Inside the GOP Attack Machine

Friday, July 22

By John W. Leek, The Mississippi Press

Included on my vacation was a one-day Washington, D.C., conference for college-age people who write for (mostly college) newspapers. It was a remarkable experience including speeches by civil rights leader and U.S. Rep. John Lewis, (D-Ga.), former President Bill Clinton, and young elected officials, among many others.

It was sponsored by the liberal Center for American Progress and the makeup of the attendees mostly reflected that. I write this and the following because it provides an excellent example of how the Republican attack machine works.

Among the speakers included Paul Begala, a former Clinton strategist and CNN pundit. Quickly following the conference on Wednesday, July 13, conservative media was ablaze with the horrifying statement Begala had made that Republicans want to kill progressives and liberals. There's one major problem though, Begala never said it. Because nothing outrageous was said, the right-wing media had to make something up.

The first mention of the "Republicans want to kill us" quote came in an article for CNSNews.com by Jered Ede, who I did see there. The pertinent portion of his article follows.



"Young liberals this week flocked to the nation's capital to hear, among other things, liberal television pundit and Democrat political strategist Paul Begala accuse Republicans of wanting to kill him and his children to preserve tax cuts for the rich"

Begala's presence on the panel created a stir when he declared that Republicans had "done a ... poor job of defending" the U.S.

Republicans, he said, "want to kill us."'

That would be an outrageous statement were it true. So that you can see for yourself how dumb or disingenuous this mischaracterization is. Here follows the pertinent portion of the actual transcript:

"we sit back and allow George W. Bush and our Republican friends to pull out 9-11 like a cheap handgun in a bar fight. OK? "9-11." There's a drought in the Midwest. "9-11." The deficit's up. "9-11" You know? But, I think we need to fight them on that. I think, frankly they did a piss-poor job of defending us, and their strategy was always we'll fight them over there so we don't fight them here.' Well guess what, bin Laden didn't get the memo. He wants to fight us here as well as we saw in London last week. And so, their theory is, "we can't really do everything to protect our country because we have to cut taxes for the rich." And so, it... they want to kill us -- particularly this city and New York and some other places. I was driving past the Pentagon when that plane hit. I had friends on that plane, this is deadly serious to me -- they want to kill me and my children if they can. But if they just kill me and not my children, they want my children to be comforted that while they didn't protect me because they cut my taxes, my children won't have to pay any money on the money they inherit. You know, that is (expletive) national defense and we should say that."

I can tell you that every attendee understood "they want to kill us" to mean the terrorists want to kill us, not Republicans.

This is how conservatives in the media can keep so many folks so riled up about liberals. They maliciously find fault by taking things out of context or by outright fabrication.

This story didn't just appear on one extremist Web site. It was posted on the Drudge Report, a story appeared in the Moonie Washington Times, and was talked about on the Rush Limbaugh show. The lie was repeated dozens or possibly hundreds of times and to many conservatives, it is now fact.

It could not have been a simple misunderstanding because had any of the sources looked for verification they could have found none. Both the transcript and video of the event were easily accessible on the conference's web site.

This event by itself would be no cause for alarm, but it is repeated frequently and intentionally. The best perpetrated example I know of this is the so-called bin Laden-Saddam connection. There is no proof that the connection existed though there is proof that the two hated each other. Even so, many Americans believe this connection exists. The "proof" was published by a little known right-wing news site and was then the "proof" needed for conservatives to write about it, right-wing talkers to endlessly talk about it and for Fox News personalities to report on it. It was repeated so long and so often that many believe it to be fact, when even George W. Bush admits there is no connection.

If you read something, get a second source. If your second source is conservative, make sure it's not sourcing the same thing and of course remember to believe nothing you hear and only half of what you see. I can't tell you which half.

John W. Leek is a resident of Ocean Springs who will enroll at the University of Southern Mississippi this fall.

© 2005 The Mississippi Press.


Link: http://www.gulflive.com/opinion/mississippipress/


Catherine

Wow, that was an eye opener.