It all makes sense now
Let me preface this by saying that when I refer to the "Left" and Right", I don't necessarily mean Republicans and Democrats. To my definition, the "Right" are any number of individuals in places of power pushing for more war, more fear and less civil liberties. The "Left" are individuals in places of power pushing for less war, less fear and more civil liberties. There are Democrats, Republicans, Tea Partiers, Independents, Libertarians and others that are actively pursuing either side of these idealogical platforms. You may, or may not agree with my definition, so here's the Wiki definition so we all share some common ground:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Left–right_politics
So let's get on with it.
After a decade of wondering with sick amazement when and how America became the land of the insane when viewed in the light of its loudest Right Wing media pundits, I think I finally have the answer.
It's a simple psychological sales tool called the "Door-In-The-Face" technique, also known as a 'sequential request' or 'rejection-then-retreat'. It's been modified slightly by the Right to work on larger groups over time.
It's a simple trick. First make a request of the other person that's way over the top, which they'll most likely refuse. Act dejected, but then make a request that's more reasonable; the other person will be much more likely to accept the second proposal. It's just negotiation 101 - start your bar in the stratosphere so you can end up merely at skyscraper level.
For example:
Honey, can I spend $3,000 on a week-long trip to Vegas with my friends? (NO! Are you out of your mind?)
I see... Ok, how about $300 for a 3 day weekend fishing trip with my buddies?
Can you help me edit this entire book? (Ummm... I don't have time to do all that...)
Well... can you help me with just this chapter?
All the years of watching, mouth agape, as every top GOP media pundit worked overtime to out-crazy each other, making ever more outrageous statements on a daily basis always left me wondering if they actually were crazy.
Sure they are... crazy like a Fox (News).
It's all about moving the middle knot on the tug-of-war rope inch by inch, as far to the Right as possible. Think back on the most outrageous "opinion grenades" lobbed over the wall by Rush, Coulter, Hannity, Beck and others in the GOP lineup. By employing such stellar punditry of over-the-top individuals not afraid to throw their personal credibility under the bus for a larger cause (and a much larger paycheck), the Right has consistently, over time, caused us to accept things as normal that we as a nation would have NEVER accepted 30 years ago. Endless trillion dollar wars, torture, billions to Wall Street, near total erosion of the middle class, tax cuts for the wealthiest .01% etc., etc.
The Left (and the American people in general) have been completely routed by this technique. The Left stands there dumbfounded, barely able to illicit a response, most of which has been "Did... did you just hear what they said?! They're crazy! Please listen to us, we're sensible and it's obvious we're the saner choice. It'll all be fine, nobody is stupid enough to consider their ideas as workable."
They missed the point.
It was supposed to sound totally crazy to make "just-moderately-crazy" sound almost reasonable. It works like a charm. Glenn Beck even wrote a book called "The Overton Window", which, in its most basic form, is a political theory (not originated by Beck) that states that at any given moment, a “window” of ideas can move or expand, accordingly become more or less politically acceptable. The degrees of acceptance of public ideas can be described roughly as:
• Unthinkable
• Radical
• Acceptable
• Sensible
• Popular
• Policy
It's a con job, a Three-Card Monty and the Left doesn't seem to understand how the game is being played. They think, "ignore their insane bluster, it only makes us look better...'reasonable and prudent' is self-revealing, and therefore will be chosen by reasonable and prudent people as a matter of self-preservation", but that's not how the Door-In-The-Face Technique works. It does an end-run around your rational, all-things-being-equal mind. The very, very rich are running the con, this media onslaught, and we're the transfixed mark, being nudged farther and farther toward the extreme Right.
Just look at what's happened of late with the debt ceiling negotiations of 2011. By starting off from the 100% furthest point on the right, and even though they aren't technically the party in power at this moment, the Right has unequivocally declared a stance of "No Compromise", and if the Left wanted to negotiate, they'd have to start at 95% on the right, just to get them to sit down at the table.
Obama complied with nary a whimper. Just scooted right over and begged for compromise. He got crumbs. Both sides declared victory, except that the Left was woefully delusional if they call that a victory. People on the Left all over America looked at other and wondered, "How did we get here?"
The answer has been right in front of us the entire time. It's the Door-In-The-Face Technique, in full effect.
Winking at us, Glenn Beck coyly revealed his true job description when he constantly referred to himself as a 'rodeo clown', distracting the stupid bull, taking heat on the front line to let the matadors (the .01%) do their job safely.
He inferred that the bull was "the Left", but his main audience was never the Left. It was the legions of poor and middle class that tuned into his show to hear "their side" and get all fired up with every tear-stained patriotic diatribe. Enraged, actually. Some listeners were enraged to the point that they picked up weapons and used them against abortion doctors, or like the Glenn Beck devotee that ran into the police on the freeway with a bulletproof vest and a vehicle loaded with an arsenal of guns and ammo. He was on his way to the Tides Foundation after Beck targeted them as the 'Progressive Front Line'. He was going to kill as many of them as possible to kick off a 'revolution'.
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-504083_162-20011219-504083.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Byron_Williams_(shooter)
Personally, though, I think Beck was just a few degrees shy of the true metaphor at work here. I think it's less like a rodeo and more like a spanish bullfight. There's still a bull involved.
We, the American people, are the bull, pushed into this frothing, political, Right vs.Left rage, primarily by this one, single sales technique performed by the matadors, the top .01% of the wealthiest movers and shakers in the nation. Sure it's effective - one side is certainly moving the flag on the rope, but at what cost to us as a nation?
