Psychological warfare ? What can we do to drive the Repubs crazy?

[kentuck]

:) What really pulls their chains? What makes their faces turn red and slobber come out of their mouths, a la Novakula? Is it possible to drive them all insane?

[movonne]

1. They already are!!!

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

2. You can't drive someone to where

they already are.

[knight_of_the_star]

4. How about this then

We make them so insane that the rest of the country can see it.

[proud patriot]

3. Being Patriotic

I get yelled at all the time

They holler at my house and car ....:eyes:

They just can't stand that I support the troops am
proud to be American and am voting for Kerry ...:evilgrin:

[Ohio Dem]

7. I have a feeling that you are indeed . . .

a proud patriot. Where would I get an idea like that, anyway?

[Ohio Dem]

5. Turn your flag upside down. Tell them it's because the nation

is in a crisis because of Bush. Pisses them off on two levels.

Level #1: You're saying the country is in crisis because of its leadership. Its Republican leadership.

Level #2: You dared to do it with your flag! What will they tell the children?

[Dookus]

6. Get

Linda Ronstadt to sing "God Bless America" at the Democratic convention.

[Wapsie B]

10. Oh that would be priceless!

I second that motion.

[joefree1]

8. Insist on the three minute debate rule

"You get to speak for up to three minutes and then I get to speak for up to three minutes."

This sort of rational discussion of the facts without the ability to degenerate into a shouting matching drives 'em nuts. I love watching their little heads turn beet red as I calmly lay out the facts.

[GoneOffShore]

9. Fun time yesterday

riding on my bicycle in center city Philly.
Came up behind a car (Lexus) w/Virginia plates and a Shrub/Cheney bumper sticker. I caught him at the next light. Rolled up beside him and got him to roll his window down. White guy, my age (50+) or maybe younger. Me,politely, "Excuse me, some jerk put a Bush/Cheney sticker on your car." Him - nervous laugh.
One more guy who now is more aware of the dislike that people feel for Repubs.

[calimary]

25. Oh MY! This one's just WUNNNderful!

[Nay]

37. ROFL!!! That's great! Gotta remember that one!

[sandnsea]

39. omg, that is freakin' hysterical!!!

I'm going to remember that one too! rotfl

[Tsiyu]

40. Gone off shore

you are a genius.

[stepnw1f]

11. I Already Do... But I'm Not Civil About It

;-)

[wildeyed]

12. Win.

[opihimoimoi]

13. Expose their lies and distortions with Reason and reality

Refuse them control of the debate. Frame the arguements into the larger picture where the Pubs hate to go...

The Pubs wish us to remain on the low level of discourse with divisive issues and topics.

Ask them about Bush and how he talks to GOD. ASk them if Bush hears the messages and if so, how come he is where he is today, trailing Kerry.

Ask the tough questions....

[woo me with science]

14. i am not at war with republicans

i am not at war with any american. i hate wars. i try to convince them of my point of view.

[Nevernose]

15. Gay people. GLBTs drive them insane.

I say we institute a Gay Make-Out Day, where GLBTs park in front of local Republican headquarters and just make out for a while. Send them a subscription to The Advocate. Blare the audio from a gay porno from car speakers. Volunteer for a Repuke election campaigns, screw up everything that you touch, walk out holding hands, and kiss in front of the window.

[Still_Loves_John]

16. Elect John Kerry

I'm so on message. :)

[Ohio Dem]

17. Tell then Franken's thought on the difference between us and them.

You know - we both love our country. But they're like four-year-olds that love their mommy. She can't do wrong, and any criticism of her is bad. We're like adults in an adult relationship. We love, but when our S.O. does something wrong, we don't like it. We still love, but we want the right things, and not the wrong things, to be done.

I've found this pisses them off, and good.

[Hekate]

18. Reframe every talking point so it's the truth

We have GOT to stop letting them use Doublespeak, rewrite history, and claim the moral high ground by their misuse of language.

Remember Contract With America? I've called it Contract On America so many times it's now automatic. But Dems can and should do this better and more consistently.

When they say "Clear Skies Initiative" and "Healthy Forests" we say "Dirty Air Initiative" and "Clear-Cut Forests." "No Child Left Behind" becomes "No Child Left Unrecruited," "No School Board Left Standing," "No Child Educated," or whichever portion of this bill you want to emphasize. Question their family values at every turn and show how Repub policies undercut families in every way, and how a Dem administration would be different.

The list is long -- they have been busy, busy, busy not just the past four years but the past twenty. And during that time the radical right has hijacked the public vocabulary and forum on religion, morality, abortion, government, family, environment....

