Jeffrey Lord: Remember Sarah Palin?

Welcome to the club, Gov. Walker
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The American Spectator's Jeffrey Lord, on the AmSpec Blog, sees Alinsky's Rule 13 in action:

I know you can remember. She made liberals foam. Go nuts. Crazy nuts. And when some of us tried to point out that she was following a path trod by other conservatives from a young Richard Nixon to an old Ronald Reagan to a middle-aged Rush Limbaugh and George W. Bush and Sean Hannity, Mark Levin, Glenn Beck, Ann Coulter -- the path of most hated conservative in the land -- we were told (indignantly!) that this wasn't so…that it really was all about Sarah herself. She was just…just…well…fill in the epithet of your choice.

Suddenly…Sarah Palin turns out NOT to be the most hated conservative in America. Uh-uh. The crown has been rudely snatched and jammed on someone else's head. That honor has now reverted to a white guy. This one named… Scott Walker. Shoved into the coliseum as the lions roar… he's Hitler. He's Mussolini. He's a Nazi, a Fascist, a racist, a tool of billionaires. He's so bad he makes Sarah Palin look reassuringly plain old vanilla.

Not to put too fine a point on this, but this is what happens when a conservative or even someone who is not a movement conservative but flies enough conservative colors -- becomes the focus of left-wing wrath. What we are watching in real time is the demonization of Scott Walker by the left…a process recently devoted exclusively to Sarah Palin and before that to George W., the talk radio stars, Ann Coulter, the Fox crew.

The irony is that this process is now becoming familiar to more and more people -- more people get the game. Which has two interesting side effects.

One, people begin to realize what the real game is -- discrediting conservatism itself by using one star as a target. The old Alinsky trick of picking the target, freezing it, personalizing it etc.

And two -- by focusing on the newest target with such fierce animosity, it makes the last target fade into… dare we say it… the comfort of a reassuringly familiar face...

We have just one minor disagreement with Jeffrey Lord. When the left is done with Scott Walker, it's not bloody likely that "someone now unknown" will be thrown into the middle of Alinsky Memorial Coliseum to face the lions. It will be "deja vu all over again," because they don't consider the demonization of Gov. Palin to be complete. As Aaron Goldstein succinctly phrased it at the IC Blog:

"Make no mistake. Sarah Palin is still in the crosshairs."

This goes double if she gets into the 2012 presidential race as expected.

- JP

Marc Schenker: Sarah Palin's Warning

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Excerpts from Marc Schenker's latest Examiner op-ed:

Sarah Palin is warning conservatives and Republicans that the Left will get more destructive as their poll numbers before the midterm elections continue to decrease. Speaking on Sean Hannity’s Fox News show last night, Palin appeared to give her analysis on what to do to fix the economy, how Republicans should handle the destructive smears from the Left before the midterms, and what the Republicans’ closing argument should be to make their case to voters. With pre-midterm polling data showing only increasing dominance on the Republican side and a wider gulf between who voters say they’ll choose, the Democrat Smear Machine is gearing up its ugly self in full force, mainly because Democrats have no record to run on. Insofar, they would rather resort to the politics of personal destruction than discuss why and how their party has screwed up the US in just a few short years.

With new and depressing polling numbers out from Gallup that show Democrats losing big time in both scenarios of high and low voter turnout, Palin’s warning to expect only the slimiest, dirtiest gutter-politics from the uncivil and hateful partisans on the Left is oh-so-true. There have already been increasing signs just in the last few weeks of this repulsive and worsening trend by the Party of No Ideas And Only Name-Calling (read: the Democrat Party).

Take the slanderous hit job that victimized the Republican candidate running in Florida’s 8th congressional district, Daniel Webster. The perpetrator of that hit job of a political ad was none other than the always-shameful Alan Grayson...

(More)

Yes, libs, she's not only read Rules for Radicals, Gov. Palin has had every tactic in the book used against her, her family and her friends. And she's not only still standing, she's still fighting and kicking your sorry backsides.

