Reply #15: Been said 50 cazillion times [View All]

This was the approach in 2004 and the same people who manipulated the vote THEN are manipulating it NOW. They don't WANT to know and no amount of rational debate is going to change them. They're intimidated into believing the false myth that real men aren't Democrats and the worst thing you can say about a man is that he's not a fighter or doesn't have the courage of his convictions. That's how they've successfully framed John Kerry. It isn't something you can prove with speeches or words. It is something men grant each other and men are just as vulnerable to masculine insecurity as any bunch of high school mean girls.

Winning political battles does not just take place in the head, especially not the reasoned rational head. Some people respond to visual images, others to emotional appeals to guilt and greed and sometimes to giving and honesty.

Watching the reports on Gerald Ford these last days, it seems to me that he suffered some of the same unfair ridicule John Kerry did. It's amazing how much power SNL can have. Here's a football star, Yale grad, who saved an entire military ship in WWII. Yet what we know him most for is being a bumbling doof, which is obviously far from true. Sound familiar?

People repeat lies and gossip because it serves some inner emotional purpose. Democrats were intimidated into either being silent or repeating blowjob 'jokes', until it became clear that we, and the world, needed a rehabilitated Clinton more than we needed to be liked for agreeing that Bill Clinton was a degenerate. The same is true of Al Gore, now that he is taking the lead on global warming. NOW, people will fight the unfair ridicule he received rather than snickering or silently letting the slander go unchallenged.

The same will be true of John Kerry. When people believe he has a conviction that only he can answer, then they'll rally to his side and begin to stand up against some of these smears. It's up to us to paint a picture of a man whose entire life has led him to this purpose, ending the Iraq War and putting us on the right course for ending terrorism. You don't do that nitpicking policy and speeches, you do that by driving home the man's courage and determination. And not being afraid to point out the cowardice of those who won't stand up to the lies against him like they wouldn't stand up to the lies against Gore and Clinton and Dukakis and Carter and even all the way back to FDR.