Stop-Obama

This interview with Gerrardine Ferraro definitively proves Gregory’s point, Axelrod is the man behind all the race-baiting in Obama’s campaign. As Jamal stated in his pugnacious Barry the Bamboozler, Whines and Plays the Victim Card, it is Axelrod’s deliberate strategy to use race-baiting as part of his designs on the Democratic Presidential nomination.

What Ferraro shares in her MSNBC interview, is that her quips on race were spoken in front of an audience of 350 attendees, jotted down by a snappy journalist, and simply published in some unknown newspaper. Until Obama staffers picked them up, her words remained inconsequential. Once found, Axelrod’s henchmen began harassing major dailies demanding the statement’s publication.

“Somebody must have seen this (article) and said, ‘Wow, this is really something — we go after Ferraro, we go after Clinton,” (Ferraro)

Basically, Ferraro did not intend her statements for public consumption, and had no intention of being provocative, she merely shared an observation she though factual, and legitimate. In subsequent interview after interview, she now brings up the name David Axelrod, as the man behind this race-baiting blitz, and its sensationalism. Ferraro laments

“David Axelrod, his campaign manager, has chose to spin this as a racist comment because every time anybody makes a comment about race who is white - he did it with Bill Clinton, he was successful; he did it with (Pennsylvania governor and Clinton supporter) Ed Rendell, he was less successful; and he is certainly not going to be successful with me,” Ferraro told CBS’ “The Early Show.” “He should have called me up … He knows I’m not racist.”

Previous episode of such racial politicization attributed to the Clinton campaign, turned out to have been Axelrod fabrications. A four page memo surfaced on the Huffington Post reflecting the zeal with which Axelrod searched for any racially charged Clinton comments that he could use to Obama’s political advantage.

As with South Carolina, so with Ferraro; further proof of Axelrod’s instrumentalization of race for political purposes.

***

I agree with Jamal’s Barry the Bamboozler; a key component to Axelrod’s approach, consists of victimization. I also agree with Gregory, that Obama plays into Republican hands, which pursue a much simpler strategy than Axelrod, to ” get Dems to butt heads” and destroy their vast coalition, while Republicans carve out the pieces and build one of their own.

But neither Obama victimization, nor the Republican swing vote, which appears to have given Obama considerably more advantage than pundits appreciate, nor Obama’s “Unofficial Republican Advance Team,” can explain where all of this is going.

Based on my observation of the media this week (which quickly picked up where they left off before OH and TX) I notice a few worrisome trends which allow me to speculate where Axelrod is taking his campaign next.

The latest media trends

1) The media increasingly attribute Hillary’s success to a White Voting Block, and increasingly stake her future on this block. (I already attacked this)

2) The media look to increasingly racialize this primary. They resumed this mission even before the Ferrero comment, as I shall show.

3) The media are again publishing calls for Hillary to quit, and portraying her as a loser.

4) The media are increasingly discussing Hillary’s campaign failures (as if it were over), with long editorials detailing the mistakes and bickering of her campaign advisers.

The first trend plays into the hands of an up and coming Axelrodian offensive against the Hillary personality. That it is based on factually incorrect material, doesn’t weaken its potential. The same goes for the second trend, which I will address in greater detail further on. The third trend is, as before, a form of psychological warfare aimed at breaking the will of Hillary’s supporters, and pushing her out of the race. It reveals a desperation on the part of Obama and his supporters, but may actually work against undecideds. The fourth trends requires the least comment, and the most amusement. It is clear why the media have been obsessed with Clinton campaign failures- to wash their hands clean from any responsibility they may have had, in her downfall. The articles in question are sophisticated, but invariably choose to ignore the primaries in favor of an obsession with the egos and failures of Clinton personalities. These articles are deliberate canards concocted at the highest levels of the journalistic profession, to remove the stain of favoritism from the entire media.

All these trends were readily apparent at the start of the week. While anti-Hillary coverage mellowed slightly before and after her TX and OH victories, it is coming back with a vengeance, and in a less detectable but more insidious form. Far from a coincidence, it is the successful execution of an Axelrodian communication strategy, which will now apply the following tactics to the campaign:

Prevent the discussion of issues and marginalize their importance to voters, by focusing on the Obama personality through whatever means. Be it by digging up statements that can be interpreted as insulting or hurtful of Obama or his supporters, and then hyping them up to tie-up media attention; or by overemphasizing Obama’s biography, formal aspects, and or leveraging other non-essential attributes (like religion, character, friends, popularity,winning streak). All these tactics in pursuit of the following two goals:

1) transform enthusiasm for Obama into long-term loyalty by continuing to integrate voters into a narrative of Obama vs the forces of the past, of evil (Clinton).

