There has been a lot of discussion here on dKos about framing and rhetoric, most recently the excellent diary "Rightwatch: Learning from Scott McClellan's Briefing on Bombings in Iraq" by Liberation Learning. Before reading that diary, I smiled, assuming it would be some sort of humorous farce because nobody has ever actually walked away from a McClellan Press briefing with new information. After reading it, that smile was wiped off my face because its contents confirmed an idea that has been forming in my mind ever since the election. If a better solution is not found, the dialogue between the people and their elected officials through mass media will die, and progressives will deliver the coup de grace.
I think that the way the GOP operates right now is something like that part of 1984 where O'Brian asks Winston how many fingers he's holding up. When Winston sees four fingers and says so, O'Brian tells him that he is mistaken and there are five fingers, and tortures him until he agrees. If you substitute relentless propaganda, distorted information and clever rhetoric for torture you basically have the Republican Party's SOP. The suggestion that Democrats adopt that same strategy is fundamentally flawed. Ideally we should figure out how to educate and inform the electorate so that they can use reason and see the four fingers with their own eyes. Adopting our own subversive rhetoric is just beating them into submission until they finally agree to acknowledge what we believe to be the objective truth. I will admit that there may not be a better solution. Maybe the reality of the situation is that we've brought a knife to a gun fight and it's about time we replaced it with a .357 magnum. Like war, demagoguery should be a last resort, called upon only when all other alternatives have been exhausted. The candid and transparent exchange of ideas is the lifeblood of a free society. Let's try not to poison it.