My Post-Debate Analysis

In a September 4 post
http://liberalbabyboomer.blogspot.com/2012/09/gop-theme-we-built-this-straw-man.html
just before the Democratic Convention, I expressed the hope that the Dems would offer a strong defense of Obama's "You Didn't Build That" speech. The Republicons had taken those words out of context and then, in the most galling display of underhanded political deceit in my lifetime, used their twisted interpretation of those words as the theme of their own Convention.

This was my prediction of what would happen:

"Unfortunately, I'm not hopeful of that hope because I can count on one hand the number of people I've heard give that message the rigor and eloquence that it deserves. My guess is that they won't even try."

Well, I would rate my prediction as "Half-True."
They did try. A little. Very little.
But the effort was neither rigorous nor eloquent and no one either talked about it afterwards or remembers it now. Do you? I didn't think so.

Here was the hope and prediction that I expressed, just before the debate, in my last post titled "Please Punish Mitt for His 47% Slur Tonight" :

"Now my hope is that in tonight's debate Obama will give Romney the punishment he deserves for the false, outrageous and insulting slander he committed against 47% of the American people. My guess is that he'll try. But I'm afraid that he won't do that job justice."

Well, I would also rate this prediction as "Half-True."
He didn't do that job justice.
But it was because the brother didn't even try! Oh Barry, how could you let us down like that?
The President needs to fire all of his advisors because they are the most inept bunch of incompetents
I've ever witnessed. Not that Obama should be absolved of blame, but these guys are awful.

Both the Republican Party and the Romney Campaign should be a smoldering heap of rubble by now. The con job that the Republicon Party have been pulling on the American people for the past thirty years is tantamount to treason. They have deliberately driven up the debt and caused a dangerous crisis with their "Starve the Beast" economic policies in order to use that debt as the excuse to circumvent the democratic process and get rid of the programs that the overwhelming majority of Americans voted for.
(I'll get into that more in a future post)

All political campaigns double-talk, obfuscate, omit facts, distort facts, mischaracterize and "stetch the truth." Obama's campaign is no exception. But the level of deception being perpetrated by the Romney Campaign must be unprecedented. They have to be the most deceitful campaign in American history.
If this were a competition for the title of world's biggest liars, the Romney campaign would be as dominant a team as the '27 Yankees were in baseball..

The fact that the Democrats have not been able to put the Republicons to rest tells us that they need much smarter people running the Party. I officially volunteer my services.

Here's what I would have suggested they do for their Convention last month:
Make their campaign theme "We Built This Economy"
The message behind this theme would be that all Americans contribute to the economy and the economy is what provides the opportunities that allow individuals to become rich.
I would invite three speakers to elaborate on this message:

1) William Deresiewicz, an essayist, critic and author.

Read this brilliant article he wrote for the NYTimes last May and you'll understand why:
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/13/opinion/sunday/fables-of-wealth.html?_r=0

Here is a relevant snippet:
"First of all, if entrepreneurs are job creators, workers are wealth creators. Entrepreneurs use wealth to create jobs for workers. Workers use labor to create wealth for entrepreneurs — the excess productivity, over and above wages and other compensation, that goes to corporate profits. It’s neither party’s goal to benefit the other, but that’s what happens nonetheless."

2) Nick Hanauer an entrepreneur, venture capitalist and author.

Check out this fantastic YouTube video also from last May:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bBx2Y5HhplI

Please check those links out, if not now, then when you have time. You'll love it.

Boy, I wish I had done the kind of thinking that resulted in the brilliant ideas that those two men came up with, then written it down in my blog. Wait a second. I did. Way back in August of last year.

