The Other McCain

"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

Alinsky as Rhetorical Dadaist

Posted on | May 27, 2011 | 5 Comments

by Smitty (h/t Big Peace)

Andrew McCarthy in the National Review makes a perceptive point on our good President, noting how the duck-and-weave on Israel is straight out of the Saul Alinsky playbook. Also, that pattern is the same as what was used on ObamaCare. Emphasis mine:

Obama is an Alinskyite, though, a practical radical. Ineffective radicals are so blinded by ideology, so intoxicated by their own sense of righteousness, that they refuse to gauge the public sensibilities. Alinskyites are no less committed to their ideology; indeed, only a person who has completely bought into his ideology can maintain the patient discipline necessary to implement his utopia incrementally. That discipline is what makes the Alinskyite effective. Such an operator understands that you must always check the public pulse: Figure out how far you can push people, but never push so far that you lose political viability. Without power, radicalism is a dead end. The race is not to the swift but to the electable.
So Obama tweaked his health-care positions, pretending he’d never said the things he’d said, massaging his message depending on the sensibilities of his audience. He shrewdly banked on a press corps willing to be enlisted to his purposes, and on the natural tendency of decent people to give likeable politicians the benefit of the doubt, to assume they are not being lied to.

Sure, we like to treat people as innocent until proven guilty. Life is more efficient that way. However, technology is about to deliver a thorough spanking to the Alinsky’s collection of cunning stunts. In an era when having a politician verbally kick his own butt is as simple as splicing a series of YouTube clips together, politicians are going to have to be more forthright.

Shifts in policy opinions, e.g. RomneyCare, may be allowed, if there is a clear rationale. Wavering on something like the sanctity of human life will not do.

In BHO’s case, we’re going to see that his Alinsky tricks are like Dada: effective as long as not self-aware. Also, no one else is aware of the Alinskyisms. Now that there is an internet around, and WCFCYA, no politicians are going to get away with a 2008 triumph of style over substance again. No amount of propaganda is going to make mediocrity a big deal again. The seemingly incongruous selection of Joe ‘Effing’ Biden for VP was a tell: without the Alinskyism, the teleprompter, and the speech writers, there really isn’t much difference between BHO and Plugs.

Unfortunately, the spiritual void of Alinskyism means that there are no alternatives for BHO. When his only principle is pursuit of power, then run for President he must. He becomes the Über-lemming, driving off the cliff, all ahead full-tilt boogy, simply because he has nothing else to do with himself. It would be tragic, if it wasn’t so flipping expensive.

Category: Barack Obama

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