I see that some Democrat politicians in the USA have taken to calling Tea Party politicians terrorists.
I wonder if this is wise on their part. It is clearly wrong and nasty; that’s a given. What I now wonder is whether such insults will be politically damaging to the Tea Party, or rather to any politician who uses such wrong and nasty language. Is this some kind of concerted effort by Democrat bigmouths to badmouth the Tea Party? Or are they just very angry, and individually blowing off steam? Being the optimist I am, I suspect the latter, or that if it is more the former, it may be a serious miscalculation.
Recently, in a comment here (I apologise for forgetting to which posting this comment was attached and for being unable to supply the link that the commenter did supply – perhaps he or some other commenter can rectify that and I will be able to add the link (by turning those last two words blue)) to a theory that once a “convinced minority” (I think that was the phrase) reaches about ten per cent of the population, its success from that moment on cascades, and soon part or even all of the agenda that this minority is pushing becomes a given of conventional discussion and debate. (I presume that this book was involved.)
This makes a lot of sense to me. I think the key to such transformations of opinion or behaviour are that individual members of the population, even though mostly not themselves already members of the convinced minority in question, are almost all of them quite closely connected to people who are.
The Tea Party, for the purposes of such analysis as this, doesn’t just mean all the good (I think) people who are spending every spare hour and spare dime they have forcing, by impeccably democratic methods, Tea Party opinions upon that great and greedy bi-partisan tribe of Washington tax-and-spenders. I include also the (much(?) greater) group of people who, when they hear a Tea Party opinion about government spending, government debt and so on, nod their heads and say: “Yeah that’s right. They may be … (insert insult of choice involving religion, science, abortion, witchcraft, guns, four-wheel-drive vehicles, etc.) … but these people are right about government spending. It’s too much. It’s got to be controlled.”
And, I’m guessing, a lot of Americans now know people like that. A lot are even related to such people. They may not agree with such sentiments themselves, but they know, and like, maybe even love, people who do now believe such things. So, when some Democrat politician calls a Tea Party politician a terrorist, a great many average Americans respond, not by making a note to not join the Tea Party and to agree about how mad they are when next they come up in conversation, but rather, by reacting with a thought like: “Hey, that’s my Uncle Freddy you’re talking about! He likes those Tea Party people. He may be a bit of an old grump, but he ain’t no terrorist sympathiser. He drove a truck in Gulf War 1. Last Christmas he bought me an iPhone. He’s okay. Take it back!”
To put the above story another way, the key to all this is that once the population as a whole starts to have its own personal face-to-face take on what it thinks about that convinced minority with its previously off-the-chart-of-respectability opinions, no amount of political and media insults can change how they see things. They now have their own personal versions of the story, and they ain’t going to be told what to think by a mere politician on TV.
If that’s right, and if all this convinced minority stuff does now apply to the Tea Party, then bigmouth Democrats calling their Tea Party enemies “terrorists” is cause not for fear, but for rejoicing, among all those of us who want the finances of the US government to be something vaguely like sane in the years to come. Such insults are not evidence of an argument being or about to be won by such Dems; it is evidence that they are at least beginning seriously to lose this argument, and that they are starting to realise this. They know that a great many people will feel personally insulted by all this terrorist talk, but, … Grrrrrrrr!!!! What the hell is happening to the world, when a politician can’t spend other people’s money any damn way he likes? Screw the damn world!!! Screw you all, you bastards!!! When Dems call Tea Partiers terrorists, they are being honest, in the sense that they are truly saying what is on their angry, confused, wrong, nasty minds.
Does the above make any sense? It does to me. Or am I being, as I so often am, too optimistic?
By the way, while typing in this posting (on an unfamiliar computer) I noticed that I had at one point put the “Teat” Party. But actually, I quite like that phrase, to describe all the kind of people who think that Tea Partiers really are terrorists.
Actually the Democrats have a bit of a speech defect. They meant to call the tea party people “Bigamists”
No, you’re not too optimistic. A perusal of comments on NYT editorials already shows (hedged) identification with the Tea Party — quite astounding.
I tell people that in 5 years no one will own up to having been a Progressive.
They are losing. Calling democratically elected politicians who don’t want to raise taxes “terrorists” is a sign of desperation.
The trouble is, of course, (as Paul Marks says), much of the MSM will continue to make out that the Tea Party folk are mad and dangerous and all the rest. The key problem for the MSM, though, is that a sufficiently large number of voters are so appalled at the lies and uselessness of their media/political class that this tactic will not work.
I am actually pretty optimistic.
First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win. (A quote often attributed to Mohandas Karamchand Ghandi)
Having seen the events play out to the third stage is also cause for optimism.
Calling them “tea baggers” didn’t stick. So, I would guess calling them terrorists won’t stick either. It will be forgoten in a few months so long as some nut doesn’t answer the call.
As for winning? I don’t know. The tea parties current problem isn’t really the Democrats at all it’s the establishment Republicans. The danger is that they will be co-opted into some conservatice social agenda such as abortion or gay marriage instead of focusing on spending. The current front runner in the republican presidential primaries is Romney and he is no tea bagger. Certainly, he has the potential to side line the tea bagger agenda.
