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Recent events in this year’s rapidly closing primary season showed erstwhile Republican frontrunner Newt Gingrich at his level best, creating new campaign themes design to sever, with a surgeon’s precision, a candidate from his independent, middle-class, “real-America” support. The problem: this time, Gingrich’s focus was a fellow Republican, Mitt Romney, and the type of bare-knuckle capitalism he made famous, leading to charges that the fiery speaker was “attacking capitalism” itself. This is an overreaction, but a justified one.

The Gingrich argument — that Romney’s past with the corporate raider firm Bain Capital shows a candidate who’s not just comically out of touch, but in fact made his fortune shuttering the kinds of firms that employ average citizens — is not about capitalism. It’s about Romney’s electability, and the many ways his candidacy fails to resonate with those elements of the 99% that comprise the Republicans’ post-Reagan power base. But it raises deeper questions, and Republicans are right to worry, because the Bain argument appears to show a chink in the larger party’s rhetorical front.

Since the beginning of Obama’s term, Republicans have endeavored to present a unified line of battle when defending corporate interests, large and small alike: that’s why, in the hands of John Boehner and congressional Republicans, the regulation of highly volatile, irresponsibly-traded derivatives becomes an existential threat to the free market, and a danger to small business job creation, when in fact it’s no such thing. The result is a political landscape where one is either entirely for the unregulated free market — with all of its excesses — or by opposing one portion of it, entirely against it.

This line makes sense as long as Republicans stay on one side, and Democrats the other. But Gingrich’s attempt to invoke Bain to damage Romney compromises the Manichean simplicity of their argument. If parts of capitalism are flawed, or work against middle-class interests, maybe other parts need fixing too. And if so, does it still make sense to say that all regulations kill jobs? This is the proverbial flank which, when weakened, compromises the integrity of the entire army. Think of von Kluck’s right flank, turned at the first battle of the Marne, to the ruin of Germany’s greater dreams.*

Of course, the Speaker ultimately reversed himself, and gloriously returned himself to the Republican orthodoxy. But the damage is done, and vigilant Democrats should observe the weakness on Romney’s right. If some Republican voters could be turned by Gingrich in such short order, perhaps they could be turned again in the fall.

* – With apologies for the tortured World War I metaphor. I just finished reading Guns of August, and that book is just great.

For reasons I can’t fathom, demands for loan forgiveness have always been a staple of youth movements — but it’s never gonna happen. Forgiveness wouldn’t erase debt, it would just shift it, saddling corporations with the more than $1 trillion dollars currently borne by students nationally. Perhaps corporations remain better able to carry that burden than recent graduates on an individual basis, but on a systemic level, the financial sector simply can’t write down another trillion dollars without prompting another industry-wide collapse. Nor can universities simply stop charging for college degrees, without eradicating jobs for academic professionals, and endangering the research universities that make American higher education (and science) so unique. Simply put, there’s really no such thing as a free lunch here.

And, demands for loan forgiveness fairly clearly bump up against the honorable opposition’s favorite mantra: “personal responsibility.” Some issues truly are out of the hands of even responsible citizens: employment (in many cases) is one of them. Loan debt is not. In today’s economy, a college degree is a bare necessity for a successful life — but a degree from the institution of your choice is a luxury. You don’t have to go to Harvard to get a good education. Nor do you have to go to one of the quaint little liberal arts schools that define the college experience in the popular mindset, but stand to set you (or your family) back $50,000 a year, and offer only a mediocre academic pedigree in return. I sympathize with the kid from a poor family who saved day-in-day-out, went to Georgia Tech, did well, and still can’t get a job — or was laid off when his sector of the economy imploded. I don’t sympathize with (say) SMU alums who simply didn’t ever think about how they’d pay back their loans. That’s on you.

Part of building a good movement is crafting an agenda that’s forward-thinking enough to inspire, but realistic enough to potentially see some real-world success. OWS has hit the first mark — wouldn’t it be nice if everyone could go to Harvard, and not pay a dime?? — but needs to dial it back to hit the second. Until that happens, I’ll sympathize generally with the protestors, begrudge them the minor inconvenience they inflict on my Financial District, and thank God for the privilege of living in a country where people like them can sit around in a park just to “make a statement.” I’ll even take seriously their general discontent (ahem, NSFW) with the current state of things.

