The Nation has a review of a movie that is coming out about Lee Atwater. The write up gives alot of insight that is so timely and I felt this article should be read by Kossacks.
The beginning of hate politics and polarization and the end of good governing and effective leadership. Everything that is so bad about todays politics can be traced to Atwater.
http://www.thenation.com/...
Atwater was really a slug. He lied and cheated and stole his way to power and was instrumental in bringing Rove into power. Afterall, he was the mastermind of Rove's run for president of the College Republicans.
The telling thing about Atwater is that he actually believed in nothing and had no loyalties to anyone. Except to be part of the inner circle of the Bush family.
But, he knew he would always be regarded as purely a political operative and nothing more.
To say his protege, Rove, managed to achieve that very thing himself with the son, W Bush, is ironic.
Atwater was shrewd enough to look out at the political landscape, throw out the old republican playbook and rewrite it completely in the way he saw how republicans could win and destroy democrats.
." Early on, it was Atwater who understood that "people vote their fears, not their hopes"; he did all he could to stoke those fears. The cultural backlash he created wrested power from one party and firmly entrenched it in the hands of another. Look no further than George W. Bush's entire presidency as one shining, painful example of just how successful Atwater was at devising a whole arsenal of tactics aimed at shifting the political discourse away from substantive issues to visceral ones. These tactics now dominate American politics and have served to distort the democratic process. They include push polling (fake surveys conducted by "independent pollsters"), the use of coded language (i.e., "welfare queens") and tapping into white Southern and blue-collar resentment. Of the latter, Atwater acolyte and former deputy director of White House communications Tucker Eskew says, "Resentment became the destiny of the Republican Party, and Lee was adept at tapping into that."
How Atwater was able to conduct such sleazy campaigns and get away with some of the sleaziest and race baiting tactics was not just because of republicans who cheered Atwater but, also democrats, who refused to challenge him and assuming the public would be smarter then that. And the press, which just never bothered to fact check him or question the things he put out on rivals.
As Boogie Man unfolds, it's hard not to ask how Atwater got away with such outrageously dirty tricks. As one of his friends contends, Atwater used the old Southern trick of "slow-playing 'em" and then, with a "wink and a nod," charmed the gullible press. Forbes's film indicts a system that long ago failed to prevent an operative like Lee Atwater from attaining such a powerful level of political influence. It cannot be understated that the Democrats contributed to this political shift, thanks in large part to their inability to effectively counter Atwater. Perhaps they thought that the American people would see through the con the Republicans were running.
Lee Atwater brought us fear politics, smear tactics and the culture wars. He was probably the single most responsible person for changing the poltical landscape and campaigning for the worst.
Atwater died in 1991; Rove was heir apparent. His former protégé did not disappoint, delivering the White House to George W. Bush in 2000. Rove's ambitions and the power he ultimately attained surpassed that of his teacher. As Nation columnist Eric Alterman explains in the film, "Rove, who learned these tactics at the knee of Lee, moved into the White House, where you have the entire resources of the national government in the services of a political operative. I'd say that's new and rather frightening."
Alterman is right. In the end Atwater, who prided himself as the man behind the curtain too clever to leave any trace of his nefarious political operations, has left his fingerprints all over the American political system. And we are the worse for it, as the country remains paralyzed in a cycle of negative politics and chained to the visceral issues that continue to undermine American democracy. It's the undeniable truth that makes Boogie Man such a sobering and timely film.
I imagine that Lee Atwater would have loved to be alive today to run campaigns for Sarah Palin. she is just perfect for Atwater style campaigning and politics and she would take to it with gusto.
Imagine the very hell created by an Atwater-Palin team up like Bush and Rove in 2000.
Thank god for small favors.
But, the campaign that John McCain is running today, which we think of as typical sleazy republican, is actually a classic Atwater one, only without the discipline and effectiveness.
But, you watch that older woman at McCain's Town Hall today who said Obama was an Arab, and the rest of the rabid packs that are high on the hate and anger and whipped in a fury by the red meat of this week, and you are witnessing the fullfillment of Atwater's handiwork.
But, on a positive note in closing, regardless of the smears and sleaze in 2008, Obama is leading in the polls 3 weeks out from election day.
Maybe after 20 years, Atwater's style of politics has finally run it's course, thanks in large part to the failure of policies of those republicans that Atwater and Rove help get elected.