Melissa Harris-Perry: Latest Character Assassination Target of the Far Right

Andrew Breitbart and Rush Limbaugh make a terrific living through diversion, demonizing, and the use of techniques with a goal of destroying policy or oftentimes with character assassination.  Their writing and punditry like Glenn Beck and others skilled to excite and influence their loyal legions is most assuredly a template used on every policy or individual attack. 

They do not always use the entire strategy or structure each time but do implement an argument structure designed to persuade using techniques associated with brainwashing.  Dr. Cynthia Boaz is an assistant professor of political science at Sonoma State University. Among her areas of expertise includes political communication and media. From various pundits she has identified fourteen techniques that effectively brainwash their followers.

My experience is that many of my Conservative friends use these argumentative structures oftentimes unknowingly while others seemed to understand them purposely and are in step with the talking points necessary to forward the agenda.  Folks we refer to as trolls often use this very same structure with their arguments. Read a variety of postings and you will observe the bullying technique, character assassination, flipping, and attempts to confuse the issue, policy, or personal attack.

These are similar to those Rovian Techniques devised by Karl Rove and once the target is identified; the techniques listed above are put in motion. They attack the individual or policy and then saturate that message via blogs, Facebook,  Google groups, radio, television, and newspapers. The idea is to divert followers from facts and focus on readers or listeners preconceived notions and fears to perpetuate the attack.

I have identified several "attack" techniques in the past but those who have not read my blogs the following sources will assist you in understanding why Progressives and Liberals need to start not only "Leaning Forward" but getting off their shiny bottoms and start doing something about the arguments and techniques being employed by several far right "journalists", bloggers, pundits and entertainer news anchors like Rush, O'Reilly, and Glenn Beck. If you see similar techniques on the fringe left; call them out too! You can saturate messages of truth as well as fiction!

http://truth-out.org/news/item/1964:fourteen-propaganda-techniques-fox-news-uses-to-brainwash-americans

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/10/08/1141830/-Karl-Rove-s-Handbook
http://www.drw.utexas.edu/roberts-miller/handouts/demagoguery

I have others; but these sources whether you the reader like the sources or not are links to the people who analyzed and wrote them. Everything we do is definable and each of us may not agree with the operational definitions these people identify as the techniques employed to distract and brainwash but it can be observed and the patterns identified.

Why am I bringing this up? One name: Melissa Harris-Perry. She has an MSNBC commercial that the right is demonizing about Children being part of the Community and that we should all be concerned about them; not just the Children's parents. Move a few words around and fail to report the entire sentiment with the purpose of diverting, demonizing, and destroying the character suggesting nonsense of communism, socialism, and fascism. 

Do you really believe your children are only your concern? Do you not want teachers, clergy, police, neighbors, and even strangers to be aware of unsafe situations and step up or step in? They are trying to make this another "you did not build this" attack they used when they diverted, demonized and attempted to destroy President Obama.

How can I prove this? I will provide two links and from these you decide:

http://mediamatters.org/blog/2013/04/08/how-the-right-is-distorting-melissa-harris-perr/193532

https://www.google.com/webhp?source=search_app#hl=en&gs_rn=8&gs_ri=psy-ab&gs_mss=melissa%20harris%20perry%20MSNBC%20C&tok=oWqmcNVulDbR1YfMw7qfdw&pq=melissa%20harris%20perry&cp=62&gs_id=bo&xhr=t&q=melissa%20harris%20perry%20MSNBC%20Commercial%20Kids%20are%20the%20Communities&es_nrs=true&pf=p&sclient=psy-ab&oq=melissa+harris+perry+MSNBC+Commercial+Kids+are+the+Communities&gs_l=&pbx=1&bav=on.2,or.r_cp.r_qf.&bvm=bv.44990110,bs.1,d.aWM&fp=e9443ae8fe5a8991&biw=1366&bih=643

Remember this....To push forward their right wing character assassination of Melissa Harris-Perry they need to saturate Google Search and they have accomplished this with over 500,000 orchestrated links. The Heritage Foundation has people who use the Google Analytics to post and re-post so the only information is their right wing character assassination of this MSNBC pundit and others. My question is----What are they really concerned about? Her rising popularity?  Perhaps it is that her weekend un-rehearsed shows are analysis and discussion with a variety of viewpoints....Even viewpoints that don't always agree with hers. Imagine what that might look like on the daily rehearsed Bill O'Reilly show!

Melissa Harris-Perry Blog Response: 

http://tv.msnbc.com/2013/04/09/why-caring-for-children-is-not-just-a-parents-job/

Lies, Historical Revisionism, and What to Watch Out For

I have been blogging recently about Ayn Rand and Objectivism. When you engage Karl Rove Techniques, Christian Historical Revisionism and then get ammo from ALEC and other Koch Industry Think Tanks….Wisconsin has some serious problems. The Extreme Right has some serious issues that eliminate the Progressive State we have enjoyed for generations and reveal how they lied to get into office and then followed up with a completely new agenda that is not job creation and it will penalize further the workers, middle class, seniors, and those less fortunate throughout the state.

If you review the basic of Objectivism you can see why it is important for them to revise history and make Joe McCarthy a Hero and teachers, government workers, and Fighting Bob La Follette are now treated as bad guys….and the cause of all your economic woes. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Objectivism_(Ayn_Rand)) SourceWatch provides the following link which will take you to the various “grassroot” organizations supported by the Koch Family Foundation. http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Koch_Family_Foundations. This is important as you continue RECALL work to know who may be in your area while you gather support for your Democratic "New" Senator's campaign.