2) further destroy and co-opt Hillary’s voter coalition

The first implies that Axelrod intends to do so not through any identificaiton between voters and Obama’s policies and talent, but entirely on how voters perceive Obama. Axelrod needs to sell a participative tale in which their loyalty is crucial to Obama’s ongoing struggle with a retrograde and reactionary establishment with all sorts of childish battle cries laden with emotional meaning and lacking anything definitive.

This is the only way Axelrod can win against a more seasoned, more experienced, and far more powerful candidate. One way for him to downplay the role of experience and skills -Hillary’s greatest advantages- and to overplay personality, is by personalizing the election and making it a struggle in which Obama enthusiasts fight for the clean name of their hero.

They can fight everyone about them, everyone who quesitons Obama’s presence, intent, and credentials, anyone easy pray to all sorts of negative labels. Axelrod has provided Obamafans with a full lexicon of terms and cliches which they can exercise on their slower, less gullible and therefore less enthusiasitc opponents. By involving followers in such a struggle, they feel empowered in their daily lives, and feel themseleves part of a movement, a change, and effort. They need Obama for this empowerment, and will “work to feel important.”

Every insult Axelrod can find for Obama to coolly bat down, while himself running around setting houses on fire, helps voter’s associate negative traits with Hillary, and a sort of sympathy, and increased identification with the struggling yet heroic Obama. It motivates them to lash out at Hillary supporters, and the thinking they’ve been told Hillary represents; thinking presented as unconcerned, or entirely unfavorable with and to Obama’s message.

Axelrod is unfolding a tale before voters very eyes, and part of that tale is now the notion that Hillary is a bitter female wildly striking out at a placid, noble, and superior being. Axelrod needs this tale, to maintain even a shred of interest on the part of Obama’s jejune, and therefore prone to frivolity and quick falling out, followers.

The second goal of Axelrod’s destruction of Hillary’s voter base, will rely on the White Voter narrative, crucial to attacking two of Hillary’s strongest constituencies, non-black minorities and women liberals. Axelrod will need to do the following (and voters will be able to observe it):

1) at least partially entrench the notion through “objective” sources (media), that there exists a White Voter Block favorable to Clinton. Axelrod doesn’t need voters to be 100 % convinced of this, but to some useful degree.

2) Axelrod will need to find instance of Hillary’s speeches which can be construted to imply that she is pandering to such a White Block, and presenting herself as “one of you” - you being “white block.”

3) Axelrod will need to increase the association between the terms “racism,” “race-baiter,” and “Hillary” in voters minds. This always works to strengthen the logical, but concocted logic of Hillary’s appeal to the “White Block.”

These three simple points will allow Axelrod to gradually destroy Hillary’s lead among Hispanics and Asians, undermining her claim to representing a more diverse coalition than Obama, who will be the sole beneficiary of Hillary’s loss of this non-black minority vote (McCain will not). Such a loss will in turn make Hillary less and less attractive to liberal women, and gradually destroy her rapport with anyone under fifty.

The two preconditions of 1) “White Block” to which 2) Hillary panders, ironically will serve to weaken her position among white women, and liberal whites in general, who seek to escape the onus of a racialized white vote. Especially one which is being pandered to. In fact, any slip-up on Hillary’s part which Axelrod can fit into this “pander to Whites” scheme, will be the immediate end of Hillary.

The third precondition, is obviusly part of the second, Hillary’s ability to pander to a white vote, because she is desperate due to having lost the black one, will be an easy sell to white liberals who will want nothing to do with such “Clintonian” politics as race-baiting, and racism.

One powerful incentive for Axelrod to succeed in this Machiavellian strategy, is to finally allow him to take the heat off of Obama’s monolithic black vote. The media have raised no questions about this monolith, and why it came about and stays about, allowing Axelrod’s dirty game to go unnoticed. Given the chance Axelrod will attempt to create a more diverse coalition in order to further pressure the white vote from under Hillary. If Axelrod is really planning in winning this nomination, he still has many battles to go, and in Puerto Rico, he is anticipating significant losses of the non-states 55 delegates. Axelrod also needs a solid Democratic coalition, like the one he’s destroyed, to stand a chance against McCain in the general election. To these means Axlerod has already taken the initiative.