- JP

Just when you think SC politics couldn't get any dirtier...

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South Carolina politics reminds us of the scene in the 1969 cult movie "The Magic Christian," where the characters played by Peter Sellers and Ringo Starr stage their most outrageous of a long series of stunts intended to demonstrate that everyone has their price. The two fill a huge vat with a mixture of blood and animal excrement and sprinkle thousands of bank notes on the top. People wade into the filthy mess to recover the cash, and some of them even submerge themselves to grab at the money that had sunk beneath the surface.

Substitute political power for money in the film's script, and you have a fitting metaphor for SC politics. In this year's GOP primary for governor of South Carolina, candidate Nikki Haley was mostly ignored by her opponents while she was back in the pack. But Sarah Palin endorsed her, Haley sprinted into the lead, and now her competition sinks ever deeper into the vat of filth as they try to destory her.

It is a story best told by the bloggers who have been following it. Just follow the links...

Eric Erickson:

Andre Bauer’s campaign to paint Nikki Haley as a two-timing wh*re — and you’ll have to forgive me if you object to the word, but that is exactly what the dribbling out of “I slept with Nikki Haley” stories was designed to do — blew up in his face.

Now he’s moved on to her being a raghead.

[...]

Jake Knotts is the guy. You know him. He’s allegedly the guy who hired a private investigator to look into Will Folks. He is the guy whose private investigator allegedly took a picture proving the affair.

It’s all too convenient. Let me break it down for you: Andre Bauer failed in his bid to paint Nikki Haley as a wh*re, so now he’s trying to paint her as a raghead. David Brody is serving as the useful idiot, most likely willingly. The story got out there [Thursday] morning and Jake Knotts let loose [Thursday] afternoon. It’s all designed to move the conversation from “is she a wh*re?” to “is she an American?”

Allahpundit:

This latest bit started with David Brody of CBN, wondering why Haley’s campaign website in 2004 emphasized her Sikh faith and why her current one emphasizes her Christian faith. Just a case of a reporter doing a little digging on his own initiative? Not quite.

[...]

The good news, I guess, is that there’s not much further to go until rock bottom.

Brian O'Connor:

It seems that after Knotts’ comments aired, the State Senator attempted the old “apologize” by reinforcing your comments trick...

[...]

So, Knotts not only called Nikki Haley a “raghead”, he called President Obama a “raghead” as well.

I do not know what Haley should be more upset about, the racial slur, or the comparison to [Barack] Obama. Either way, Knotts clearly believes that Haley is lying about her Christianity. The problem for Knotts, career politicians only make hate filled, racist comments when their heart is hate filled and racist.

Stacy McCain;

I’m having a hard time imagining a contextual defense of Knotts’ remark. The South Carolina GOP chairwoman [Karen Floyd] has denounced Knotts’ comment...

[...]

It would have been nice if Floyd also condemned the sexual smear campaign against Haley. It’s clear Haley’s opponents have so dehumanized her in their own minds that they no longer recognize any boundaries between fair tactics and foul.

Dan Riehl:

Does every political race in South Carolina look like a screening of Deliverance?

I realize many conservatives love DeMint, but isn't he mostly a wash by the time you take Lindsey Graham into account?

[...]

And where are Graham and DeMint in all this? Both fashion themselves as national GOP leaders of a sort. Maybe their time would be better invested cleaning up the cesspool of antiquated racial politics in which they cut their political teeth?

One good lesson to be learned from this sorry mess is this: For those on the conservative side who argue that the best way to beat the leftists is to adopt their "the ends justify the means" political philosophy and the tactics which it leads to, just look at the result when those tactics are employed by Republicans against other Republicans. It's not only a sight that is not pretty, it stinks as badly as that vat of filth in "The Magic Christian."