In two posts from last year I offered a bit more sophisticated description of how the economy works than the slop the Republiconservatives give, which goes like this:
"the wealthy are the job creators, they do it all by themselves with nothing but their hard work, genius and risk-taking courage. How dare you think of raising their top marginal tax rate from 35% to 39.6%! Just because we have a huge and dangerous debt caused in large part by the Reagan and Bush tax cuts? Why that's socialist redistributionist class warfare! The rest of you count for nothing and just take while the creators make. You should be grateful that they do all of the work, pay all of the taxes and create all of the jobs. The rest of you sit on your couches waiting for the government check to come in. Why, you self-entitled, irresponsible moochers who can't even take care of yourselves. We should be lowering the job creators'  taxes even more so they can start creating jobs! And if they still won't create jobs, then we'll lower them again! We Republicons hope the job creators are smart enough to wait until their tax rate is zero before they start creating jobs, if they feel like it. Rather, they might just want to speculate with that dough in no-job producing ventures, instead.
 Hey, that's the invisible hand of the  free market, so keep your mouth shut!"

In my first post I directly and forcefully exposed this steaming pile of horseshit:
http://liberalbabyboomer.blogspot.com/2011_08_01_archive.html

I wrote my second post after the Elizabeth Warren speech on which Obama based his speech:
http://liberalbabyboomer.blogspot.com/2011_09_01_archive.html

In this one I criticized Ms Warren's speech for being weak and full of tactical errors. I then counseled Dems and libs on what to say and what not to say. Unfortunately Obama then said exactly what I suggested he shouldn't say.
It's almost as if the President never read my blog!
If he had taken my advice he would never had made that 'You didn't build that' gaffe in the first place.

This is why I would make:

3) Joe Barton a retired postal clerk and amateur blogger

my third speaker.

The first two geniuses on this list of speakers deserve a Nobel Prize in Human Decency.
The third is way too modest to suggest such a thing.
But if they had a Nobel in modesty, he would be forced to accept because he is too honest to deny his modesty.

Another thing I would have suggested for the Convention would have been to show how practically every businessman the Republicons paraded on that stage and put in their ads relied on government contracts, loans and taxpayer financed infrastructure. Does that make them irresponsible, dependent moochers, Mitt?

In my next post I will reveal the advice I would have given Obama for the first debate.

Please Punish Mitt for His 47% Slur Tonight

In a previous post, just before the Democratic National Convention, I expressed the hope that the Dems would forcefully defend the remarks delivered in that July campaign speech by Obama that contained the phrase "you didn't build that." That speech was an attempt to explain how successful businesses rely not only on individual initiative but, among other things, government initiatives, public infrastructure and the help entrepreneurs get from their fellow citizens..

Instead of giving that message the rigor and eloquence it deserved, Obama delivered an inarticulate mess that the Republiconservative distortion machine then used to accuse him of insulting hard working business owners by not giving them the credit they deserved. After taking that phrase out of context in order to make it seem that Obama was saying the exact opposite of what he did say, they then made it their fucking convention theme!
What a bunch of dirty, low down, underhanded skunks.

I have yet to hear one of these right-wingers square these other words (from that same speech) with their canard that Obama was denigrating individual effort:

"And what this reminded me of was that, at the heart of this country, its central idea is the idea that in this country, if you’re willing to work hard, if you’re willing to take responsibility, you can make it if you try "

"...and if they’re willing to work hard, then they can achieve things that you wouldn’t have even imagined achieving."

"The point is, is that when we succeed, we succeed because of our individual initiative..."

The Dems could have made Obama's real message their own campaign theme. They could have explained how the efforts and contributions of all of us are what makes the economy -- and the economy is what provides the opportunities that allow individuals to become rich.
That would have been brilliant. But having been burned once, the Dems decided to stay away from that.
How pathetic.

Now my hope is that in tonight's debate Obama will give Romney the punishment he deserves for the false, outrageous and insulting slander he committed against 47% of the American people. My guess is that he'll try. But I'm afraid that he won't do that job justice.
I must say that every time Obama has been given the opportunity to make the case for liberal principles he has fallen short. Worse than that, he often turns those opportunities into fodder for that 'Republiconservative distortion machine' by serving up some 'inarticulate mess' which they then seize on and use against him.

