Prop 8 Protests Still Ineffective When Set to Music

Shocking, I know, but as it turns out, song and dance doesn’t make shallow caricatures of religious people any more palatable. I really wanted to like Prop 8: The Musical, but even Neil Patrick Harris couldn’t redeem this video from Funny or Die.

While a musical protest of the Prop 8 outcome is certainly preferable to death threats, vandalism, and violence, I’m disappointed that the most vocal supporters of gay marriage still don’t understand that crapping all over Christians isn’t the way to change minds.

Prop 8: The Musical portrays Christians as thugs and hypocrites who will happily lie to themselves and others if it will prevent same-sex marriage. “If it works then we don’t care,” they sing. Is it really so difficult to understand that demonizing people for their religious beliefs is divisive and counterproductive? The cause would be better served by shelving the impulsive lashing out so that energies can be focused on analyzing why the “No on 8” campaign failed. Clearly it’s time for a new strategy, and here’s a hint: attacking Mormons? Not so persuasive.

Published by Jenn Q. Public on December 4, 2008

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Katon Dawson Makes a Mockery of Republican Ideas

The Republican Party is precariously close to fracturing. Not because GOP candidates abandoned conservatism. Not because they caved to the “oogedy-boogedy branch” of the Party. And not because the Party leadership lacks youth and sex appeal.

Those points may be worth debating (or deriding), but they’re not why the Party is on the verge of splintering. That honor is reserved for our dear Party leadership, the members of the Republican National Committee.

The RNC is preparing to elect a new Chairman in January, and among the candidates under consideration is Katon Dawson, the Chairman of the South Carolina GOP. Dawson occupied his spare time during the last 12 years or so brushing elbows with the Midlands elite at an exclusive private country club. What’s the big deal? Forest Lake Club is so exclusive that only white people are admitted as members.

The Republican Party has been a monumental force for civil rights in the United States for more than 150 years. Initially created to oppose the atrocious pro-slavery policies of the Democrats, the GOP remained committed to protecting individual liberty and has a proud history of civil rights achievements, including the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution. Throughout the twentieth century, Republicans stood for freedom and equality, and were instrumental in crafting and passing pieces of legislation that ended segregation and invalidated Jim Crow laws.

That is the Republican Party I embrace, a Party dedicated from its inception to the principles of freedom, liberty, and individual responsibility. It is gobsmackingly vile that this same Party is now seriously considering elevating a morally weak man like Katon Dawson to national Chair.

Republicans rightfully expressed outrage when news surfaced that United States Senate candidate Ned Lamont belonged to an overwhelmingly white country club. The liberal netroots and Democrat establishment were excoriated by Republicans for continuing to support Lamont, yet somehow Katon Dawson has escaped the indignation of Republicans.

Katon Dawson’s leadership accomplishments and civic achievements are now irrelevant. He made a decision 12 years ago that his political aspirations would be best served by hobnobbing with prominent white South Carolinians. He eschewed Republican principles and happily palled around with his white country club buddies, implicitly giving his blessing to one of the final refuges of segregation in America. At best, Dawson chose to turn a blind eye to his club’s admission practices, at least until he thought it might derail his run for RNC Chairman.

Once his dirty little secret was revealed in an article about Forest Lake’s heinous membership policy, Dawson suddenly had plenty to say in an open letter to the club’s Management Committee written shortly before he resigned his membership. Let me nutshell it for you:

I spend tons of time on outreach to black folks. In fact, I’m so busy reaching out to blacks that I barely get to spend time at my all-white club. But after that pesky newspaper exposé, I am overcome with a need to encourage greater diversity in my no-blacks-allowed club. Please consider changing your membership policy as my career may depend on it.

Way too little and a dozen years too late. Katon Dawson’s 12 year membership at Forest Lake Club tells me everything I need to know about his character and integrity. As Dawson wrote last week in a Politico editorial about, I kid you not, the courage of convictions, “It’s not good enough to talk the talk; you’ve got to walk the walk.” Pot, I trust you and kettle need no introductions.

Could Katon Dawson possibly be so blind to his own hypocrisy, or is he off high fiving his country club cohorts, privately congratulating himself on his stunning ability to travel under the radar for so many years? It boggles the mind that his abhorrent association with Forest Lake Club reached the pages of The State in August, yet here we are in December with Dawson still at the helm of the South Carolina GOP, vying for a position of national prominence.

Any vote for Katon Dawson to take the RNC reins will be taken as an endorsement of the dozen years he spent as a member of Forest Lake. If Dawson ascends to the GOP Chairmanship, it will be a giant middle finger thrust in the faces of every American who shudders at the memory of institutionalized racism in our country.

