing Carville’s bidding, although, as I’ve already said, they didn’t know it at the time. Nobody wants to be made out to be an unwitting dupe of a clever cabal of operatives, so Reynolds wants to position this revelation as something odd. This is really silly, of course.
The only interesting questions about Carville’s Pandergate fiasco have to do with what the hoped-for goal was, and whether it’s really backfired. The obvious theory is that he was shooting for Lott’s resignation from the Senate, which would have created a 50/50 split once again. According to this scenario, the episode backfired, because Lottt didn’t step down and the Reeps reacted with honor, etc, etc. But Carville is a devious bastard, and he’s got a history of reaching out to the racist, Southern voter in creative ways: during Clinton’s ’92 campaign, the KKK outreach took the form of the infamous Sistah Souljah speech, the shunning of long-time Clinton bud Jesse Jackson, and highlighting welfare reform as a central campaign issue.
Alongside Poppa Bush, this strategy made him the more Klan-friendly candidate. Now that Lott has been badly treated by his party, according this scenario, KKK and CCC-oriented voters will once again return to the Democratic Party fold.
If this sounds totally paranoid to you, you don’t know how campaign managers think. One such person of my personal acquaintance once managed to secure an NRA endorsement for a candidate in a race in a very touchy-feely district in order to drive voters to her opponent; this sort of reverse-dunk thinking is actually commonplace. All it takes to pull it off is a few naifs who believe politics is about principle rather than counting votes, and Blogistan is full of such characters.
In future campaigns, the ability to manipulate Blogistan will become an important predictor of political success.
No group of Democratic operatives has the power to do what Karl Rove did. Namely, engineer the replacement of a weak Senate leader with a Bush-boot-licking suckup who can assume a “compassionate” facade.
Ya got to be a loony wastelands Republican to believe any liberals have power in 2003 America.
“OK … First I’ll access the secret military spy satelite that is in geosynchronous orbit over the midwest. Then I’ll ID the limo by the vanity plate “MR. BIGGG” and get his approximate position. Then I’ll reposition the transmission dish on the remote truck to 17.32 degrees east, hit WESTAR 4 over the Atlantic, bounce the signal back into the aerosphere up to COMSAT 6, beam it back to SATCOM 2 transmitter number 137 and down on the dish on the back of Mr. Big’s limo… It’s almost too easy. ”
(Garth Algar in “Wayne’s World”, 1992)
So, either the left has to distance itself from the more radical elements in their tent and/or embrace at least some of the GOP goals (welfare reform) or they’re out of touch, and if they do they’re secretly pandering to racist KKK elements that just aren’t welcome in the GOP anymore. Nice.
Are we to expect this is the new ‘Damned if they do, damned if they don’t’ RNC spin points? Please run with this. You guys aren’t sinking in the polls fast enough and this is sure to help.
(Did you know that most people absorbed into cults are otherwise highly intelligent individuals? What? No, no reason for the question? As you were. Forget I said anything.)
Sounds “totally paranoid” to me. The New Year is a good time for a mental health checkup, Richard Bennett.
Richard and I disagree on a lot of things, but he hit the nail on the head when he described the mentality of campaign managers.
That said, I don’t see white supremacists flocking to the Democratic Party, unless pocketbook issues become more important to them than their social issues.