From Joe the Plumber to attacks on his ‘socialism.’ From the public option to rationing and death panels. From the Bush tax cuts to redistribution of wealth. From apologizing for America to 'you didn't build that.'
Obama just can't seem to defend himself.
It’s not just him, it’s the entire Democratic Party and the left in general.
However, there are a small handful of exceptions and I will highlight them in future posts.

Consider this revolting irony:
Romney just uttered, probably, the most insulting accusations ever made against the American people by a presidential candidate. And they were based on complete falsehoods. (to be fair, he did exclude all rich people from those insults even though many of them don't pay any income taxes and are dependent on government handouts.)

How is it that right-wingers can make such hay out of things that Obama never said, did or thought, incorporate it into their convention theme and drive themselves into a mindless rage, but the Dems can't effectively put Romney's feet to the fire for the most unambiguous insults we've ever heard from a presidential candidate? We've never seen Mitt so relaxed and at ease as when he made those comments.

It wasn't Obama who denigrated the efforts of people, it was that bastard Mitt Romney!
Romney hasn't suffered nearly as much as he should have for this. His candidacy should be completely over by now. Despite the fact that his efforts to squirm out of this are so fucking pathetic, he's actually succeeded to a large extent.
Out of all the insults he stuffed into the load of garbage he delivered to those rich donors, the worst by far was this one:
"I’ll never convince them they should take personal responsibility and care for their lives.”

Wow. Damn. Hoowee. That's 47% of the American people he's talking about. What a fuck.

You know, even if Obama did mean you didn't build that 'business', at least that would be partially true. Because people who start businesses -- while contributing initiative, ideas and/or capital -- don't usually build it themselves. They usually hire other people to build it for them. People like the 47% of irresponsible moochers that Mitt and his donors seem to despise.
Romney's horeshit, on the other hand, is just a god-damn flat out lie.

The only person I've seen so far to do this issue proper justice is the great Paul Krugman.
If you haven't read his recent NYT Op-Ed please do. It is beautiful:
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/21/opinion/krugman-disdain-for-workers.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20120921&moc.semityn.www&_r=0

A Nation of Couch Potatoes

Remember when Gov. Chris Christie warned that if we don't get rid of these redistributionist government programs "...we'll have a bunch of people sittin’ on a couch waiting for their next government check,”?
That was an interesting choice of metaphors coming from someone who, as a consequence of eating too many potatoes, could easily function as a couch.
Other Republicons have gone even further than the politician who is so fat he could teeter-totter with Marlon Brando. They claim that we are already there.
Rick Santorum said "...a little less than 50 percent of the people in this country depend on some form of federal payment, some form of government benefit to help provide for them,"
Gov. Romney made the same claim recently when he slandered 47% of the American people.

When I first heard them start to use this talking point I was like, "what the hell are they talking about? Are they just taking notes from Rush Dimbulb's radio show now and repeating the garbage he routinely pulls out of his big fat lard ass and expecting us all to believe it? Don't they realize that we live in the age of computers and fact checking?"
So I went to my computer and checked out PolitiFact.com to see what the story is.
They rated Santorum's statement Mostly True!
However, when you dig deep and look at how they come to this conclusion, things get interesting and very informative.

I attribute the success of right-wing propaganda/talking points to four main factors:
1) They are able to construct very simple arguments based on superficial appearances and assumptions. This is very easy to do.
2) They are able to make these arguments in a way that strikes our emotional chords. These arguments provoke our sense of outrage by creating the impression that a grave injustice is being done. This is also very easy to do.
3) They are able to manipulate the media in away where they can endlessly repeat these arguments over and over until they are accepted as true. This takes much more skill but is still relatively easy because of factor # 4.
4) Countering these arguments requires a much deeper understanding of reality, of how things work, of the 'big picture.' This is much more difficult to do. Plus it cannot be done in a simple sound bite.

