By Ned Barnett
Saul Alinsky is the late philosopher of American far-left radicalism. His book, "Rules for Radicals," influenced young Hillary Clinton while she was in Law School at Yale. Former Professor Obama used it as a teaching tool in his classroom activities and in his efforts on behalf of ACORN to "organize" the "community" in poorer sections of Chicago in the years before he became a U.S. Senator and later our 44th President.
However, these two national political leaders are not the only individuals who turn to Saul Alinsky for guidance in their own political activities. One prominent Nevada political commentator, Jon Ralston, is also a devotee of Alinsky's. His make-believe column in Sunday, March 14th's Las Vegas Sun is a classic example of Alinsky in action.
Background: If you're politically aware and live in Nevada, and you don't know that the Las Vegas Sun's Jon Ralston is a committed left-wing operative, you're just not paying attention. Ralston conducts an almost ratings-free political interview show, and writes a column for a newspaper (the Sun) that ceased to exist as an independent evening newspaper some years ago, staggering on as an 8-page supplement to the Las Vegas Review-Journal. In short, he doesn't have a big audience or a big constituency - but thanks to the internet, and the appearance of having two presumably large audiences (his seldom-read newspaper column and his rarely-watched TV interview program), Mr. Ralston has a voice and influence via the Internet far beyond his actual traditional-media impact.
Beyond the borders of Nevada, and beyond the circle of politically-aware Nevadans, Ralston has perceived influence and real credibility among those who don't understand that he's a committed partisan on the Left. Which is one reason why his columns and TV interviews have such power - others (including Fox News) assume that Mr. Ralston is a powerful and centrist (or at least objective) political observer, and they give their own voice and credence to his political observations.
Before you read Mr. Ralston's column (below), please read Saul Alinsky's Rules for Radicals - then, as you read the Ralston column, ask yourself which rules he's exercised in writing this fantasy about a meeting that never took place - a fantasy meeting in which absurdity blends with fact to create the illusion of credibility.
Rules for Radicals
1. "Power is not only what you have, but what the enemy thinks you have."
2. "Never go outside the expertise of your people. When an action or tactic is outside the experience of the people, the result is confusion, fear and retreat.... [and] the collapse of communication.
3. "Whenever possible, go outside the expertise of the enemy. Look for ways to increase insecurity, anxiety and uncertainty.
4. "Make the enemy live up to its own book of rules. You can kill them with this, for they can no more obey their own rules than the Christian church can live up to Christianity."
5. "Ridicule is man's most potent weapon. It is almost impossible to counteract ridicule. Also it infuriates the opposition, which then reacts to your advantage."
6. "A good tactic is one your people enjoy."
7. "A tactic that drags on too long becomes a drag. Man can sustain militant interest in any issue for only a limited time...."
8. "Keep the pressure on, with different tactics and actions, and utilize all events of the period for your purpose."
9. "The threat is usually more terrifying than the thing itself."
10. "The major premise for tactics is the development of operations that will maintain a constant pressure upon the opposition. It is this unceasing pressure that results in the reactions from the opposition that are essential for the success of the campaign."
11. "If you push a negative hard and deep enough, it will break through into its counterside... every positive has its negative."
12. "The price of a successful attack is a constructive alternative."
13. Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it. In conflict tactics there are certain rules that [should be regarded] as universalities. One is that the opposition must be singled out as the target and 'frozen.'...
Jon Ralston's Alinsky-like "make-believe" fantasy column, March 14, 2010, Las Vegas Sun
http://www.lasvegassun.com/news/2010/mar/14/imagining-covert-meeting-sabotage-nevada-gop/
Imagining the covert meeting to sabotage the Nevada GOP
By Jon Ralston
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid had a spy in his inner circle — the man has since left the state and changed his name because of what he heard about Reid’s evil ways — a Benedict Arnold only too willing to tape a clandestine conversation and then provide it to me.
(Note to Reid, but not to give away a source: He was the only one sipping tea and with the Armenian last name.)
I have since transcribed the colloquy, which took place a couple of months ago — I am protecting the names of everyone but Prince Reid:
Reid: “So we all know the problem — me. My numbers are horrible. I can’t keep my foot out of my mouth. And Obama is killing me. Without some scheme, the election is lost.”
Pollster: “I have an idea, Senator. The only way for you to win is to siphon enough votes from the Republican to let you squeak by.”
Reid: “I know that. That’s why I am going to vaporize Sue Lowden. She may still look good on TV, but after I am done with her, she won’t look so good.”
Aide: “Senator, the point is that’s not going to be enough, whether it’s Lowden, or Tarkanian or Angle or even that New York banker.”
Reid (chuckling): “Don’t forget Chad Christensen.”
Pollster: “Hey, even he could win in this climate. The point is, Senator, you can’t beat any Republican straight up. People just dislike you so much that we need to find another way. A third way, so to speak.”
Reid: “You mean a third party.”
Pollster: “Exactly.”
Reid: “So we need to find someone to start a third party?”
Aide: “That’s right. And guess what? There is no Tea Party yet in Nevada officially filed with the secretary of state. How good would that be?”
Reid: “Beautiful. The best way to do it would be to find someone who is not a Democrat to start the party and then find a totally clean horse, someone with no business problems at all, someone who can legitimately claim to be a Tea Partier. But that would be too suspicious. So let’s do a CIA-type deal on them and find a Democrat to start the party and find a guy who has all kinds of business problems so he might have to drop out before he can help me. That makes sense, right?”
