Let's Cloward-Piven the NYT/WaPo witch hunt

Because their hatred for Sarah Palin is are "just too darn irresistible"
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The Cloward-Piven strategy is a leftist tool which can be turned against them. Developed in the mid-1960s by Columbia University sociologists Andrew Cloward and Frances Fox Piven, their strategy owes much to Saul Alinsky's Rules for Radicals. The strategy’s original purpose was to bring about the fall of capitalism by overloading government bureaucracy until the wheels grind to a halt.

Some examples of Cloward-Piven are overloading electoral systems with overwhelming numbers of new voter registrations, never mind whether the bogus "voters" are among the living or the deceased; shaking down banks and mortgage houses, politicians in Congress, and the Department of Housing and Urban Development with affirmative-action loan applications; and creating a national financial "crisis" by demanding subprime mortgages for low-income Americans with no feasible means of repaying the loans. Those toxic mortgages helped lead to the financial bailout. Again, the key dynamic of Cloward-Piven involves overloading government with impossible demands until it breaks down under the burden.

But just as the Cloward-Piven strategy has worked for the left, it can be made to work against them. And just as it works when applied to government agencies, it will also work when aimed at other types of institutions. Although he doesn't mention Clward-Piven by name, AWR Hawkins suggests using a form of the strategy against The New York Times and The Washington Post as they enlist their readers' help in sorting through some 24,000 of Governor Palin's emails in search of anything they can use to try to destroy her. Here's how:

Both the Washington Post and the New York Times prove they’ve yet to learn how much the people love Palin. But we can help them learn this lesson after 1 pm by sending a ton of emails that have absolutely nothing to with Palin’s correspondence cache.

In other words, the Washington Post reports they’ll be posting Palin’s emails here, and they’ll include a link whereby readers can respond when they find that “most noteworthy” information. The New York Times has been kind enough to say they’ll post Palin’s emails here, and they will likewise include a link whereby readers can respond when they find that juicy nugget that’s going to prove Palin doesn’t love America after all (or that she really shot her Caribou from a distance of 120 yards instead of 123).

Our job is simple: once the emails post, we need to click the links for each paper (cited in previous paragraph) and send both of them an email (or emails) about the noteworthy information we found. But instead of sending something from Palin’s emails, send them your favorite line from a Charlton Heston speech or movie. Or send them your favorite line from your favorite song or from a piece of classic literature.

Even if both papers figure out what’s happening rather quickly, the knowledge that we’ve sent random information will them force to research and verify every email (and re-open and re-research those which they took for granted upon receiving them). In turn, this will ruin all their fun and shut this little experiment down before it even gets rolling.

Oh yes, and it will do one other thing too: it will teach them once more that America loves Sarah Palin.

Whether she runs for President or not (or whether you plan to vote for her or not), we can all agree that she stands for something the mainstream media ought not drag through the mud.

Spread the word folks. Recruit your friends. At 1 pm, it’s game on.

[More]

Yes, the corrupt media is indeed vulnerable to a Cloward-Piven operation. In the words of Washington Post Ombudsman Patrick Pexton, justifying the witch hunt, "Sarah Palin and her e-mails are just too darn irresistible." Well, the Washington Post, New York Times and their hatred for Sarah Palin are "just too darn irresistible" as well. Sauce for the gander. Any questions? Very well. Carry on.

- JP

The Evolution of the Lamestream Media's Palin Attacks

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The media's recent treatment of Sarah Palin shows how its Palin narrative has evolved. The new meme continues the eighteen-month attack on the 2008 GOP vice presidential candidate, of course, but now it admits to some degree of success on her part. This change in the lamestream media's strategy was mandated because when she resigned her office eight months ago, the media narrative at the time was that she had made a terrible mistake and was consigned to the dustbin of history.

Instead, The Arctic Fox emerged stronger and more powerful than ever, and nearly everyone can recognize that fact. So the media elites began to modify the narrative. The failure of the "irrelevancy" meme has led them to concede that Sarah Palin is a media star with a large following, but they continue to try to marginalize her as a political force. The new meme insists that Gov. Palin is the next Oprah Winfrey, but that she will never hold elective public office again. But saying so does not make it so.