Let me give you a few examples.
Right-wing talking points:
Joseph Stalin was bad therefore Communism is bad therefore socialism is bad therefore anything we label as socialism is bad.
Could I show the fallacy of that statement? Yes.
Could I do it in one short sentence? No way.
It would take several paragraphs.

Universal healthcare is bad because it rations healthcare and creates Death Panels, plus it's socialism and we can't afford it.
Again, it would take several paragraphs to explain the problems with that one sentence.

Obama apologizes for American values and sympathizes with the terrorists.
It took me 13 paragraphs to show how the US Embassy in Cairo's statement was not an apology, did not sympathize with the terrorists and actually defended American values. I did that in the following post:
http://liberalbabyboomer.blogspot.com/2012/09/brave-mitt.html
No wonder the Obama administration decided to disavow the Embassy statement rather than try to win that sound bite 'debate' through the media.

Which brings us to the right wing talking point which is the topic of this post:
Redistributionist policies take from the producers and give to the moochers.

See what I'm saying? See how easy it is to make the conservative argument? See how powerful the emotional impact of those arguments are? If they are believed they will enrage conservatives and shame liberals.
Obviously, Republiconservative politicians and talking heads want us to believe that redistributionist policies are causing us to become unwilling or unable to work because we are lazy and dependent on government.
Now this is definitely a plausible argument that shouldn't be dismissed by the left and needs to be carefully examined, which is what I intend to do in the following posts.

I want to demonstrate how Christie's, Santorum's and Romney's arguments are based on twisted and distorted facts, mixed in with enough bullshit to balance out a scale with Chris Christie on the other end of it. And by my estimations that bullshit would have to weigh at least a ton in order to do that.
But because reading a long complex explanation is almost as difficult as making one, I've decided to make that explanation in a separate post. So please stay tuned.

Class Warfare: Republicon Style

Just like the healthcare reform debates of two years ago, during which the Republicons falsely accused the Dems of precisely what they, the Republicons, were guilty of (rationing of healthcare with a free market administered Death Panel), the Recons are now engaged in a kind of class warfare that is not only hypocritical but misrepresents the facts in a very deceitful manner.

Romney recently expressed the kind of sentiments that right-wing radio hosts have been promulgating for many years now: Half of the country does the work (the upper income people) while the other half lays on the couch all day long waiting for their Government check to arrive.

Ed ciaccio, a friend and former MoveOn member sent me the following information in an email, which saved me the trouble of a google search. Ed also makes some excellent points:

"If you missed a very disgusting screed by a candidate for the presidency, here is what Mitt Romney said recently behind closed doors (revealing his true opinion of many of us):

'There are 47 percent of the people who will vote for the president no matter what. All right, there are 47 percent who are with him, who are dependent upon government, who believe that they are victims, who believe the government has a responsibility to care for them, who believe that they are entitled to health care, to food, to housing, to you-name-it. That that’s an entitlement. And the government should give it to them. And they will vote for this president no matter what….These are people who pay no income tax. […] [M]y job is not to worry about those people. I’ll never convince them they should take personal responsibility and care for their lives.'

It's actually 46 percent, and people in southern red states—you know, where those "right to work" for less laws Mitt likes keep wages low—are disproportionately likely to pay no income taxes.

Here is the truth, which Romney either refuses to know or will not acknowledge, given his prejudice against anyone unlike himself:
Just who was included in that 47% Mitt Romney was referring to in his secretly-recorded comments at a Boca Raton, Fla., fundraiser as people who don’t “take personal responsibility and care for themselves”?

61 percent of them work but don’t earn enough to owe Federal income tax.
17 percent are students (who will pay plenty of taxes once they’re out of school), military families, people with disabilities and people who have lost their jobs—including victims of outsourcers like, well, Mitt Romney.
22 percent are elderly.
(Data source: www.cbpp.org/cms/index.cfm?fa=view&id=3505#_ftn9.)