But I won’t respect them as a movement until the organizers kick this, and the Marxist element, out of their platform.

Unemployed Americans are a natural Democratic constituency. They’ve been wronged by corporate interests, and feel the system — the unrestrained free market, so belovéd lately by the right — has left them behind. And as they partially dependent on public support, unemployed Americans are less likely to be taken in by the right’s anti-”big government” shills (the tea party). The unemployed understand the value of the social safety net, and should (absent some bizarre cognitive dissonance) wish to see it continue. And when you’re out of work, it’s the first thing on your mind: a worker’s identity, as one of the unemployed, cuts across other divisive sociopolitical cleavages. It doesn’t matter if you’re gay or a fundamentalist: if you’re looking for a job, providing for your family is priority #1.

More, Republicans seem to be doing everything they possibly can to alienate this bloc of voters. Herman Cain essentially told everyone without a job that it’s their fault they’re out of work — when in this economy, we know that’s not the case. How easy is it to be excellent at your job, but become part of a random downsizing initiative that takes no account of your individual value? (Granted that Cain explained away his callousness at the last debate — but why should that matter? The sound bite’s on record. Run with it.) And the Republican wing of the Senate, helped along by two Democratic defectors, refused to even open debate on the only job-creating bill that any party has even proposed in months. While Republicans debate whether Cain’s “9-9-9″ plan is a secret tool of Satan, and muse poetically about how ending gay marriage and other “threats to the family” would magically restore the economy to its previous grandeur, the candidates’ Senate colleagues aggressively block any attempt to provide necessary relief to this neglected set of voters. Why should we let them get away with it?

A bizarre quirk of campaigning for the unemployed is that your goal is, naturally, to eradicate your supporters as a distinct bloc. So be it. When your voters return to the rolls of the middle class, they’ll remember whose policies helped them to get there.

It’s the rare campaign that goes negative in its first public offering. Perry’s is also the first experiment with this type of ad, post-Tim Pawlenty, and outside of Sarah Palin’s odd “remember-that-I-still-exist” variants. What I’m getting at is, this is an affirmatively new way to campaign, and one that attracted nothing but negative attention in its last, limited engagement. The lesson I would draw is that the country doesn’t respond to true negative ads, which is what this is, aside from a few dog whistles to the radical right (“who doesn’t apologize for America…”).

Early negativity also feels “off” for a primary election: Republicans are entitled to bet, at the general phase, that voters want “anyone but Obama.” But since the Republican candidate will be, by his* very definition, not Obama, I would expect the players to attempt to state a positive case explaining their ideas for the country — not try to simply distinguish themselves from the President in as strident and offensive a manner as possible.

But, then again, expecting anything but the absolute worst from Republicans really is what got us into this mess in the first place.

No, I still believe [officials in the Obama administration] are socialist. Their policies prove that almost daily. Look, when all the answers emanate from Washington D.C., one size fits all, whether it’s education policy or whether it’s healthcare policy, that is, on its face, socialism.

The problem here may not be immediately obvious. Over the past three years, we’ve heard the term “socialism” bandied about with such frequency that it’s probably lost all meaning. But in case you’ve forgotten, “socialism” has a defined meaning:

Noun: \ˈsō-shə-ˌli-zəm\

(1) Any of various economic and political theories advocating collective or governmental ownership and administration of the means of production and distribution of goods.

Centralized authority may suggest socialism — when it collapses into centralized ownership of industry — but the two are not identical. What Perry is actually criticizing could, at most, be described as a potential imbalance in the federal system, or disrespect for states’ rights, or (to the constitutionally ignorant, to wit, the tea party) a violation of the Tenth Amendment.

Now here’s the question. Did Perry misspeak, or does he know what he’s doing? With apologies to my Aggie readers, it’s not clear to me that Perry does actually know better, although he certainly should. Still, we should confront the possibility that the Republican frontrunner and likely nominee (see, e.g., this) has chosen to frame his recidivist, anti-federalist views in terms of America’s struggle with Communism, imbuing a battle as old as the republic with the moral force of that rivalry. And comparing something as blasé as the centralization of education policy to a conflict that almost brought the world to a nuclear end both does violence to language, and suggests violence in fact. Does the country actually benefit, when we elevate every political debate to the eschatalogical level, making it an issue of life or death? I expect not — but it increasingly sounds like we should prepare ourselves for that kind of campaign.