The better way is to learn about Alinsky's methods, but only to recognize them, not to try to use them ourselves. If we do, we end up like Nikki Haley's opponents in South Carolina, whose attacks are only making her stronger and themselves more despised. Instead, we should counter Alinsky's tactics with those of Sun Tzu, the Chinese general whose book on military strategy, The Art of War, was written in the 6th century BC. The general's tactics have been applied to a number of situations in modern life, and the book has helped many leaders and business people succeed in their chosen fields. The wisdom of Sun Tzu is valuable knowledge for those who fight the battles of modern politics and want to win the war.

- JP

Leftists push counterfeit Bachmann-Palin tickets

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Leftists, can't do anything in a straightforward manner. With them, it's always dirty tricks and subterfuge. Latest example The maggots at Wonkette (Dirtbag Warning!) have scanned some real tickets to the April 7th Minneapolis rally featuring Michele Bachmann and Sarah Palin, and posted them on the Web.

What do the widdle worms at Wonkette suggest the useful idiots who hang out there do with the ticket images? Wink wink, nudge nudge:

"... we’ve got scans of the rally tickets for you to, uh, look at. Or maybe try to use ‘em for real, by printing them out (5.5″ x 2″) on the same kind of cheap two-sided glossy laser-printer photo paper used by the real GOP of Minnesota!"

Their mommies or daddies must be so proud!

- JP

Quote of the Day (February 13, 2010)

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Phil Boehmke:

"Obviously Sarah had failed to cooperate with the Alinsky plan. No 'irrational anger' was forthcoming, she countered the strategic mocking of Obama's crew and the MSM with genuine good humor. What do you do with someone who can laugh at themselves?"

Sarah Palin's Sun Tzu Trumps Obama's Saul Alinsky

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In a Report today, Fox News White House correspondent Major Garrett observed, "Sarah Palin remains... somewhat of an obsession to the Obama White House." And over at CNN, producer Peter Hamby tweeted, "Gibbs probably revealed that the White House thinks about Palin a little more than they like to let on." (h/t: Tommy Report)

Another way of evaluating this obsession the Obama administration has with Sarah Palin is in the strategic sense of a fighter pilot, who would say that Gov. Palin is "inside Obama's OODA Loop." The term, from the acronym for Observe, Orient, Decide and Act, is a concept from the mind of the late USAF Col. John Boyd, a former fighter pilot who wrote the first manual on jet aerial combat. Although the OODA model was originally developed for military purposes, elements of the same theory can also be applied to business strategy, law enforcement and -- yes -- to politics.

In political wars, execution of the OODA cycle can allow one to get inside the mind and decision cycle of the adversary. Boyd was influenced bythe writings of Sun Tzu, who wrote The Art of War 2,500 years ago:

"If you know yourself and know your enemy in a hundred battles you will not be in peril, If you know yourself and not your enemy for every battle won you will suffer a defeat, If you know neither yourself nor your enemy in every battle you will be in peril."

Boyd's strategy holds that an enemy can be defeated strategically by psychological paralysis. He emphasized that strategy should always revolve around changing the enemy’s behavior, not annihilating his forces. Both Boyd and Sun Tzu advocated the ideas of harmony, deception, swiftness and fluidity of action, surprise, shock, and attacking the enemy’s strategy. If the enemy perceives the wrong threats or misunderstands what is happening in the environment around him, then he will orient his thinking (and assets) in the wrong directions and ultimately make incorrect decisions.

In the August of 2008, there was some speculation by Michael Barone and others that McCain, the old Navy fighter pilot, was pursuing an OODA strategy against Obama. But other than the selection of Sarah Palin as his running mate, McCain never showed that he grasped the concept, at least as how it is applied to politics. Gov. Palin, on the other hand, seems to at least instinctively understand both the Boyd and the Sun Tzu way of taking the battle to one's opponents. She certainly knows her enemy.

So what we are seeing here is Sarah Palin's Sun Tzu and John Boyd versus Obama's Saul Alinsky. Sarah's strategic mentors are winning. Everything the White House does is a reaction to a Sarah Palin action. She is right inside their minds and inside their loop. She acts in ways they don't understand, and by the time they react, she has already confounded them again.