Our candidates and pundits and all the rest of us should not be reactive but proactive -- we should make reframing every point one of our highest priorities.

Hekate

edit: forgot to add this:
During this summer's Olympics, every time an American woman wins a medal or even competes say this, with a sigh: "I guess this is the last generation of Title IX girls doing us proud at the Olympics." Opens a whole conversation on Title IX, women and girls in sports, and the way Title IX allowed a tidal wave of US women to win the gold at the Olympics.

[Nevernose]

20. It worked for Rush and Newt in the early 90s

Maybe it would work for us, though I'm still torn between the deisre to win and the desire to take the high road.

[calimary]

27. This is EXTREMELY important. We simply MUST take back the language.

I like all your renamings. Be sure to say Marriage DISCRIMINATION Amendment.

It's not "tax relief" or "tax reform" or "tax ANYTHING." It's DUES - that we all contribute to the smooth and steady daily operations of our country. Oliver Wendell Holmes said: "Taxes are the price we pay for a civilized society." It's how we loyal, PATRIOTIC Americans make a contribution to our country instead of just leaching what we can out of it with no thought to our fellow Americans. After all, did John F. Kennedy not advise: "Ask not what your country can do for you. Ask what you can do for your country." Part of our obligation to our country as Americans is to help pay for our country to run, day to day. We all chip in. It's the dues we pay to be Americans and to enjoy everything that America offers. Your opponent in this argument surely wouldn't complain too much about the dues he/she has to pay to his/her fancy country club or private beach club or sports/athletic club, now, 'eh?

Also a small, derisive chuckle when you repeat things that the republi-CONS like to say will also cast whatever it is in a lesser light. Consider how many times you have seen Pat Buchanan and other thugs starting to visibly guffaw while their opponents are making their points. It's done to cheapen and contribute ridicule to the opponent's argument. To knock it down a peg.

Mainly, NEVER, and I MEAN NEVER, let them get the last word. They're used to having it all to themselves because up until recently (with the still rather anemic Air America Radio - great truths getting out there - to maybe what? FOUR stations?) they HAVE had the airwaves all to themselves.

Hekate, can we have this statement of yours tattooed on the insides of all of our eyelids? "We should make reframing every point one of our highest priorities." WELL WORTH REMEMBERING. REPEAT AS OFTEN AS POSSIBLE.

[Hekate]

38. Yeah! The wingnuts want us to play by Marquis of Queensbury rules...

...while they play by Marquis de Sade rules. I just shamelessly stole that line from another DUer because it says how I feel about the way we've been jujitsued and hijacked while we've been trying to play fair.

Reframing does not take away fair play, though it can be abused -- we do not have to descend to the loathsome level of screaming heads like Coulter and O'Reilly.

But used rightly, reframing can be our way of insisting on the truth and insisting on our own worldview -- and we better believe in those things strongly enough to insist because we are about to lose everything if we don't.

Hekate
Cheerio my deario, there's a dance in the old dame yet

[SpiralHawk]

19. Hold an image of each and every Repub living at the highest

possible expression of his or her soul -- having somehow magically attained a state of High Spiritual Resonance. It could happen. Think about it.

Several cumulative thousand years of human experience suggest that holding a positive image and positive thoughts is a basic technique for making progress as a human being. If you don't think you can do something, you have upped the odds that you either won't try it, or will screw it up (just as you expected). This is a very basic energy pattern of life.

If we hold the best possible image and understanding of other people -- without being blind or silent to injustice -- things work better. It's easier for other people to be their best if we hold positive imagery and thereby re-shape the morphogenetic fields of energy that surrounds every living being.

The process of demonization -- "You are either with us or against us" (on both the Right and the Lef)t -- works the same way, in reverse. The more you demonize the other, the easier it is for them to live up to your negative imagery. They just kind slide right on into the morphogenetic field you have projected for them -- you are kind of greasing the skids for them to be their worst.

At this point in time -- at every point in time -- I do not want to drive Repubs any crazier than they already are. It's gone much too far, and the Earth Mother weeps. I weep, too. I feel it's time for us to re-orient our individual and collective political compass. By nature, all Points are represented on the Wheel. This is a fundamental reality. We all must deal with it. Same as it ever was.

The Sacred Hoop spins,
more and more swifty now.
And the Sun sends a rainbow ring to mark the sky
as Grandfathers and Grandmothers long ago saw.

Take your place on the Great Mandala.

Looking for updrafts,
I remain,
SH

[BeFree]

34. Well, Mr. Hawk

It's fun to watch you spiral ever higher.

The energy one glows with indeed lights the way. It can be bright or dull, it's one's choice. Really, one's energy gives one the best chance one has to be free.