For all the merit to the general idea, AttackWatch somehow manages to appear unstatesmanlike, petty, ineffective, timid, and overly aggressive — all at once. For one, this type of political warblogging should never be done under the direct auspices of the party, the campaign, or the president. Though Fox News and the Republican Party do, for all intents and purposes, merge into a single partisan entity, Republicans correctly maintain some semblance of formal separation.

Democrats should too, perhaps especially so. Our (putative) advantage with some swing voters is our even-tempered, statesmanly presentation of ideas — even at its worst, this White House never engages in the kind of histrionics you see on the right. We don’t screech about socialism or stoop to the historic depths plumbed by Palin during the “death panel” fracas. And we compromise. Perhaps we need a party platform to attempt to set the world straight about what Obama’s policies are — and what they aren’t. AttackWatch accomplishes that goal rather well, but an even-keeled site addressed to rumors as positive points — not “Obama does not hate Israel,” but “Obama supports the unique U.S./Israel relationship” — would accomplish it better. Especially if the grisly, alarmist black-and-red scheme could be traded instead for something hopeful and inspiring — something we expect of the American president, addressed to preserving (and rebuilding) our moderate image.

This is not to say we shouldn’t treat the Republican Party’s continued and false attacks on Obama as creating the state of total war that they, in fact, have. But an aggressive, full-throated partisan defense of the President’s agenda is what party functionaries and surrogates are for. What we need from the President is measured calm; what we need elsewhere is a unified, partisan and unofficial messaging system — a talking points memo, but one read by middle America, not a site by and for college-educated young liberals – and a platform from which to read it. Not a fact-check site that those being fed rumors will, after all, be disinclined to believe.

Goldberg, the boy who cried “Nazi,” flies into a rage over Democratic lawmakers’ reference to congressional Republicans as “hostage-takers,” budgetary “terrorists,” etc., and the media’s relative silence, compared to their heightened interest in recent overwrought Republican zealotry. Why the double standard, he asks?

Because Republicans call Democrats “terrorists” all the damn time. Biden’s quip hasn’t gotten coverage because we’re just used to it from the other side of the aisle. That’s sad, and feels true. But: examples, please?

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A fair request. I set out to write this post wondering how hard it would be to dredge up quotes of Republicans calling their fellow citizens — especially Democrats — terrorists, disloyal, un-American, etcetera, based only on those citizens’ failure to subscribe to the GOP’s vision of a white, straight, upper-class Christian America. Probably pretty hard. I mean, we can start with Michael Savage (“The Enemy Within,” which casts all liberals as traitors) and Ann Coulter (“Treason,” same). Then there’s always Glenn Beck (who says Obama is “sympathetic” to terrorist causes) and Rush Limbaugh. The latter, of course, claims that Democrats actually are terrorists! But after that, where would I look?

Well, there’s also President Bush. Who made a large part of his regular stump speech the claim that any Democratic electoral victories would mean that “the terrorists win.” And Karl Rove, who equated habeas corpus, which is apparently now a liberal part of the Constitution, with terrorist “hand-holding.”

That’s probably it, right? Too bad. If only there was one more example of Republicans regularly debasing their political opponents, preferably from a party operative who commands media attention like none other, ran on a mainline ticket, and may again. But who!?

Well, thank God for Sarah Palin. She just went ahead and gathered up all those little tropes, rolled ‘em into a nice, tight little sound clip, and positively ran to Fox News to deliver it, making my job so much easier.

It’s really quite offensive. And remarkable, in that Palin’s larger point is actually tone deaf to itself. She gets to the undoubtedly correct argument, that it’s not nice to call fellow citizens “terrorists” based exclusively on their nonviolent political advocacy, but runs right past it to remind us of the official Republican position, that “liberals” are, actually, no better than terrorists. Or want the terrorists to win. Or hate America. Or aren’t even American in the first place.

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So let’s return to the original question. Why hasn’t Biden’s admittedly offensive quip gotten more coverage? Because it’s boring. Thanks to a steady stream of abuse from the right, it’s now acceptable to refer to one’s political opponent as a “terrorist.” Biden chose not to try to change that tone. And Palin, in response, affirmatively perpetuated it, while feigning offense, and giving the obligatory nod to decency. I’ll be the first to admit, both sides need to cut it out. Us and them. But I’d like to see the party that started this trope make the first move. Even if the box can never be closed, Pandora is in the best position to try.

