RAMMING SPEED! Time to Torpedo the Smear Boat Liars' PR Hacks!

[johnfunk]

From the latest e-mail edition of American Politics Journal. Reprinted with permission. Time to don the sailing gear, DUers: we're going to help the AARP and Rapid Responders torpedo the Smear Boat Liars' PR flacks:

The Smear Boat Liars' PR Team Sets Sail Again
... and this time, they want to torpedo Social Security and the AARP
by The Editors

Feb. 21, 2005 -- NEW YORK (apj.us) -- Here's a message forwarded to us by our in-house "rapid responder":

As you may already know, Bush is bringing back advisers to the old "Swift Boat" liars that scuttled Kerry's campaign to go after AARP -- even though AARP helped Bush last year when he needed his Medicare plan passed (
http://nytimes.com/2005/02/21/politics/21social.html?hp&ex=1109048400&en=31aa371bb47479ad&ei=5094&partner=homepage)!

We can use this to our advantage, so long as we act now.

If we act now, our letters will set the tone -- and turn back their attacks before they start them.

Rapid Response is why Bush is being forced to go to these people in the first place: he never expected to face any major opposition to his privatization plan, and he'd expected it to be signed into law by now!

But we beat them to the punch -- and framed the debate before they could.

As fans of George Lakoff know, once a frame is set in the public mind, it takes a lot more effort to undo it than it did to plant it.

The essential message to your local newspaper and your elected representatives should spell out this point:

• George W. Bush is so determined to push through his failed privatization plan that he's sending out the same people who slimed John Kerry with lies and smears last year to do the very same thing now to the AARP -- even though AARP backed his Medicare card plan last year."

There are variants that work well with people who follow national politics closely, naming names:

• Bush has become so desperate to bring his unpopular privatization plan back from the dead that he's brought back the folks who worked with proven liars and smear artists Jerome Corsi and John O'Neill to do his dirty work for him.

If you can dream up some frames of your own, please share them with us (send them to [e-mail]; we'll pass 'em on).

And back up your words with sources. Here are a few links to use that demonstrate the untrustworthiness of the so-called "Swift Boat Veterans for Truth" -- this gives newspapers the facts to that back your letter, and political staffers will also find these links useful. Right wingers can lie and try to get away with with it, and we know we are better than that:

http://mediamatters.org/items/search/200408250002 (this one collects most of the lies)
http://mediamatters.org/items/topic/200408060010
http://mediamatters.org/items/topic/200408120005
http://mediamatters.org/items/topic/200409150006
http://mediamatters.org/items/search/200410260001
http://mediamatters.org/items/search/200409160004
http://mediamatters.org/items/search/200408250004

You can contact your congresscritter using the search engine at http://www.house.gov/writerep/ and you can look up your senators' email addresses at http://www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm

You can find local and regional newspapers using the search engine at http://www.newspapers.com/search.htm

You can track down state and local political organizations starting with the state links at http://upload.democraticunderground.com/links/pages/State_and_Local/

Surf's up -- have fun!

[johnfunk]

1. Scoobie Davis: Smear Boaters' Flaks Cribbing From Tammy Bruce?

Check it out. Looks like someone has some 'splainin' to do...

[johnfunk]

10. More of USANext's banner ads by the Smear Boat PR folks exposed!

This is the one being posted to American Spectator...



Thanks to the sleuthing of a Talking Points Memo reader, two more have been found:





Cute, huh? Time to write to your local papers and elected officials about this phony grassroots effort targeting AARP.

[GiovanniC]

13. A Response to the First Ad

[johnfunk]

14. I like it -- so true! BTW, USANext and AmSpectator have removed the images

... but it's TOO LATE! At least two bloggers have copies of the grafx and screen shots.

[Kingshakabobo]

2. Am I missing something?

What the hell can these hacks possibly add to the debate?

Help me out here.

[jean]

3. they can suck up alot of time, energy and money from our side

[JHB]

4. They don't intend to add to the debate, they intend to subtract...

...They're being hired on to do a smear campaign against AARP, the way they ran a smear campaign against Kerry. (Remember, it's not the dopes from the boats thyat are being hired for this, it's the PR flaks that organized the Swift Boat Liars who're being employed here).

[johnfunk]

5. ... which means WE have to act to subtract -- THEM! Take a look...

at the banner ad they're running:



It's running on the American Spectator web site, and links you to USANext.org, a fake "grassrrots" seniors organization being aided by the Smear Boat Liars' PR team.

Which leads me to the new meme:

Back in the 1930s, hate radio -- Father Charles Coughlin and his ilk -- joined a number of newspapers and magazines in propagating anti-Semitism, railing against the corrosive "influence" that those filthy, greedy Jews were supposedly having on American "culture." Welcome to the 21st century. Substitute Rush for Father Coughlin, Free Republic and the Washington Times for the Hearst rags, take another look at that ad above, and consider this:

Gays are the new Jews.

'Nuff said...

[blm]

7. Wasn't Bob Novak's SON doing SwiftLiar PR?

That brood must have ice in their veins.

[SpiralHawk]

6. BushCo is going to deeply regret pissing off the AARP

This is going to hurt BushCo Big Time.

The masks are off. Many millions more Americans are seeing who Bush and his cronies really are, and how they are dismantling our great nation for the benefit of a few rich people.

Finally, it is getting noticed. This latest Swift Boat boner will call lots more attention to the whole stinking mess of BushCo.

[Greylyn58]

8. I agree with you on this

The seniors are a huge lobbying group and I think Shrub has bit off more than he can chew.

[cthrumatrix]

12. clearly a sign of desperation.............

[johnfunk]

9. Morning KICK - so the hard right wants to try to assail AARP?

Let's KICK 'em where it hurts

[kk897]

11. I've been researching CRC (the PR people) and Sean McCabe

who was the swifties' "spokesperson" for a few days now. Essentially, CRC reps every damn conservative group out there. They're behind *creating* these organizations. There's too much to explain, but if you want to find out exactly how powerful these people are, wend your way through my thread (I was posting as I was discovering, so it's a little disjointed):

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x3137074

don't be deceived by the LexisNexis beginning, although that in itself is incredibly disturbing. Obviously, the Right owns our history and controls our research, now, too.

[mandyky]

15. DemocracyforAmerica has a petition up

http://bsd.democracyforamerica.com/page/petition/stopusanext

The right-wing fringe has declared war on Social Security -- and this week they launched their newest attack.

The ridiculous image you see to the left is the latest from USA Next, a front group for radical conservatives who want to dismantle Social Security.

You won’t be surprised to hear who they hired to publicize their efforts: the same team of hatchet men that ran the swift boat smear campaign against John Kerry. Now they are targeting the AARP, a group that millions of seniors rely on to defend their interests.

We must stop these people … now.


Sign our petition to stop these dishonest, bigoted attacks from spreading any further.

Your petition will be delivered to every TV station that aired the swift boat ads during the 2004 campaign and any station that airs this new garbage in 2005