When Sarah Palin wrote some topics on her hand, she did nothing less than millions of ordinary Americans have done at one time or another. The reaction of the White House was to follow Alinsky and ridicule her. But they don't understand that when they ridicule Sarah Palin, they are ridiculing those millions of ordinary Americans at the same time. From inside the administration's OODA loop, Gov. Palin is making not just the White House, but all of Obama's other support troops behave in a predictable manner -- one which is perceived as elitist and frowned upon by the great majority of real folks. It only serves to widen the gap between those who occupy the seat of power and those who disapprove of the way they wield it.

- JP

Why independents are tuning out the Left

Independents and some blue-collar moderates are running away from the Democrat Party and the radical Leftists who control it in droves. What is turning them off? Liberals, instead of engaging in substantive debate or constructive criticism, can only insult conservatives, and that's not what independents want to hear.

Here's an example:

I really enjoy a good discussion no matter what the subject and it’s always fun to play devil’s advocate should the opportunity arise. I suppose this is why I listen to people like Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh and others on the extreme Right. I just wish there were folks like that on the Left which is why I had high hopes for Joy Behar on CNN. When I switched to Behar’s show the topic under discussion was Sarah Palin, which was no big surprise, she seems to be a favorite for discussions on the Left. I was so disappointed when the conversation was exactly what I have come to expect from the Left, just a bunch of insults. I really wish they would twist facts and statistics like their counterparts on the Right to make things more interesting. I heard comments like, “Sarah Palin is just promoting her book which is strange since she has never read a book”, and, “… George Bush who never read a book…”, which is just what I have come to expect from the Left. I was never a fan of George Bush and I’m always happy to debate his presidency and policies. From what I understand of the past President he was actually very well read, perhaps not the greatest speaker, but well read nonetheless which makes these kind of comments just insults and lies. Come on Joy, you can do better, I’m sure of it. Joy Behar really should try and learn more [than] Hannity and Limbaugh, if she did, people like me might actually watch her show once in a while.

While we're not sure where that blogger stands on the political spectrum, we can extrapolate that he or she is not a conservative, since the author considers a rather mainstream conservative such as Hannity (who is a big fan of moderate Rudy Giuliani) to be on the "extreme right." We can therefore reasonably assume that he or she is a moderate or an intellectually honest liberal.

What is telling here is that the Alinskyite tactic of ridicule is a big turn-off for the writer. Just how many others share this person's thinking remains to be seen, but we believe the number is growing rapidly. People are interested in hearing why one side believes its solutions to the problems that they face in this country will work better than what the opposition proposes, not childish insults.

Here is a golden opportunity for Sarah Palin to gain ground with independents and blue-collar moderate Democrats. As the Left continues to insult her -- and you know that they will because they didn't learn this lesson in Ronald Reagan's day -- she will ride above the smears and present an optimistic vision for America which can be realized through the application of common-sense conservative principles.

Please, leftists, don't change a thing that you're doing. You are turning out to be our best recruiters. Thank you for your contribution to our cause.

Update: Richard Cohen proves our point with his insults and lack of substance.

- JP

Quote of the Day (September 26, 2009)

Doug Ross:

"Considering that Sarah Palin needs utter only a single statement -- and political hacks, the mainstream media, Hollywood celebrities and lefty blogs react with foaming-at-the-mouth fury -- I'd say she's learned much from Alinsky."

- JP

Quote of the Day (September 21, 2009)

Bob Morris:

"Hey, Sarah Palin says something outrageous and liberal blogs get infuriated, foam at the mouth, and run the story constantly. I’d say she has them well-trained."

- JP

Mark Noonan on The Palin Effect

To paraphrase George C. Scott's Patton, "Alinsky, you magnificent bastard. Sarah Palin read your book." And she's using it as a weapon against your dark army, as Mark Noonan observes in "The Palin Effect":

“Death Panels” did it - and I know our liberals still yank their hair in frustration…there was no such thing, they assert.