Get ready for the Grand Old Party to suffer an irreparable fracture. Republicans who treasure our Party’s core values will defect to other parties and dilute the strength of the GOP. If we’re lucky, the Party will split in two; in a more realistic scenario, the GOP will splinter into a half dozen or more factions unwilling to associate with a leader who allowed discrimination to simmer under his nose. The Democrats will be handed the country on a silver platter, achieving the inverse of Karl Rove’s “permanent Republican majority.”

But the demise of the Republican Party can be averted by electing a Chairman like Michael Steele whose actions match his words, and whose words convey core Party values. Last weekend Governor Mark Sanford of South Carolina proposed a set of principles central to rebuilding the Republican Party. He reminded Republicans that “our loyalties need to be to ideas, not to individuals.” The 168 members of the Republican National Committee cannot forget that when they cast their votes for RNC Chair in January.

In 1870, South Carolina sent Republican Joseph Rainey to Congress as the first black member of the House of Representatives. Were he with us today, Joseph Rainey would not be welcome to schmooze with Katon Dawson and his comrades at Forest Lake Club. Katon Dawson is a blight on the GOP. The only noble path available to Dawson is to immediately withdraw his candidacy and step down as the South Carolina GOP Chair. If he fails to choose the noble path, he must be ousted by Republicans who can talk the talk and walk the walk.

Published by Jenn Q. Public on December 1, 2008

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Lessons From a Collision

Something dreadful happened to me last night that gave me a bit of perspective as we prepare for the coming Obama administration.

A young deer darted out in front of my car. I was only going 25 MPH, but slamming on the brakes and swerving sharply didn’t stop the spooked deer from getting clipped by the edge of my headlight. The poor animal rolled up the hood and onto the windshield as I came to a stop.

Amazingly, the fawn slid to the ground and landed squarely on his legs.

America will do the same.

I expect the country to take a beating during the next four years. The economy is unstable, terrorism remains a threat, and the size of our federal government is unacceptable. These things would be true no matter who emerged victorious last night.

But Barack Obama, our most liberal senator, is now our president-elect. He will be backed by Democratic majorities in the House and Senate comprised of some of the most liberal legislators in history, and together they will ignore the lessons of history and respond to crises with big government solutions. During the next two years, government will plump grotesquely like the collagen-injected lips of aging celebrities. From a right-of-center perspective, the country’s energy, fiscal, and foreign policies will sustain notable damage, and we will witness the implementation of social programs that undermine the progress of minorities and limit the upward mobility of the poor.

That said, a dire future is not inevitable. Like the deer that hurtled into my car, our country will survive its collision with a liberal agenda. It may end up temporarily worse for the wear – my car certainly did – but America has weathered greater threats than being governed from the left for a few years. America and Americans have an undeniable history of greatness and a solid record of using our freedoms to oppose government when necessary.

I remain proud of my country and in constant awe of my good fortune to awaken each morning in 21st century America. John McCain may not have been the man to carry the Republican Party to victory, but all Americans would be wise to heed his words: “America is worth fighting for. Nothing is inevitable here. We never give up. We never quit. We never hide from history. We make history.”

Now we gird our loins, cowboy up, and forge ahead.

Published by Jenn Q. Public on November 5, 2008

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Obama: Reports of Hope and Change Are Greatly Exaggerated

Hope? Change? Not so much.

Team Obama is busily preparing to dash his supporters’ hope for change should he win the presidential election on Tuesday. Even in the final days before the election, the pressure to deliver on his lofty promises has Obama attempting to dampen expectations on the campaign trail:

“The first hundred days is going to be important, but it’s probably going to be the first thousand days that makes the difference,” he said. He has also been reminding crowds in recent days how “hard” it will be to achieve his goals, and that it will take time.

“I won’t stand here and pretend that any of this will be easy – especially now,” Mr Obama told a rally in Sarasota, Florida, yesterday, citing “the cost of this economic crisis, and the cost of the war in Iraq.”

This should be a huge wakeup call to any voters who remain undecided.  Hope and change are on backorder.  Barack Obama is scaling back his resplendent rhetoric because it has been empty rhetoric. He is a demagogue whose promises of hope are as fraudulent as his fundraising operation. Whether or not you find inspiration in his message, understand that Barack Obama cannot and will not deliver positive change. Can unfulfilled hope sustain you and your family for the next four years?