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

44. I can dig it, SH

Just as one must have peace in one's heart to create peace. The way out of this mess is to hold to the higher consciousness. Peace from one mystic to another.

[InkAddict]

21. Make love - not war

bare-souled naked in front of them - It does drive them insane because it reminds the poor shleps they need to visit the pharmacy for their Cialis and Ambien. They can't get no....sat-is-fac-tion!

[phiddle]

22. Ask them why they're voting for a miserable FAILURE

Point out incessantly,continuously, and loudly that Bush is, and always has been, a FAILURE.
He was a FAILURE as a student (couldn't even get in to UT Law school.)
He FAILED to show up for his National Guard duty
He FAILED in 2 successive businesses (Arbusto and Spectrum 7)
He FAILED to stay within the Law at Harken Energy, bailed out by daddy's SEC
He FAILED to help Texas as governor, leaving the state a fiscal wreck, and the state with the highest rates of child poverty and the most polluted in the country.
He FAILED to win the presidency legitimately.
He FAILED to continue sound budgetary policies, foisting the bills for his adventures off on future generations.
He FAILED to get Oama bin Laden.
He FAILED to tell the truth about Iraq's weapons and relationship with Al-Qaida
He FAILED to improve any aspect of American life, except for the pocketbooks of those who have bailed him out his entire life.
He has, however succeeded in hiding his FAILURES from most of the American public.

[kentuck]

24. Oh yeah !

They hate it when you remind them that Bush did not win the election, he was selected by the Supreme Court.
And there were no WMDs in Iraq...
And he was AWOL....
And he has been a miserable failure... :)

[Zorra]

23. Tell them that Kerry is ahead in most polls and it looks like he will win

in a landslide. Tell them, very confidently and matter-of-factly, that this is a given and that it's basically over already. It's best to prep them with how the people are united against Bu$h because he lied about Iraq, was AWOL and that Kerry was a war hero, and that F9/11 is a blockbuster and is converting voters. Print out articles from major news sources to back up your claims.

I had a republican drooling and red-faced ready to have a stroke the other night. He shouted "I'm outta here", stood up, and left the cantina with drink in hand.

Yes, he did take the cantina's glass.;)

[Feanorcurufinwe]

35. I fully agree - especially because it is the truth

the big question now is how big Kerry's coattails will be. Will the public's rejection of Bush and his extremist administration drag the rest of the party down with him? Or will the Dems only win the Presidency and the Senate?

[Octafish]

26. Ask them: "Won't it be great to have a REAL President?"

"You know, an ELECTED one?"

Their heads explode, every time. Try it. You'll like it.

[calimary]

28. I've used a version of this, myself.

"Say what you will about Clinton, at least he was legitimately elected. TWICE."

And then ask 'em if they're better off now than they were four years ago...

[Octafish]

48. That combination's a 1-2 punch knockout!

I'm printing out this entire thread at work.

[Sparkly]

29. Tell them you're a Patriot

who loves their country, respects their flag, and wants nothing more than to keep the citizens of this country safe -- and that it's WHY you oppose the Chimp.

That makes their brain synapses misfire, which can be fun to watch.

[yankeedem]

30. Tell em its time for the adults to take over

nt

[Keirsey]

31. flag 'em

Hang American flags upside down - distress signal.

[Crunchy Frog]

32. Elect a Democratic House and Senate

and get Kerry elected President. They absolutely can't stand it when Democrats win, as it challenges what they believe is their God given right to absolute power.

The other thing would be to take a sledgehammer to the media conglomerates and reinstate the fairness doctrine, so that diverse points of view can compete in the marketplace of ideas. They absolutely can't stand it when they don't have a monopoly of political expression in the media.

The final thing is to stop being afraid of them, and just tell them to go Cheney themselves when they behave badly.

[Warren DeMontague]

33. Have Sex, and Enjoy It Without Guilt.

As near as I can tell, this is what drives about 70% of them absolutely batty.

[Nay]

36. Well, F/9-11 really made them heave.

[ronabop]

41. Ask them about fiscal responibily.

Then ask them about the pork, the debt, and why republican control hasn't changed any of it.

:-)

-Bop

[Mr.Green93]

42. give Michael Moore press credentials to the convention

[Cocoa]

45. they would love that

[Mr.Green93]

47. I am shocked that he was denied

[mopaul]

43. mention peeing on reagan's grave........

that usually does the trick. i'm serious, i've tried it on a couple die hard pubs and it stops them cold in their tracks to hear a dem say something you'd normally hear a pub say.

it's as if they think they OWN nastiness.

[Cocoa]

46. John McCain

drives them to distraction