[...]

But... so were there “death panels” in the health care reform proposals, disguised as various commissions and committees which would [oversee] what coverage plans were to provide. And Sarah Palin’s phrasing was crucial to turning the debate firmly against Obama and his Democrats.

[...]

We’ll have to see if Palin can develop Reaganesque ability to re-shape public perceptions. But, be that as it may, Palin has shown why she rose so far and so fast - and still has a shot at the White House in 2012: she’s very, very smart.

And she’s made the left jump to her tune - that, in and of itself, will provide satisfaction when set against the slanders the left has launched against her.

Recommended reading.

- JP

Democrats' Alinsky tactics spread from AK to MN

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The Democrat Party, using networks of local blogger operatives, successfully bogged down the Alaska state government with a series of bogus "ethics" complaints and FOI requests, all designed to destroy former Gov. Sarah Palin. Now the party of Hope and Change is using the same strategy in Minnesota:

"Three Minnesota bloggers filed an ethics complaint against Rep. Michele Bachmann this week, claiming the Republican violated House franking rules in an email to constituents."

Sound familiar? In the early stages of using the strategy, Obama's goon squads seem to be concentrating on on states that have attractive, conservative women of faith in public office:

The bloggers say Bachmann advocated for the National Automobile Dealers Association, which is a political organization. They say that violates House franking rules, which stipulate that members can only refer readers to government resources and private groups doing public policy programs such as the Red Cross.

We believe it is of no small significance that the dealers association (N.A.D.A.) provided legal and other support to those Chrysler and GM dealers who believed they were being unfairly shut down when Obama's fascist takeover of the two automakers required the corporations to close large numbers of their dealerships.

The strategy being used in Minnesota and Alaska is a variation of the Cloward-Piven Strategy, which is explained here. Just because the latest variant of the strategy, which employs Alinsky's methods in a manner that would do Uncle Joe Stalin proud, has so far only been employed against conservative women, don't think for a moment that your own state's young male conservative guns are somehow immune to Cloward-Piven and the Democrat goon squads who employ it. It will eventually be used against them as well.

The Democrats are ignoring the old warhorses on the right and aiming their Stalinist tactics right at the GOP's most promising young stars -- those who have been touted in recent years as being "the future of the Republican Party." Obama's most ardent supporters are determined to see to it that the GOP has no future, except for the squishy sort of candidates who can be counted on to lose elections to their Democrat opponents. No one even remotely Reagan-like will be allowed to stand untainted by their vile smears.

Exit question: What do you, dear reader, intend to do about it?

- JP

Alinsky Rules: Drive-by hate bloggers keep makin' things up

The same Democrat operatives / nutroots bloggers who hounded Sarah Palin with bogus ethics complaints are now attacking her family by spreading vile and vicious lies about her marriage. The vile creature "Gryphen" posted on the appropriately-named hate blog "Immoral Minority" -- quoting the all-too-nebulous "anonymous sources" -- that Sarah Palin has decided to end her marriage to Todd, tossed her wedding ring into a lake and has purchased land in Montana so she can move "herself and the children as far away from Alaska as she can get."

It seems to us that if one wished to get as far away from Alaska as one can get, Montana is the wrong destination. Assuming that such a location would be limited to the continental United States, the Florida Keys would probably put the most distance between one and Alaska.

Back in October on the campaign trial, vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin explained why she sometimes removes her wedding ring when she attends events that involve a lot of hand-shaking:

"And my wedding ring, it's in Todd's pocket cause it hurts sometimes when I shake hands and it gets squished..."

In a statement posted on former Gov. Palin's Facebook Notes page, her spokeswoman said that this was all so much manure:

Yet again, some so-called journalists have decided to make up a story. There is no truth to the recent “story” (and story is the correct term for this type of fiction) that the Palins are divorcing. The Palins remain married, committed to each other and their family, and have not purchased land in Montana (last week it was reported to be Long Island).

