“Resistance is Futile” BS: The Republican Romney/Ryan Feint

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“Resistance is Futile” BS: The Republican Romney/Ryan Feint
By Kay Whitlock

Feint: A feigned attack designed to draw defensive action away from an intended target.
2. A deceptive action calculated to divert attention from one’s real purpose. See Synonyms at wile.
v. feint•ed, feint•ing, feints
v.intr.
To make a feint.
v.tr.
1. To deceive with a feint.
2. To make a deceptive show of.

In the coming days, we will all experience a barrage, a tsunami, an avalanche of Republican firepower and narrative intended to demoralize and discourage us. And to give the impression that Romney somehow now has momentum that can’t be stopped.

Kind of like being confronted by The Borg from the Star Trek Next Generation and Voyager series.

For those of you not familiar with The Borg: that’s a collective noun referring to a group of species morphed into cybernetic beings all connected by a “hive mind.” The Borg assimilates others by force.

Here’s a typical Borg pronouncement:

We are the Borg. Lower your shields and surrender your ships.
Your culture will adapt to service us. Resistance is futile.

Don’t get rattled. Easy to say, I know.

Especially when you’re seeing/hearing reports, polls, blog headlines that seem to be promoting a purported post-debate onslaught of Republican invincibility. Some of it’s coming from the Republican Party or its surrogates (including the NRA, which just endorsed not only Romney, but Todd Akin and Rove’s Crossroads super PAC). Some of it’s being mindlessly repeated, but not analyzed, by the mainstream media.

And some of it’s being promoted – again, with little or no real analysis – by panic-stricken media pundits and bloggers CMP earlier characterized as sunshine patriots and fair-weather White Guys.

Walk away from the blogs for a bit. Turn off that TV. Go to Twitter and add Jeff Gauvin @ JeffersonObama and Keith Boykin @keithboykin, to the list of folks you’re following. Go sit with friends and laugh about something. Take a deep breath, and then remind yourself of these things:

  • Later this week, CMP’s Nancy Heitzeg will help you read the entrails of polls, and they’re not nearly as straightforward as you might like to think. ( for some immediate perspective, see TPV or 538 right now)

  • The media likes sensationalism and a horse race. A steady lead by President Obama doesn’t fuel a sensational narrative that sells more ads and creates more page clicks.
  • Both President Obama and former Gov. Mitt Romney come with years of history, political and otherwise. One has a history of steady progress, despite a Republican congress that, for all of less than 5 months of the Obama presidency, has tried to thwart him at every chance. The other has a long history of lies, deception, and ruthless business practices. One event – the media would like us to think it was the first debate – does not turn the race on its head so suddenly.
  • In a post-Citizens United political circus atmosphere, the Right has more money than God to throw around to create a counter-impression of reality.
  • But voters aren’t shifting in the huge swaths that some suggest. Publish information that can’t ultimately hold up, but create an immediate headline. Harder to get out accurate information.

So: keep calm and carry on.

Above all, volunteer to help GOTV.

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  • KayWhitlock

    Another piece of music for anyone who stops by.
     
    Mavis Staples – “99 1/2.”  Give your soul something wonderful for the next 27 days, and then the years beyond.
     
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UIa8pq8Pr6c&feature=watch_response

  • rubyr

    Oh my darling, what a wonderful reasoned essay. The Democrats eat their own. 
    They always have and always will and MSNBC did much on debate night to drive 
    the doom narrative. On the GOS right now, there is so much Obama bashing that if 
    you didn’t know better, you would think you were on Red State. 
     
    Your piece is a breath of fresh air. Thank you so much. 
     
    Hello, Nancy and Seeta. Hope all three of you are well and thriving.
     
    I have been off-blog period a lot lately, late nights at work, so I have missed
    a few diaries here. I am sorry because they are always so good!! 
     
    love.

    • @rubyr they are ratf%^&ers at the GOS ruby ..Known that for a long time
       
      Hang in there :)

      • rubyr

        @nancy a heitzeg Many of them are just that. I will fight them to 
        the end. I gravitate to the intelligent, humane people on the site. I have hated the admin ever since all of that crap with you and Kaye. 
         
        Thanks for the encouragement.

        • KayWhitlock

          @rubyr  @nancy a heitzeg The biggest crap/BS was with banning black people who dared to question the GOS narrative.  Never forget.  Nancy and I got in the crosshairs only because we wouldn’t toe the line and let a particular group of black folks be sacrificed without protest.

        • KayWhitlock

          @rubyr  @nancy a heitzeg We were supposed to be a warning shot across the bow to other white people to shut up.  Other white people should never shut up.  Never.

        • rubyr

          @KayWhitlock  @nancy a heitzeg I remember all of it. Horrible.

        • rubyr

          @KayWhitlock  @nancy a heitzeg True.

      • KayWhitlock

        @nancy a heitzeg  @rubyr amen, Nancy.  Amen.

    • KayWhitlock

      @rubyr Ruby:  stay away from GOS.  It was always like that, with only temporary reprieves. 
       
      I know you will do what you need to do.
       
      But I would be remiss if I did not advise you to leave there.  There is no permanent community there, and no lasting commitment to pragmatic, progressive change.

      • rubyr

        @KayWhitlock I am involved with the poetry diaries there and with Gulf Watchers and I have been and the people in those diaries are like my family, especially Gulf Watchers. 
         
        Thanks for your kind words. I am careful about what I do there. 
        I just got wound up in the anti-Obama screamers thing because I am 
        so outraged at their audacity.

  • Thanks for this much needed piece and perspective. We’ve got.work to do in these next 27 full days left. Just seeing this now – I’m in transit today.

  • KayWhitlock

    Some beautiful music for your spirits/souls this morning – and for the next 27 days.  We will be rocked and we will be rolled, but we will come through.
     
    Here’s Mavis Staples to help remind us all:
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ZWdDI_fkns

    • @KayWhitlock thank you Kay
       
      this is a key point — Both President Obama and former Gov. Mitt Romney come with years of history, political and otherwise.
       
      Media and some hair on firers are treating this as an ahistorical event — ddevoid of context and records..
       
      we all need to get back to The Records

  • KayWhitlock

    Good morning, folks.  Batten down the hatches.  We’re in for some big storms – and we always were.  Remember what Bernice Johnson Reagon, cultural historian and co-founder of Sweet Honey in the Rock says.
     
    I’m not quoting exactly, but she says, “And when you want change, step into the storm.  If you get to the other side, you will be changed.  But if you want change and you’re avoiding the storm, you can forget it.  So, as Harriet (Tubman) would say:  “Wade in the water, it’s really going to be troubled water.”
     
    Have faith and work like hell.  Things are not collapsing around us.  I know many are anxious.
     
    You didn’t think we’d get home scot-free, did you?
     
    Of course you didn’t.  Now please, use the link above to help GOTV.  In the meantime, my absentee ballot was mailed this morning, and I can’t wait to vote early.