Seriously, she lost in 2008. We all remember that, right?

Anyways, this puff-piece, dashed off at 3 AM PST, has since become the most popular (and controversial) piece of Conor’s short career at The Atlantic. In a post yesterday, he chronicles his shock, responds to his detractors, and in the process, pens an abnormally all-encompassing story of life, culture, and writing in the internet age. Let’s investigate.

Popularity: as American magazines go, The Atlantic is fairly highbrow — exceedingly, even– and Conor’s writing is no exception. As he notes, he’s written a number of pieces sharply critical of the left, of the right, and several excruciatingly well-researched pieces, some of which took months, and one of which — on the best long-form journalism of 2010 — I will certainly now read. Yet he’s become “famous” for a hastily penned gag post that, while very clever, bears little relationship to the reason we value publications like The Atlantic, and writers like him. Why?

Because we read for sensationalism, not for substance, and the internet rewards writers who understand this.

My experience is similar (though on a lesser scale). As of this writing, this site’s most widely read post, at 28,1256 page views, questions whether Birther queen Orly Taitz is, or was likely to remain, a lawyer. And the premise of that post was ultimately disproved! She was properly admitted to the Supreme Court’s bar, though I still maintain that she fairly clearly committed several grave violations of the rules of professional conduct. My favorite post, on Glenn Beck’s Common Sense, actually took a long time to write, holds up well, but clocks in at the #3 slot, with a comparably dismal 12,158 views. (My second favorite, on science fiction’s moral authority, comes in at #12). If we construe exposure as a “payoff” in blogging, the effort-to-payoff model this sampling suggests discourages talent, insight, and substance, to instead reward well-timed hackery and snark.

Some blogs defy the odds. Andrew Sullivan supplies consistent quality content and, by all estimates, is widely read for it. But he’s the exception, and his stats probably admit of similarly disturbing trends. This is a serious Problem For The Internet, probably compelled by the breadth of available content, and the frequency/necessity of on-the-go reading. Both pressures combine to create the internet as a medium exclusively designed for rapid consumption.   I’m as guilty as the next man, but it’s something we need to confront, because the alternative, of an internet where information is sought only for entertainment, feels disastrous.

Conspiracies: call it a corollary of the last point. Any world where sensationalism rules becomes, naturally, a breeding ground for conspiracy theories. Just so, Conor’s critics latched onto a provably false fact pattern where Conor didn’t just invent the whole story of the empty theater — no. He made it a reality by conspiring with theaters, newspapers… everyone… to bring about the downfall of Sarah Palin, by underreporting attendance at a fictitious theater. Naturally, the theory was picked up, and run into the ground, by Andrew Breitbart, who us did the favor of even reporting the lie incorrectly.

From “death panels” to birthers, here, too, is a poignant representation of political discourse in the internet age. “A lie gets halfway around the world before the truth has a chance to get its pants on” and, because it sounds better, is more widely read, sits more prominently in the public consciousness, and controls the conversation moving forwards.

Numbers, numbers, numbers: Finally, Conor flags one of the stranger points about this entire exchange. How many people attended Palin’s little panegyric is, literally, irrelevant. He says:

But what is ultimately at stake? Say it earns billions. Is that going to shrink the federal government? Or reform entitlements? Or affect the foreign policy America adopts? Why would an ideological movement that insists the country is going down the tubes waste so much time and energy complaining about their perception that a movie is doing better than the MSM says?

A good question, which becomes better when you realize that this isn’t an isolated incident. Time and again the conservative media have instigated, or suborned, attempts to artificially inflate attendance numbers at rallies, and general caucus strength. The movement seems more obsessed with proving its relevance, rather than earning it with policy victories. The tea party has always been more heat than light, and based on the battles they pick — like this one — that’s how they like it.

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Sensationalism, conspiracy, and an obsession with status. Such is the state of political discourse on the internet, and therefore, the go-to style of the conservative grassroots. It’s strange to see these three ills so close together, and in a situation where they’re so clearly problematic, but we have Conor, and the Palin camp’s reflexive need to overreact to damn everything, to thank for this rare opportunity. Now, what can be done about it?