A new PAC is targeting Progressives on the Ames, IA, school board over a BLM and LGBT curriculum — see this excellent piece from the Iowa Informer.
Why do you need to read this? because this is the blueprint for attacking progressives all across the country for at least until November 2022. Republicans from Maine to Miami are using it already. They don’t have any achievements, or evidence for the benefits of their policies, or even majorities in most states. So this fear-mongering is what they're running on. And the Supreme Court is poised to help them in the name of ‘religious freedom’ or ‘freedom to discriminate’.
Note how the leaders of the PAC are cleverly avoiding to confess that they're Republicans — they also claim to not be affiliated with a fundamentalist Church (it’s just coincidence that the treasurer is Youth Outreach minister at one, Cornerstone Church). They just stick to their messages “BLM = hatred of Whites”, “historic facts about slavery = indoctrination”, “LGBT = ick”, and “masks=tyranny”. And the President of the PAC is just a “concerned Mom”, grassroots and all (past communications director of the Chamber of Commerce? not mentioned).
They’ve already gotten our wonderful Superintendent Jenny Risner to resign. And the PAC President, Eve Lederhouse, scored an appearance on Laura Ingraham’s show.
We better study this and prepare. One thing I know will NOT help — yelling ‘racists’ at them. It’s true, no doubt they are! No need to convince me! But what we need to do is getting enough good people off their butt this (!!!!) November in the upcoming School Board election, and even before, to usually sparsely attended board meetings. No need to motivate the activist base — I am rather thinking of a good friend who (back in 2014) had not even heard of the effort to recall three Justices of the Iowa Supreme Court. Conservatives had heard, from the pulpit probably or maybe at a BBQ like the one described in the linked article — the recall was about three Justices who had affirmed gay marriage.
Luckily, we managed to spread the word and beat the recall, even in the dismal year 2014. So it can be done! And it was done by similar, low-key, no-ads, grassroots campaigning. Just show that Progressives are kind and caring, and we know how to BBQ, too. You don’t have to bring up politics at all. But imagine what you would say if someone brings up one of those Ingraham talking points! If it’s a hardened R partisan, don’t feel the need to debate — maybe just point out that this is the Republican standard talking point, and that you don’t want to be “drawn into politics”. Imply that you would win a fight if you did engage, you just don’t want to. But if you feel up for it, and especially if it’s a low-engagement R or a Dem leaner, hit them up by all means! would we Whites not be mad if Whites were killed and imprisoned at much higher rates than Blacks? It’s a rather admirable restraint if BLM protesters are only protesting non-violently. LGBT youth are still bullied and kill themselves at much higher rates than straight youth. Masks save lives — tell about the two hairdressers in Missouri who served 140 customers not knowing they had Covid. Nobody got infected, because they wore masks. Covid’s not dangerous? tell about NYC running out of morgue space in Spring 2020. Tell about mass graves in Iran visible from space.
PS — the Iowa Informer, and reporter Gavin Aronson, formerly of the Village Voice and Mother Jones, definitely deserves a bookmark.