The fact that they're not paid enough or are active duty military or are too old or disabled—maybe suffering from black lung or other diseases acquired on the job—does not mean they don’t contribute to America’s tax revenues. In fact, the poorest one-fifth of U.S. households pay a grinding 16 percent of their income in various federal, state and local taxes."

Hey that's more than Romney pays!
Thanks Ed, good work

The Republiconservatives are trying to make it look like half the country is on welfare. This garbage comes straight from the bigoted minds and out of the big fat mouths of radio hosts like Rush Limbag and the countless copycats who have adopted his surefire moneymaking techniques.

This is how the deceit works: First you take the worst examples of the excesses of the 1970's welfare state. Then, because the President's a Democrat (all the better that he's black), you make believe that welfare reform never happened in the 90's under Clinton. Then you take that 70's stereotype, exaggerate it, then conflate it with every government program including Medicare and Social Security. Then you conflate that twisted image with the idea that this is where all your taxes go, assuming that you're in the 50% who pay "all of the taxes."

Here's a more honest and accurate, fair and balanced description of the "welfare state":

Government "welfare" programs are insurance programs that we all pay into either directly or indirectly, including the poor. These programs are available to any and every American citizen who is proven eligible and meets the requirements. This is a fact that is ignored by the right until it comes out that one of their heroes, like Paul Ryan or Ayn Rand or Joe the Plumber used Government programs. When it came out that Ayn Rand collected her dead husband's Social Security and used Medicare to treat her self-inflicted, tobacco-caused lung cancer (tobacco which was supplied by the free market at a handsome profit) and Joe the Plumber was on public assistance, their defenders pointed out that "they paid into the system"! Same goes for the hypocritical bug-eyed creep Ryan.

Do some people cheat? Sure, but the same thing is true for private insurance programs. I don't hear conservatives calling for getting rid of private insurance. We should do our best to stop any cheating. Interestingly, conservatives don't want to do anything to stop cheating in the free market because that would be "big government interference." Better to let the market regulate itself.

I'll have more on this later.

Is This an Apology or an Acknowledgement?

Is this following post an apology? If there are any conservatives reading this, please let me know what you think because sometimes it seems that an apology is in the eye of the beholder, a matter of perception.

I'd like to take this opportunity to extend to my fellow countrymen, who happen to be conservative, the same consideration and courtesy that I do to those Muslims from other countries that are at odds with us.
When I reread my last blog post I realized that I can be just as incendiary towards conservatives (many of whom are my friends and family members) as what I criticize them for being.

I acknowledge and agree with many of the grievances conservatives have regarding the behavior of certain Muslims throughout the world.
As a liberal and an agnostic, I am very troubled by much of this behavior. Especially the lack of restraint in the use of violence when expressing anger. (I think US military policy should practice more restraint as well)
Killings, the persecution of other religious groups, the treatment women, gays and dissenters are all things that are much worse, by far, than anything I've ever accused conservatives of. (except maybe the dropping of the atomic bombs on Japan)

I've often noted the similarities between the mind set and behavior of the unbalanced ultra-conservative religious fundamentalists of Islam and that of our own conservatives.
But let me say this, I'll take good old American unbalanced ultra-conservative religious fundamentalists over those foreign ones any day of the week. That's because they've been tempered and shaped by good old American liberals.

If you think about it, conservatives and liberals in this country basically agree on our ultimate goals. We just disagree on how to get there. I think that conservatives have about a third of it correct. Liberals have about a third correct. And the other third is yet to be decided.

One of the things we disagree about is what constitutes an apology.
So if any conservatives are reading this and would like to tell me whether they think that this post is an apology, I'd appreciate it. If I can know what your perception is I will reveal my intention and see if they match.