I agree that it means they are losing. My only caveat is that those who are heartened by this turn of affairs must be very careful not to expect too quick of an end to this battle. The fight won’t end, even with a good result in the 2012 elections; it will only just be getting started.
Here’s the link to that “commmitted minority” article you asked about (it’s a précis of the scholarly article and itself provides a link to the entire thing). And no, it’s not related to the “Tipping Point” book to which you linked, although there obviously is some overlap in ideas.
I agree that the “terrorists” remark is a sign that we’re winning. Calling names is the first sign of intellectual bankruptcy; it’s an emotional response of the defeated. They’ve played the “racist” card for all it’s worth, and it no longer has any traction (if it ever did), so now they’re trying something else. They’ll probably try “pedophiles” next.
“I tell people that in 5 years no one will own up to having been a Progressive.”
Awsome. Here’s hoping.
Sarah Palin said that they way you could tell the Democrats weren’t serious was, if they really thought the Tea Partiers were terrorists, they’d call them insurgents and try to surrender to them.
I realise that the only hope for Democrats is for angry opponents of socialism to go amok with guns or bombs in America.
Way too optimistic. Of those Republicans elected under the ‘tea party’ banner, something like two/thirds of them voted for raising the debt ceiling. The insults are political cover- Republicans will only get votes if voters who disagree with current policies think Republicans will change the policies. Now, we know they could have refused to raise the debt ceiling, but they did not. Both sides cooperate with each other, and conservatives merely pretend to want smaller government while never actually making it smaller.
Instead, we get soundbite wars. They play on our emotions. It is insinuated we would get something far different if we voted for these ‘terrorists’, precisely so that those who want something far different will vote for them. This is congress, and they know all they are doing is consolidating each other’s constituency with this crap. The insults don’t put anyone in danger of being turned out of office.
Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression, Acceptance… they have a ways to go.
I understand your general point, but I think you’re missing an important element in the way statists think.
If you’ll recall, the same congresscritter who said the tea party people were terrorists also said “They won’t let us spend any money.” Given the trillions upon trillions that the progressive nanny state has already pissed away on uncounted failed programs and subsidies, truly a surreal statement.
But the point of all of this is that if the “right people” all agree that anyone who objects to government expansion and spending is a terrorist, and they all go around saying that in all the usual forums, then, to the collectivist mind, it must be true.
And if it’s true, then any legislation, and law enforcement action, and infiltration, etc., etc., is justified.
After all, repression of terrorists is sane and legal, no?
You may remember, during the 1990’s, the sudden alleged surge in the number and power of “right wing extremists” who threatened the social order.
Google “Posse Comitatus” or any other names you can remember, and you will see article after article quoting government officials and law enforcement people about the deadly dangers of the tax protesters and anti-government types.
The purpose of all this inflamed rhetoric is to create just that sort of fearful spectre, and justify the same sort of repressive actions by the state that followed that hunt for the boogey-man.
We are dealing with people who can literally convince themselves of anything if they need to believe it in order to advance their agenda.
They actually believe that their perceptions are reality.
They must. Otherwise, they might have to look at the shambles all around them, and question their fundamental beliefs.
And that, of course, can never be allowed.
I revel in their howls of execration.
Here it is.
What August and VR said. Quite depressing, really.
One man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter or so we were told during the 8 year span of BDS.
Brian, I sent the link you requested several hours ago but it’s stuck in Smitebot purgatory.
Two words: childish tantrum.
Laird, I posted it yesterday – here it is (again).
The “Teat Party” is an awesome description of most of what goes on in government!
It’s nothing that complicated or meaningful. The Democrats are just continuing the practice begun ten years ago by the Republicans of the faction in power calling anyone who disagrees with them a terrorist. If the Republican faction of the ruling party wins the next election, the positions will reverse and it will be back to the Republicans calling the Democrats terrorists.
Cite, please. I can remember implications that not being happy with Fed security programs was “unpatriotic”, but I never, not once, heard a major politician (much less the VPOTUS) refer to those who disagree on domestic policy as “terrorists”. Not once.
You are going to have to prove this is not merely a case of your wishing the Dems were only as rotten as the Reps.
Personally, I think this represents a true new low in American public political behavior in modern times.
From Brian’s post:
“To put the above story another way, the key to all this is that once the population as a whole starts to have its own personal face-to-face take on what it thinks about that convinced minority with its previously off-the-chart-of-respectability opinions, no amount of political and media insults can change how they see things. They now have their own personal versions of the story, and they ain’t going to be told what to think by a mere politician on TV.”
I think this a very sensible point, very sensibly written and which is typical of what I think Brian does best.
“We are dealing with people who can literally convince themselves of anything if they need to believe it in order to advance their agenda.”
That may be true of some people, but not true of others.
Voter disenchantment with the Democrats may not be enough to get them out of power: there’s always election fraud and our wonderfully incurious media….