Save for an apparent glitch that occurred in 2006, this first principle has been astonishingly effective in both winning new seats and in keeping existing seats in the Republican column. With this as their foundation for all of their campaigns, they have been able to utilize a vast array of political dirty tricks, election chicanery, the repeated use of the "big lie" theory of propaganda, red herrings, straw man arguments, logical fallacies, character assassination, distortion of the opponent's statements and positions, and outright lies constantly repeated and reiterated by legions of their surrogates and disciples.
And whaddayaknow? It worked! Paraphrasing H.L. Mencken's famous comment about the American consumer, Rove believes that nobody ever lost an election underestimating the gullibility of the American public. Financed legally and illegally by millions of dollars from a well of wealthy supporters who have their own political agenda for America, the Republicans have managed to broadcast their lies and deceptions to every city, town, village, and hamlet in America.
See, here's the thing, how else can anyone explain the election (twice) of the smug, bullying, fratboy, layabout, moronic, feckless cretin George W. Bush. (Did I miss any other adjectives? Feel free to add your own.) Of course, they did have an astonishing bit of good luck in electing him the second time called the World Trade Center attacks on September, 11, 2001. His political and intellectual shallowness was becoming quickly apparent to the American public only months after taking office. But like so many other times in his life when he found himself in way over his head, he got lucky.
So now they're once again rolling out the same old bag of tricks in order to elect an aging, political hack with no new ideas, no grasp of the dire straits the average American finds him or herself in, and no plan for the future of both the nation and the world other than same old platitudes and bromides the Republicans have been peddling for years.
But here's the real truth about Rove's first principle. It's not the average American who is an intellectually lazy, easily manipulated moron. It's the average clod in the mainstream media. If it wasn't for him or her, the average American might actually be told the truth.
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