In the meantime, I will compose my 'apology' for apologies.

Brave Mitt

You gotta give it to him. Mitt Romney has guts. Not only was he courageous enough to falsely accuse the President of something he didn't do and, in the middle of a dangerous crisis, insult the actions of our brave diplomatic corps, but he also showed spine by defending the fucking asshole who took it upon himself to throw a match into an ocean of gasoline.

Check out the fearlessness of Mitt's initial statements in regard to the American Embassy in Cairo's initial statement:

"I'm outraged by the attacks on American diplomatic missions in Libya and Egypt and by the death of an American consulate worker in Benghazi. It's disgraceful that the Obama administration's first response was not to condemn attacks on our diplomatic missions, but to sympathize with those who waged the attacks."

Then later:
"...the statements were inappropriate and, in my view, a disgraceful statement on the part of our administration to apologize for American values.
I think it's a terrible course to -- for America to stand in apology for our values...And apology for America's values is never the right course."

From what Mitt said, you'd think that right after an American was killed in the attack in Libya, Obama pleaded for forgiveness from the attackers then apologized for granting the right of free speech in our Constitution. But just like almost every other time Mitt opens his mouth to utter something, he said the exact opposite of what the truth is.

Check out this timeline of exactly what was said, when and by whom, and how it (mis)matches with what Romney charged: What They Said, Before and After the Consulate Attack - Graphic - NYTimes.com

This was the Embassy in Cairo's initial statement which Mitt described as "disgraceful" "sympath[etic] with those who waged the attacks" and an "apology for America's values" and which he falsely attributed to the Obama administration as their first response to the attacks on our missions :

"The Embassy of the United States in Cairo condemns the continuing efforts by misguided individuals to hurt the religious feelings of Muslims – as we condemn efforts to offend believers of all religions. Today, the 11th anniversary of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the United States, Americans are honoring our patriots and those who serve our nation as the fitting response to the enemies of democracy. Respect for religious beliefs is a cornerstone of American democracy. We firmly reject the actions by those who abuse the universal right of free speech to hurt the religious beliefs of others."

Disgraceful? Sympathetic to the attackers of our missions? An apology for America's values?

What's disgraceful is how Romney insulted our brave diplomatic corps who, in service to our country, put their lives at risk in one of the most dangerous parts of the world and only made a perfectly reasonable, even-handed "fair and balanced" statement intended to calm a dangerous situation. Mitt wouldn't give the experienced people who were in the heat of battle the benefit of the doubt as how to best handle a very volatile situation which was developing quickly. It's like he wanted them to stand on top of the wall with a megaphone and yell "Now listen you Muslims. Everything in that Movie is the truth. You just can't handle the truth. Now back off before we let you have it!" Mitt and his fellow conservative chicken-hawks should try that next time something like this happens.

But maybe I'm being unfair referring to Mitt as a chicken-hawk because I heard that he earned a Purple Heart during the Vietnam war. Not that Mitt ever served in Vietnam. You see, even though he demonstrated in favor of the draft during the war, he used a deferment so he could serve as a Mormon missionary in the brutal and dangerous jungles of France. The way he got his Purple Heart is when he was annoying a French patron who was trying to enjoy one of the lowest heart disease rates in the world by practicing the French tradition of drinking a daily glass of wine. Part of the Mormon mission is to convince people not to drink alcohol. As Mitt preached the evils of drink to the Frenchman, he reached out to stay the wino's hand. This caused some of the wine to splash onto Mitt and produce a purple, heart shaped stain on his crisp starched-white Mormon shirt. Story goes, Mitt's salesmanship sold the Frenchman on the idea that wine could only cause him harm. So he gave up wine drinking on the spot. Unfortunately, the gentleman died of a heart attack in his mid forties.
Oh well, at least Mitt got out of going to Vietnam!

Sympathetic to the attackers of our missions?

