fighting back

Mediaite: This week the Obama campaign launched a new front in the heightened information wars that come with presidential campaigns, with a starkly designed and somewhat controversial new website called Attack Watch. The site enables user-generated submissions of what Obama supporters deem to be unfair or untruthful media attacks on President Obama, his political campaign and his administration’s policy….

…. the site has so far been a big hit. A source within the Obama campaign has told Mediaite, that in just the first day, the user-generated research tool has been nothing short of an enormous success. “In less than 24 hours we’ve had over 100,000 people sign up at the website, which indicates significant interest from supporters.”….

….. the very least this digital effort did its job bit perhaps instilling a little fear in the GOP campaign efforts. It’s not difficult to imagine social media staffers at the RNC scratching their heads and saying “why didn’t we think of that?”

The essence of AttackWatch is the Obama campaign outsourcing of opposition media research to its army of loyal supporters …. In the brave new world that is political smear campaigns, leveraging the passion of one’s political base is not something that we should fear, but rather a smart and savvy political move.

Thank you Loriah

Sign up here

Follow @attackwatch on Twitter

‘get the facts, fight the smears’

Link – this is a seriously excellent site, part of OFA. I’ve added it to the blogroll here if you ever need the link.

Sign up here

Follow @attackwatch on Twitter

Thanks Jovie and Tien Le

‘the gop’s cia playbook: destabilize country to sweep back into power’

Robert Parry (Alternet): Modern Republicans have a simple approach to politics when they are not in the White House: Make America as ungovernable as possible by using almost any means available, from challenging the legitimacy of opponents to spreading lies and disinformation to sabotaging the economy …  almost as if they are following a CIA training manual….

…. When a Democrat somehow does manage to get into the White House, Republicans in Congress (and even in the Courts) are ready to do their part in the destabilization campaign…

…Immediately the Republicans and the Right set to work demonizing and destroying Obama’s presidency. Instead of allowing the Democrats to enact legislation aimed at addressing the financial and economic crisis, the Senate Republicans launched filibuster after filibuster.

….There were waves of propaganda pounding Obama’s legitimacy …. Soon, billionaires like oil man David Koch and media mogul Murdoch were promoting a “grassroots” rebellion against Obama called the Tea Party. Activists were showing up at presidential speeches with guns and brandishing weapons at rallies near Washington.

….The Republican propaganda machine will tell the American people that they must throw Obama and the Democrats out of office for stability to return….

Of course, the reality of a new Republican administration, especially with a GOP Congress, would be the return of the old right-wing nostrums: more tax cuts for the rich, less regulation of corporations, more military spending, and more privatization of social programs.

….The hard reality in the United States today is that the Republicans and the Right are now fully organized … they are well-positioned to roll the U.S. economy off the cliff and blame the catastrophe on Obama.

….that may be their best hope for winning Election 2012.

Full article here

Thank you Michelle and Jackie