Some time ago I heard the story about a town which was going through a change as it was becoming integrated rapidly. The town fathers were concerned that there might be problems so they hired a consultant (I heard it was A.D. Little). After a time the consultant came back and suggested that the town pick one of the telephone poles in the area and paint it purple, then announce in the local paper of their plans to paint all of the poles purple and give some excuse as to why they were adopting this strategy. "And", he concluded, "this should avert any problems you could have."
The town fathers were agast they had paid this guy money for such a stupid idea. The consultant convinced them to follow his plan, and they did.
Within a short period of time there were committees formed and people , no matter what their ethnic backround came together to protest and stop the town fathers from painting the poles purple. As a result this forced the different groups to work together, to seek each other's help and be a part of a successful project. ( Of course the Town was convinced by this effort to stop the painting the poles purple)
The community worked together and as a result the consultant was proven right.
(I have not found this story on the Internet as an Urban legend or anything else, I would love to have this verified.)
So what's my point? The Other side has been doing Purple pole politicing. It was Gays, and Guns, and God, now it's Merry Christmas, Christmas trees, Rick Steves, like it or not these are the purple poles. They pick a "thing" as a rallying point to build community, then they use this community to their own end.
The purple pole is a fabricated issue, much like the issues that are coming up to distract attention from the Corruption in the Bush administration, incompetance and of course the Iraq war.
Every time I hear another attack I think, "Purple Pole Politics" ,