Does this sound like sympathy with the attackers?
"Today, the 11th anniversary of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the United States, Americans are honoring our patriots and those who serve our nation as the fitting response to the enemies of democracy."

Notice how Mitt used the plural when he referred to the "attacks on our diplomatic missions." In other words, he included the attack in Libya which caused the deaths of three Americans. He was trying to make us think that the statement was made after those killings. As the NY Times reported, the statement was made by the Embassy in Egypt before the first attack even happened. The Administration's first response after the killing in Libya was to strongly condemn the attacks.
Ain't Romney something?

An apology for America's values?

Did you see an apology anywhere in that statement? I always thought that apologies required the use of words like "we apologize" "we are sorry" or "we deeply regret." It wasn't an apology, it was a condemnation of the asshole film that got three Americans killed. Something that jerk-off Romney should have done in the first place. Instead, the fuck decided to inflame the emotions of his countrymen by doing exactly what his ultra-conservative religious fundamentalist counterparts in the Arab Middle East do: throw even more gas on the fire.

Far from apologizing for American values, the statement proudly asserted them: "Respect for religious beliefs is a cornerstone of American democracy."
From the way Romney and his fellow war-mongers have been behaving, it looks as if they would like to apologize to right wing "Judeo/Christians" for the Founding Fathers including Islam in that one. (Check out Jefferson's writings on that: http://www.theatlantic.com/daily-dish/archive/2010/08/jefferson-on-the-toleration-of-islam/183790/ )
But what about free speech?
The statement went beyond defending it as an American value by calling it "the universal right of free speech."
The exact opposite of what Romney charged.

Do you recall what the appeasing Muslim-sympathizing General Petraeus said two years ago?
The US military commander in Afghanistan warned that the lives of American troops would be endangered if evangelical Christians in Florida went ahead with plans to burn the Koran on the ninth anniversary of September 11. I think that should apply to Romney's reckless staements, as well.

GOP Theme: We Built This Straw Man

I really hope the Dems do a decent job of exposing all that deceitful horseshit that was piled up on the stage during the GOP Convention last week. What a puke-fest that was.

I think it would be helpful to look at the definition of the word deceit: (from Wikipedia)

"Deception, beguilement, deceit, bluff, mystification and subterfuge are acts to propagate beliefs that are not true, or not the whole truth (as in half-truths or omission). Deception can involve dissimulation, propaganda, and sleight of hand, and well as distraction, camouflage or concealment. There is also self-deception, as in bad faith."

Isn't that a perfect description of Republiconservative tactics?

Check out the description of Straw Man from http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-a-straw-man-argument.htm:

"The straw man argument, ... deliberately misrepresents and weakens the argument of the opposing side. This can be done by leaving out key points of an opposing argument, quoting a person’s words out of context, or presenting a particular person’s poor defense as the entire defense of an opposing side."

From Wikipedia:"A straw man, ... is a type of argument and is an informal fallacy based on misrepresentation of an opponent's position.[1] To "attack a straw man" is to create the illusion of having refuted a proposition by replacing it with a superficially similar yet unequivalent proposition (the "straw man"), and refuting it, without ever having actually refuted the original position.[1][2]"

I also hope the Dems can do a much better job of reiterating Obama's message, which was taken out of context by the right but then ironically expressed with the use of the collective "We" in the GOP's very convention theme: "We built it."
It's almost as if the Republicons recognized the reality that we are all interdependent on each other.
Except, whenever Republicons and libertarians hear that concept expressed, their limbic system produces a powerful and angry emotional reaction and this causes their pre-frontal cortex to shut down rendering it incapable of accepting any information that contradicts their emotional biases. (To be fair, Dems and libs have this same tendency.)

Unfortunately, I'm not hopeful of that hope because I can count on one hand the number of people I've heard give that message the rigor and eloquence that it deserves. My guess is that they won't even try.

I'll be following the convention on the "Fair and Balanced" station and see what happens.