A fine example of the evolved state-run media treatment of Sarah Palin can be seen in David Carr's column in the media section of the Sunday New York Times. Much of the familiar media condescension is still part of the media's most recent salvos fired at the former governor:

"After her failed bid for the vice presidency, she was more or less told to head back to Alaska to serve out her term as governor — a kind of metaphorical kitchen."

"Instead, she quit her day job and proceeded to become a one-woman national media empire, with the ratings and lucre to show for it."

Notice that by virtue of being chosen as Sen. John McCain's running mate, Gov. Palin is always described by the media as "failed," even though the failure was that of the McCain campaign. John Edwards is never referred to by the media elites as having "failed" in the 2004 election, nor is any other Democrat who ran on a losing presidential ticket.

"Filthy lucre" has become part and parcel of the new drive-by media meme. The latest effort is to use Sarah Palin's success as a wedge to drive between her and the average Americans who admire her because they feel that they share much in common with the happy warrior from Wasilla. The media is now trying to tell John Q. and Jane Q. Public, "Look, she's not like you. She's rich." Never mind that success hasn't spoiled Sarah one bit.

"With its tales of uplift and pluck, 'Real American Stories' trades in the kind of easy sentimentality that provokes eye rolls among those of us who work in media while quickening the pulse and patriotic ardor of almost everyone else."

This statement says a lot, probably much more than Carr intended when he wrote it. It is an admission that the lamestream media has severed the few remaining ties between the once-honorable profession of journalism and Mainstream America. It is a measure of the degree of condescension present in the media view of everyday Americans and drives home the meaning of the term "Media elites."

"Ms. Palin’s politics can border on the atavistic, but beyond her Tea Party theatrics, she has tunneled her own route into the public consciousness and gone into the Sarah Palin Across America business. And what a business it is."

Here Carr reveals that he and his fellow leftist media elites view Sarah Palin as a political throwback. The common sense conservatism of Ronald Reagan is indeed shared by Gov. Palin. That a large number of Americans also share it seems to be beyond the comprehension of the media elites. What Carr calls "theatrics" is what the right of center majority of Americans recognize as Sarah telling them the unvarnished truth.

"Many observers thought her unwillingness to serve out her term would be fatal to her ambitions, but the fact that governance did not suit her — she resigned as governor back in July — has become a kind of credential."

More spin. Anyone who is acquainted with the facts knows that it wasn't governance which did not suit Sarah Palin, it was trying to govern while under a full-scale Cloward-Piven attack. The $600,000 in personal legal bills Gov. Palin was saddled with as a result of the attacks was a major factor in her decision to resign as Governor of Alaska.

"Ms. Palin still gets a session in the media spanking machine every time she does anything, but the disapproval seems to further cement the support of her loyalists. Ms. Palin may or may not be qualified to represent America around the world, but she certainly represents vast swaths of the American public and has a lucrative new career to show for it."

"If we don’t see why, then maybe we deserve the 'lamestream media' label she likes to give us."

Carr is just one of an increasing number of leftist media types who now admit that their attacks on Sarah Palin and her family have backfired. But that's not the only reason why the label sticks. It is the media's failure to perform its primary function -- unbiased reporting of the news -- that makes it so lame. By acting as Barck Obama's publicity agents rather than journalists, the media lost what little remaining credibility it had with the majority of Americans.

"'Going Rogue' is just one more example of how her inability or unwillingness to connect with the establishment leaders gives her credibility elsewhere."

That Sarah Palin has the ability to connect with the GOP establishment has been demonstrated. Michael Gerson, Fred Barnes and Fred Malek are just a few of the Republican Party insiders who have championed her. It's the more corrupt elements in the GOP establishment that she refuses to kowtow to, but the lamestream media won't tell you because it doesn't fit their "Get Palin" agenda.

"Last week, she returned to Senator McCain’s side to help in his re-election bid. As she bounded across the stage in Arizona and Cindy McCain struggled to maintain her frozen smile, even people who can’t stand her politics must have laughed."

A twofer! Carr couldn't pass up the opportunity to beat Cindy McCain and Sarah Palin with the same club. And this is just one of the many reasons why the latest media attacks on Sarah Palin remind us so much of the old ones.

Update: Stacy McCain comments on Carr's piece:

"Burn, burn, burn!"

- 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