Less than one week ago, Governor Palin asked the media to “quit making things up.” We appreciate that the more professional journalists decided to question this story before repeating it.

Meg Stapleton

Yet Gryphen and fellow hate bloggers, undeterred by truth and common sense, continue to spin their Alinskyite web of lies.  A Stalinist's work is never completely done. 

h/t: Tim Lindell

Update: From Dan Riehl:

Just had a discussion with a source close to Sarah Palin, this is a quote from former Governor Sarah Palin:

"Divorce, Todd? Have you SEEN, Todd? I may be just a renegade Hockey Mom, but I'm not blind!"

RS McCain, who got the same quote, adds:

"Thank you, demented lying moonbats, for providing this unexpected opportunity to score a worldwide scoop with the governor's quote."

Breaking: We have obtained a video which explains how Gryphen "knows" that Sarah Palin "threw her wedding ring into the lake":



h/t: FReeper Dallas59

Update 2: Via the NY Post:

Palin attorney Thomas Van Flein blasted the "vicious" rumor as totally false.

"I spoke to Sarah and Todd this morning. They are not getting a divorce," he said in a press release.

CBS News: "Palin's Team Shoots Down Divorce Rumor"

More Reaction: Right Wing News, Scared Monkeys, Ace, Tom Lamb, Mashable, Jimmy Orr, Conservative Comeback, Wizbang, American Power, Sister Toljah and Macsmind.

- JP

Believe this: Mama Grizzy will get her payback

Doctor Zero's prognosis, "Nobody knows the Left’s game plan better than Sarah Palin, and it seems like she plans to use what she has learned":

Palin can do a lot of good by highlighting the thuggish tactics of the Left, which were all on nauseating display in the campaign to destroy her. Deranged conspiracy theories, in her case about the maternity of her son? Check. Blinding hypocrisy and manufactured “crises” pushed by political operatives masquerading as “journalists?” Absolutely. Vicious misogyny, passed along with nary a raised eyebrow from “feminists?” You betcha. Invasions of privacy and abuses of government to destroy a political target? Ten-four.

The good doctor is right. Using Saul Alinsky's Rules for Radicals as its strategic guide, the Left has smeared Sarah Palin with abandon, and it has not been held accountable so far:

Like the people who exploited Alaskan law to bury Palin under bogus ethics complaints, the Left is generally free to lob dirty bombs at its opponents, with few lasting repercussions. The story of David Letterman’s unforgivable attacks on the Palin children ended with Letterman still holding his job, having suffered nothing worse than being forced to issue a tortured apology… while Sarah Palin stopped being the governor of Alaska [Sunday]. Only time will tell if Letterman learned any sort of lesson from the affair, but you only need to drop by a liberal blog to see that the Left, as a whole, drew exactly the wrong lesson.

True, Sarah Palin has liberated herself from the Alaska governor's office, which in effect unties the one hand she previously had bound behind her back. She will now be able to go to battle with the Alinskyites unemcumbered. But it will be a bloody fight because the stakes are so high. As Phil Brennean observed:

They are making stuff up about Palin because telling the truth about her threatens to undo all they are trying to do to help Obama turn America into a socialist worker's paradise.

Brennan explained that it is key to the Left, its media shock troops and GOP fellow travellers that they define Sarah Palin as an ignorant and stupid snowbilly and her supporters as easily-duped fools in flyover country:

What makes Palin dangerous to the collectivists is her popularity with the great mass of ordinary Americans. They see her for what she is — one of them. When she speaks she speaks in a language they understand, and she makes sense — good common sense. She sees things as they see them and not as the media elite wants them to see them. And that makes her dangerous.

So she must be, in Brennan's words, "demonized, slandered, and crushed." The only problem with their plan is that Sarah Palin was raised by her parents, Chuck and Sally Heath, to be a fighter. She has shown no small degree of grit and determination in her life, though the Left and their media and Vichy GOP allies call her a quitter. Our money's on the mama grizzly wearing the Kawasaki glasses. She has a lot of payback coming, and we have no doubt that she has a plan of her own to extract it.