Among the various funded groups The Cato Institute is often cited by Paul Ryan and other Extreme Right Republicans as truth. http://www.cato.org/ In a recent conversation with a fellow Political Junkie I was surprised to hear that he only was reading Progressive and Liberal News and Blogs. He was not familiar with CATO or ALEC and I explained to him that to understand an Extremist view one needs to read what they say and then seek truth with facts to disarm their often fact less opinions. The PublicEye cites informational links to various Conservative Viewpoints so Progressives might evaluate the viewpoints of various issues of the "right" side of the political spectrum. (http://www.publiceye.org/lnk_antidem.html)

Why the Christian Right Distorts History and Why it Matters

Frederick Clarkson writes in part:

...."History is powerful. That's why it is important for the rest of society not only to recognize the role of creeping Christian historical revisionism, but our need to craft a compelling and shared story of American history, particularly as it relates to the role of religion and society. We need it in order to know not how the religious Right is wrong, but to know where we ourselves stand in the light of history, in relation to each other, and how we can better envision a future together free of religious prejudice, and ultimately, religious warfare"…..

http://www.publiceye.org/magazine/v21n2/history.html

A New – and Biblical – Understanding of History

By: Colin Harris

“Quite beyond the short-term historical amnesia that is affecting much public reflection and discourse on a range of issues, especially the condition of the economy, there are good indications that a deeper understanding of our historical foundations is lacking in that conversation.

Our tradition has always been susceptible to a "message in search of a text." If not found, one can impose a current idea on an available one, be it a 19th-century defense of slavery or a 20th-century prohibition of women speaking in church.

And we call what we do both "biblical" and "historical."

Recent efforts to connect contemporary agendas with our nation's founding events and principles have illustrated a practice of historical "proof-texting" that seems somewhat parallel to biblical proof-texting.”

And that becomes the problem dealing with many members of the New Republican Party...They believe "their" revisionist history is correct and accurate.

http://www.ethicsdaily.com/a-new-and-biblical-understanding-of-history-cms-18115

The following link is available to review on how Propaganda has been used to distort truth. If one knows what to “sniff out” then you will not become another “believer of truth” when what you are being told is not true. Being careful of the Historiography associated with the history one reads is also important. Be wary because the History you read may be revisionist and may even be propaganda.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propaganda

The following Ming.Tv article discusses the three steps to use the Media as a conduit to push through something that is not true.

Karl Rove media technique consists of 3 steps:
1. Keep the message simple
2. Keep the details secret
3. Never admit you are wrong

http://ming.tv/flemming2.php/__show_article/_a000010-000721.htm

The Governor Scott Walker/Fitzgerald/New Republican method used this strategy to implement their “Budget Repair Bill” and tried to convince people it was necessary. Their message:

1. We're Broke and We Need An Emergency Session
2. Walker's Team builds a Budget with ALEC for Wisconsin and keeps it secret
3. Never admit to any errors and keep the process moving quickly

About ALEC’s Tax and Fiscal Policy

The mission of ALEC’s Tax and Fiscal Policy Task Force is

to explore policy solutions that reduce excessive government

spending, lower the overall tax burden, enhance

transparency of government operations, and promote

free-market fiscal policies.

Public Sector Chairman: Indiana Sen. Jim Buck

http://www.alec.org/am/pdf/tax/Budget_toolkit.pdf

In the Games of the Rich, the Poor Lose

“Where are the Christians in economics and finance who dare to think "outside the box" and write the kind of books that Susan George writes, explaining to "ordinary" folk how not to be hoodwinked by the games the rich play?

Here is George's apt summing up of the reigning economic orthodoxy that is playing havoc with God's earth and human lives:

"Every cultivated field must produce a maximum without fallow or rest; every worker must be infinitely flexible; every factory must produce at lowest cost or perish; every bank must out-risk its rivals. Hundreds of millions are excluded because they are 'not productive enough' or 'cost too much.' Hundreds of millions more produce and consume so little that they serve little or no purpose in a capitalist marketplace. They are dispensable or worse; their perceived uselessness is nothing but another drag on the system. As far as the rich are concerned, so long as they accept to do so quietly, they can rot. If they protest, they will be dealt with. The rich can do without them. Our societies are stretched financially, economically, socially, ecologically to the breaking point and we have no shock absorbers."

http://www.ethicsdaily.com/in-the-games-of-the-rich-the-poor-lose-cms-18116

This is especially true with the Scott Walker team as well as the guiding principal of Paul Ryan. Assure people that you are doing things for their best interests and then try to get it done before they understand it. The speed attempt did not work because the Senate 14 used a filibuster method to slow the process so people could read and understand it and then take appropriate action. One such action was RECALL Senators and organize voters to attempt to unseat a Judicial Renegade…Justice Prosser.

Crossroads GPS a purported “grassroots” advocacy group, have launched a $20 million ad campaign with a focus on Obama's failed policies, overspending, debt and high unemployment. Now some will ask what the following Townhall citing has to do with Wisconsin’s situation. It shows what the Republican side is willing to do once they have distorted the record, create economic theories to support an agenda intended to divert everyday people from the truth. They will launch all sorts of Media Blitzes to tie up the air waves and scuttle elections to keep their seats any way possible. They will gain help from the ALEC think tank as well as the Cato Institute and those listed on Source Watch earlier cited. Watch those ads and see who is sponsoring them and then check them out on Source Watch and you will understand how Revisionist History, Karl Rove Techniques, and coupling it with an often ill-informed Christian Right to attempt to steal the RECALLS with only 20-30% of the vote.

http://townhall.com/tipsheet/katiepavlich/2011/06/26/$20_million_ad_campaign_launched_against_obama

Now---If you like this review the sources and see if this seems to be the path of the Walker Republicans in Wisconsin.