Aide: “Really, Senator? That doesn’t sound like the Machiavellian guy we know. That sounds like some kind of black helicopter nuttiness.”
Reid: Exactly. That’s how we will throw them off. And let’s find some Armenian guy, too, because that will send Danny into orbit. And make him a Mormon, too, because that will cause even more suspicion. You know we are all alike. (Chuckles.)”
Armenian Aide, sipping tea: “I have just the guy, as it happens, Senator.”
Reid: “What?! Who?”
AA: “His name is Scott Ashjian. His whole family hates you, but one of his good friends is a Democratic lawyer named Barry Levinson. We get Levinson to start up this deal, blow some smoke at Ashjian and viola, we have our guy.”
Reid: “But does the guy have some bad business dealings, too? We need that so we can triple-blind, double-reverse, one half-nelson this. Or whatever. Wouldn’t want to put a clean horse in there and have a well-known conservative start the Tea Party of Nevada. That would make it too credible.”
Aide: “Business problems? The guy has a $200,000 IRS lien. He’s had property foreclosed on, businesses go out of business. He’s perfect.”
Reid: “And he’s Armenian, too? Those people all stick together and Tark will go bonkers.”
AA: “And guess what? He’s an Armenian Mormon convert. I doubt he even knows the secret handshake yet, but no one else will know that. (Chuckles.)”
Pollster: “Senator, you know the Republicans will try to discredit this guy, accuse you of planting him. The media will be skeptical, too.”
Reid: “So what? Let them squawk. We will not leave fingerprints. That’s our specialty. And because they can’t connect this guy to me, it will just make them even more nutty. They will say all kinds of crazy stuff. Just wait. The so-called ‘real’ Tea Party folks will claim he is illegitimate. Get that: One group of flakes saying another group is not flaky enough. I love it. This is too good to be true.”
Aide: “It just might work, Senator. If this guy gets some traction, and enough people choose ‘none of the above’ because of our negative campaign, you just might survive.”
Reid: “Put the Super-Secret Armenian Mormon Flawed Businessman Tea Party Diversion Plan into action right away.”
End of article
Look again at Saul Alinsky's Rules for Radicals, and determine for yourself which of these rules Mr. Ralston has followed in writhing his satiric "Imagine" column today. Here are the rules I think Mr. Ralston followed in writing this article:
Alinsky's Rules for Radicals:
1. "Power is not only what you have, but what the enemy thinks you have." Mr. Ralston has the perceived power of the press, and he is taken seriously by people who do not understand how limited his readership is, or the far-Left nature of his perspectives.
5. "Ridicule is man's most potent weapon. It is almost impossible to counteract ridicule. Also it infuriates the opposition, which then reacts to your advantage." Clearly, Mr. Ralston is trying to ridicule all of those who believe or suspect that Jon Scott Ashjian and the bogus-third-party Tea Party of Nevada are tools of Reid's desperate attempt to steal a re-election he can't win fair-and-square.
6. "A good tactic is one your people enjoy." Making fun of the opposition is generally entertaining, and Mr. Ralston has a gift for Swiftian satire as well as an "Airplane - the Movie" like absurdity that is entertaining, even to those being skewered.
8. "Keep the pressure on, with different tactics and actions, and utilize all events of the period for your purpose." Mr. Ralston has been debunking those who distrust Mr. Ashjian's campaign - who see his campaign as a clever attempt to split the grass roots movement and allow Harry Reid to squeak by in a closely-contested three-way race. This fantasy column, ripe with satire, is just one of several methods he's using to chip away at the grass roots.
10. "The major premise for tactics is the development of operations that will maintain a constant pressure upon the opposition. It is this unceasing pressure that results in the reactions from the opposition that are essential for the success of the campaign." Once again, Mr. Ralston never misses the opportunity to discredit or attack the grass roots - mocking them is one more effective way that Ralston has mastered.
11. "If you push a negative hard and deep enough, it will break through into its counterside... every positive has its negative." Ditto. Using satire is a subtle, effective way of breaking through to what Alinsky called the "counterside." It is harder to maintain focus when being mocked than when being attacked openly.
13. Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it. In conflict tactics there are certain rules that [should be regarded] as universalities. One is that the opposition must be singled out as the target and 'frozen.'... Once again, Ralston has carefully followed Alinsky in "freezing" the opposition in place. He is mocking the opposition, showing them to be on the tinfoil-helmet fringe - and that freezes them in place, a place that no rational mind would take seriously.
There is no question that the Ashjian candidacy will split the grass roots vote. There are tens of thousands of Nevadans who share beliefs with the grass roots - the real tea party activists - but who are themselves politically unaware of the behind-the-scenes machinations. The Las Vegas Review-Journal recently conducted a poll that showed Ashjian - totally unknown, with no public positions or track record - received, as the candidate of the "Tea Party of Nevada," 18 percent of the voters' support. That 18 percent represents the aspirations of conservative Nevadans who "assume" that if you're the candidate of the "Tea Party of Nevada," then you're the candidate of the grass roots.
That naming tactic is proving effective. Ralston's satiric Alinsky-like tactics will, unless exposed, do more to re-elect Harry Reid by giving Ashjian's campaign far more credibility than it deserves.
Ned Barnett
http://nevadapoliticsmatters.blogspot.com/2010/03/following-alinskys-rules-for-radicals.html
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