Unless this bull learns to look past the red cape and concentrate on the matador, this bullfight has only one outcome.
The bull dies at the end.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Left–right_politics
So let's get on with it.
After a decade of wondering with sick amazement when and how America became the land of the insane when viewed in the light of its loudest Right Wing media pundits, I think I finally have the answer.
It's a simple psychological sales tool called the "Door-In-The-Face" technique, also known as a 'sequential request' or 'rejection-then-retreat'. It's been modified slightly by the Right to work on larger groups over time.
It's a simple trick. First make a request of the other person that's way over the top, which they'll most likely refuse. Act dejected, but then make a request that's more reasonable; the other person will be much more likely to accept the second proposal. It's just negotiation 101 - start your bar in the stratosphere so you can end up merely at skyscraper level.
For example:
Honey, can I spend $3,000 on a week-long trip to Vegas with my friends? (NO! Are you out of your mind?)
I see... Ok, how about $300 for a 3 day weekend fishing trip with my buddies?
Can you help me edit this entire book? (Ummm... I don't have time to do all that...)
Well... can you help me with just this chapter?
All the years of watching, mouth agape, as every top GOP media pundit worked overtime to out-crazy each other, making ever more outrageous statements on a daily basis always left me wondering if they actually were crazy.
Sure they are... crazy like a Fox (News).
It's all about moving the middle knot on the tug-of-war rope inch by inch, as far to the Right as possible. Think back on the most outrageous "opinion grenades" lobbed over the wall by Rush, Coulter, Hannity, Beck and others in the GOP lineup. By employing such stellar punditry of over-the-top individuals not afraid to throw their personal credibility under the bus for a larger cause (and a much larger paycheck), the Right has consistently, over time, caused us to accept things as normal that we as a nation would have NEVER accepted 30 years ago. Endless trillion dollar wars, torture, billions to Wall Street, near total erosion of the middle class, tax cuts for the wealthiest .01% etc., etc.
The Left (and the American people in general) have been completely routed by this technique. The Left stands there dumbfounded, barely able to illicit a response, most of which has been "Did... did you just hear what they said?! They're crazy! Please listen to us, we're sensible and it's obvious we're the saner choice. It'll all be fine, nobody is stupid enough to consider their ideas as workable."
They missed the point.
It was supposed to sound totally crazy to make "just-moderately-crazy" sound almost reasonable. It works like a charm. Glenn Beck even wrote a book called "The Overton Window", which, in its most basic form, is a political theory (not originated by Beck) that states that at any given moment, a “window” of ideas can move or expand, accordingly become more or less politically acceptable. The degrees of acceptance of public ideas can be described roughly as:
• Unthinkable
• Radical
• Acceptable
• Sensible
• Popular
• Policy
It's a con job, a Three-Card Monty and the Left doesn't seem to understand how the game is being played. They think, "ignore their insane bluster, it only makes us look better...'reasonable and prudent' is self-revealing, and therefore will be chosen by reasonable and prudent people as a matter of self-preservation", but that's not how the Door-In-The-Face Technique works. It does an end-run around your rational, all-things-being-equal mind. The very, very rich are running the con, this media onslaught, and we're the transfixed mark, being nudged farther and farther toward the extreme Right.
Just look at what's happened of late with the debt ceiling negotiations of 2011. By starting off from the 100% furthest point on the right, and even though they aren't technically the party in power at this moment, the Right has unequivocally declared a stance of "No Compromise", and if the Left wanted to negotiate, they'd have to start at 95% on the right, just to get them to sit down at the table.
Obama complied with nary a whimper. Just scooted right over and begged for compromise. He got crumbs. Both sides declared victory, except that the Left was woefully delusional if they call that a victory. People on the Left all over America looked at other and wondered, "How did we get here?"
The answer has been right in front of us the entire time. It's the Door-In-The-Face Technique, in full effect.
Winking at us, Glenn Beck coyly revealed his true job description when he constantly referred to himself as a 'rodeo clown', distracting the stupid bull, taking heat on the front line to let the matadors (the .01%) do their job safely.
He inferred that the bull was "the Left", but his main audience was never the Left. It was the legions of poor and middle class that tuned into his show to hear "their side" and get all fired up with every tear-stained patriotic diatribe. Enraged, actually. Some listeners were enraged to the point that they picked up weapons and used them against abortion doctors, or like the Glenn Beck devotee that ran into the police on the freeway with a bulletproof vest and a vehicle loaded with an arsenal of guns and ammo. He was on his way to the Tides Foundation after Beck targeted them as the 'Progressive Front Line'. He was going to kill as many of them as possible to kick off a 'revolution'.
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-504083_162-20011219-504083.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Byron_Williams_(shooter)
Personally, though, I think Beck was just a few degrees shy of the true metaphor at work here. I think it's less like a rodeo and more like a spanish bullfight. There's still a bull involved.
We, the American people, are the bull, pushed into this frothing, political, Right vs.Left rage, primarily by this one, single sales technique performed by the matadors, the top .01% of the wealthiest movers and shakers in the nation. Sure it's effective - one side is certainly moving the flag on the rope, but at what cost to us as a nation?
Unless this bull learns to look past the red cape and concentrate on the matador, this bullfight has only one outcome.
The bull dies at the end.