I am the honorable flamingo. What you read here might make you smile, make you think, or make you wonder. This is the world as I see it, from the view of a pink, long legged, slightly awkward bird.

Sunday, December 02, 2007

Anatomy Of A Ron Paul Smear

Of course, the bloggers out there tend to denigrate their least favorite candidates in very clear terms, and that is great, but surely this doesn't happen in the main-stream media, does it? Think again. Although they certainly can not be honest about it, the media has been slowly but surely marginalizing the support for Ron Paul, and I'd like to show you how to do it yourselves, if you so choose.

1.) Brand supporters with a nick-name.
Paulians or Paulites are two of the most popular. These names just scream that we are dealing with a tiny group of people. Surely, if his support were wide-spread, the media wouldn't have to give everyone who favors him a pet name? My personal favorite of these, however, is neither of the two above, but rather Paulistinians. That's great...associate Ron Paul supporters with a group most Americans have negative views of, how fair and balanced.

2.) Associate them with people identified as evil or crazy.
Whether it be racist "white power" people, or 9/11 truthers, the tactic is just the same. Throw in some vague terms, followed by the name of some racist and/or crazy person who no one has ever heard of and explain how Ron Paul accepted money from him/her. Be sure to make it sound as though Paul took the money directly from him whilst giving him a Swedish massage. This is a good tactic, because we all know that if he doesn't spend his time and money refuting these endorsements, then he must agree with them.

3.) Relegate their campaign to "internet people".
For some reason, and I'm not sure why, internet support seems to be used only in a derogatory manner. "Well, they are only internet supporters". What the hell does the mean? Are likely Republican primary voters unaware of the internet? The internet permeates the lives of nearly everyone everyday...how can support coming from it be bad? How can any support be bad?

In an effort to demonstrate these techniques, I have penned a small sample paragraph that I think will illustrate the phenomenon quite clearly.

Ron Paul supporters, or Rontards, flocked to a rally he held in Iowa last week. Among them was a random guy, who is the spokesperson for the group "Americans for the Destruction and Mutilation of Cute, Cuddly Kittens", or ADMCCK. He said, "ADMCCK really feels as though we can get on board with Ron Paul. With a national membership of more than 57, it is important that we elect a candidate who we think possibly would allow us to continue our feline extermination programs in peace." Random guy also mentioned that he had donated almost $12 to the Ron Paul campaign over the course of the past month. Money Ron Paul has not yet returned.

4 comments:

Unknown said...

Let me be the first to admit. I felt strange at first, I'm not a "conspiracy" guy, and Paul has such a good message... I don't blame the media, I blame ourselves for letting this happen. (the media does suck. Laughable) People finally don't feel as put out of this megalopolic system - It's finally a game of ideas, not iconography.

This blog is right on.

Anonymous said...

It's okay because that's all they've got. They can't smear Ron Paul, so they smear us. It's okay because we can continue to have smart, informational responses to people's questions and misunderstandings in the comments following these articles. If we ignore their comments and just use them to buoy our own passion to get Ron Paul in office, those smear tactics will help us.

One thing we shouldn't do is insult them back. Then we go down to their level and we miss the opportunity these smears give us to respond in a civil way and show that we're not crazy or weird. Or maybe we are crazy and weird and the sleeping masses of Americans are normal. But I don't think so.

Just don't take it personally and go on helping in whatever ways you can.

Anonymous said...

Of course they will smear Ron Paul as his message of liberty and freedom frightens most of the vested interests here in the US. What scares them most is Ron Paul could actually win.

Read: President Ron Paul – Could He Really Win?
http://www.gambling911.com/Ron-Paul-121407.html

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