- JP

Bill Whittle video: The elites' war on Sarah Palin

Bill Whittle explains why the left, the media and Vichy Republicans joined in a de facto Axis of Elites to try to destroy Sarah Palin. This is must-see PJTV made out of pure 100% awesome.

But it's about much more than Sarah Palin. It's about a political struggle the good guys won't win unless they wake up, smell the Alinsky and stop taking prisoners.

Don't just watch it. E-mail it to your political friends... and foes.

Related: Here's a must-read to compliment Bill's must-see.

- JP

Aw jeez! Not THIS again...

Remember the old leftist lie about how Sarah Palin was allegedly charging rape victims in Alaska for rape kits? A rape kit is a collection of items used by medical personnel to collect and preserve physical evidence following a sexual assault. The bogus story, first circulated on nutroots websites with reputations for distortion and outright lies, percolated up into the liberal "mainstream" media, which has a reputation for simply reprinting material from their nutroots cronies without bothering to check for such pesky stuff as validity.

That the Big Liberal Lie has been thoroughly debunked matters little to most "feminist" groups of the deranged Left, who perpetuate the myth, according to House of Erastosthenes:

"They’re bringing up the thoroughly debunked urban legend about Sarah Palin and the rape kits — again. And they’ll do it again and again, anytime Palin’s name is brought back into the news and the general public reaction isn’t already quite as negative and visceral as they’d like it to be."

The reaction from conservatives is, "Aw jeez! Not this again." But we shouldn't be surprised. The tactic is right out of Alinsky's Rules for Radicals:

RULE 12: Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it. Cut off the support network and isolate the target from sympathy. Go after people and not institutions; people hurt faster than institutions. (This is cruel, but very effective. Direct, personalized criticism and ridicule works.)

But we shouldn't lay all of the blame on the radical feministas. Hey, if it works for Obama...

- JP

Van Flein: 'This is proper attribution'

The liberal lie has spread across the nutroots, as liberal lies tend to do. A HuffPo diarist had claimed that Gov. Palin 'plagiarized' Newt Gingrich, a ridiculous assertion which we debunked here.

Now Gov. Palin's lawyer, Thomas Van Flein weighs in:

"It is abundantly clear in context, and even in subcontext, that the overview of President Reagan's legacy was attributed to Newt Gingrich," Palin's lawyer, Thomas Van Flein, said.

"Far from 'lifting' or plagiary, this is proper attribution in a political speech," Van Flein said. "The audience was made aware that Mr. Gingrich wrote about President Reagan's legacy, and Gov. Palin attributed her paraphrasing to Mr. Gingrich expressly and did so at the beginning and at the end of the paraphrasing."

Palin twice referenced Gingrich during the speech. Toward the beginning, she said, "Recently, Newt Gingrich, he had written a good article about Reagan."

Later, she said, "What Newt had written in this article, he wrote, 'Remember how refreshing it was with his outrageous directness that Americans loved, and praised and deserved' that Reagan dealt with, with then the troublesome Soviet Union, remember this? His vision for the Cold War? We win, they lose."

This should be the end of the story, but the Left has a nasty habit of continuing to spread their vicious lies, even after they have been exposed as lies.

Rules for Radicals and all that....

- JP

Democrats live the Book of Saul

Who says Democrats aren't deeply religious? I'll have you know that their tactics come right from the Book of Saul - Saul Alinsky, that is. Bob Sikes:

Pick the target. Freeze it. Personalize it. Polarize it.

One of many memorable Saul Alinsky’s Rules for Radicals that Americans should find as common place since the Clinton years. The legendary communist still influences they way Democrats make political hay. Alinsky Rules are still at work with another true believer in Barack Obama. But no where do we see this frightening tactic at its zenith but in the continuous Democrat party attacks on Sarah Palin.

A must-read.

- JP