I won’t make false promises that a McCain administration will someday inspire unparalleled awe and reverence in historians. His presidency will revolve around the decidedly unsensational task of cleaning up inherited messes, and he isn’t likely to provoke tingly exhilaration in crowds. But all evidence indicates that John McCain is a man of his word who loves his country with breathtaking intensity and unwavering devotion. He is a man of honor who doesn’t need need an Olympian backdrop to lend gravity to his words or an embellished resume to inflate his experience.

Only one candidate has told the truth about the state of the union and the challenges we face. When Barack Obama spoke of hope and change, he was blowing smoke. When John McCain says he’ll put country first, he means it.

Published by Jenn Q. Public on October 31, 2008

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Confessions of a Paid Astroturfer

A woman who says she’s a paid member of the Obama marketing team shared the campaign’s astroturfing strategy in an anonymous email to HillBuzz. I can’t vouch for the credibility of the emailer, but it certainly jibes with my observations of the leftroots strategy.

The internal campaign idea is to twist, distort, humiliate and finally dispirit you.

We pay people and organize people to go to all the online sites and “play the part of a clinton or mccain supporter who just switched our support for obama”

We do this to stifle your motivation and to destroy your confidence.

We did this the whole primary and it worked.

Sprinkle in mass vote confusion and it becomes bewildering. Most people lose patience and just give up on their support of a candidate and decide to just block out tv, news, websites, etc.

This surprisingly has had a huge suppressing movement and vote turnout issues.

Next, we infiltrate all the blogs and all the youtube videos and overwhelm the voting, the comments, etc. All to continue this appearance of overwhelming world support.

People makes posts to the effect that the world has “gone mad”

Thats the intention. To make you feel stressed and crazy and feel like the world is ending.

Wrangled by strategist David Axelrod, the Axelturfers also did their best to skew polls in favor of Obama. The tipster also told HillBuzz, “There is a huge staff of people working around the clock, watching every site, blogs, etc. We flood these sites. We have had a goal to overwhelm.”

If you have a political blog (or lurk or comment on one), then you’re already familiar with this artificial grassroots movement. The email confession is far from shocking, and in many ways just confirms what we already know. But how will the right use this information?

Many writers on the right side of the blogosphere have weighed the relationship between bloggers and the GOP, and have found it wanting at best. The rightroots movement, if it can be said to exist at all, is extremely disorganized and consequently, ineffective in contributing to the success of Republican campaigns.

Undoubtedly there will be a wealth of discussion in the coming months about how the right must respond to a well-developed leftroots operation. This discussion will focus on technological organization and how we can leapfrog past the left and beat them at their own game. Further attention will be paid to the development of alternative news sources that counter the bias of the mainstream media. But there are also some questions that need to be asked that will strike many as distasteful. Can we beat the left by always taking the high road? Are we willing to employ the sleazy tactics of the Obama campaign? Is it necessary (or desirable) to serve our candidates by playing dirty while they keep their boots clean?

I don’t know the answers yet, but I have my suspicions.

Published by Jenn Q. Public on October 30, 2008

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Your Plans For Tonight

In less than an hour, Barack Obama’s thirty minute infomercial will air on NBC, CBS, and Fox. The three million dollar media buy also includes air time on Univision, MSNBC, BET and TV One.

This extravagant prime time broadcast will be funded, in part, by a fraudulent donation racket deliberately facilitated by Team Obama.

Take a stand tonight. Use your remote control to show the country and the world that the American people are sickened by Barack Obama’s campaign finance fraud. We’re not interested in another half hour of carefully scripted pablum. Let his campaign know that we’re not buying what they’re selling, even if the Shamwow guy himself offers up an endorsement.

Barack Obama can slice and dice pineapples in mid air or guarantee a sleigh full of confidence and a sack full of pride, but it won’t matter. You see, people buy infomercial products knowing that they have the Better Business Bureau, the FTC, and their credit card companies to protect them from fraud. But Americans know that their votes are the only things to protect them from an Obama administration.

So tonight, show your support for John McCain by NOT tuning in to one of the seven channels airing Obama’s As Seen On TV Extravaganza. ( I promise you’ll be able to catch it on the Internet later, or you can check out Michelle Malkin’s live blog of the Obama variety half hour.)

Instead, take the thirty minutes between 8pm and 8:30pm eastern time to join John McCain’s voter-to-voter phone bank. Come on, you know you have at least thirty unused cell phone minutes this month, so make a few calls to Ohio or Pennsylvania and help get out the vote.

Leave the infomercials to Chef Tony and Ron Popeil.

Published by Jenn Q. Public on October 29, 2008

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