***

Even before Ferraro, the outlined strategy was already in play. The week started with an insulting and truly impudent New York Times editorial claiming that Hillary’s 3am ad was blatantly racist. The author compared it to Griffith’s Birth of a Nation, an epic twenties film devoted to the birth of the KKK. His charges were as outlandish as they were unfounded, but that did not prevent other outlets from picking up the ball and running with it.

Then there was the AP article , which bluntly stated that Obama’s black support was driving a visible white backlash, i.e. irrespective of any facts or figures, the article is preparing ground for the “logical” argument of a “White Block.”

In “Obama and the Bigots” William Kristol is already laying the foundation for interpreting what this imagined backlash should mean for white liberals.

The obnoxiously monolithic black vote is silently being explained-away by articles which purport that Obama’s story represents the story of ordinary blacks, and hence accounts for his control of their vote.

Then there are the articles which seek to position Obama as a figure, whose success guarantees the abolition of the race issue altogether (provided he wins, of course), so that a vote for him is a vote for your conscience, and future peace.

The creation of a “White Block” is being witnessed by media outlets everywhere, but especially Fox.

The narrative of Hillary race-baitin is being sustained all accross the board, notably the Atlantic saying point blank about the Ferrero affair:

I’m willing to bet damn near anything Bill thought this up himself. As a white male Bill realized he couldn’t push Obama into the ghetto box, but what a brilliant strategy!

There are even already signs of Axelrod’s move to paint Hillary as pandering to the imaginary White Vote.

In an insidudous article in Newsweek, which I’d relegate into the category of Goebbelsian propaganda of the worst kind, we get the title “Clinton’s Pennsylvania Pitch: I’m One of You” Surely the author of this piece, is not ignorant of the associations such a title has in the presently racialized environment? Hot on the steps of Ferraro, the pronoun You, attributed to Hillary in “I’m One of You” imediately evokes “White voter” connotations, “I am one of you, I am white.”

The author was no doubt aware of this association, because when he couldn’t find a single instance when Hillary had actually spoken such words, he went to enormous lenghts to construct them on the basis of other statements Hillary made in a Pennsylvania town-meeting.

The effort is proof of the intent.

***

Obviously this is just a soupcon of the propaganda laying the ground for Axelrod’s success with his nefarious strategy. Misleading propaganda which won’t recieve the critical attention it deserves as it gradually conquers the minds and hearts of America’s voters. As Axelrod pumps his messages through various media outlets , what I’ve outlined above will begin to take shape in our minds, and will be reflected in tangible loses for Hillary with all her key constituents bellow 50 years of age.

This will give Obamagroupies, the pleasure of a continued virtual encounter with evil, so their loyalty is solidified in a solid pro-Obama block, built on the bones of the one Hillary had painstakingly cultiavated since time immemorial. The evil is Hillary, a nasty old woman, gradually more reliant on old-timers in biology, and outlook. Old-timers making the best targets for this new Maoist insurgency, in which the young have been given cause with the old, and hence promised political conquest.

***

As the primaries wind down, we will have the chance to observe how far off my analysis is. I think something along the these lines, will indeed take place if Axelrod is not stopped.

With her present approach, Hillary will not be able to beat Axelrod, because he enjoys superior media access. He does so in part due to a more media friendly message, a message crafted with the media in mind. Anytime a candidate runs on personality, the media have an easy sell. Axelrod knew he couldn’t pitch Obama on merit, so personality was his only asset and he leveraged it incredibly well. Especially since it was no ordinary asset in the case of Obama -but due to his race- an extraordinary one.

Axelrod knows this, and uses it to the max. He also knows that for a black candidate to command media attention, he cannot speak of race as Al Sharpton or Jackson would, and he cannot just play the victim. He must appear above race, while his surrogates do the dirty work. He must play the impertrubable hero, who is above the fray while viciously assailed from all sides by race-baiters and irrational haters. This is the tale the media can slobber over, and the one Axelrod can give them.

Clinton, campaigning on an honest down-to-earth platform of merit and hard work, simply cannot be framed in such fanciful, and plainly childish ways. This may be her undoing, unless she strikes first and undoes Axelrod’s plans.

***

So far, Hillary had one big chance of reversing Axelrod’s narrative, and destroying his s strategy. This was her option of standing by Ferraro, and force the message unto the media. As of tonight, she decided not to do it. This doesn’t mean she will lose, but it does mean she blew a good one. Let’s hope her team has something better up their sleeve, and there is more to come.

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