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A Tradition Of Stolen Rhetoric

Using the Media to Win Election to Public Office

By Rich Stevenson Ó April 25, 2004
Interim Acting Chair of the Hamilton County OHIVA

Stolen Political Rhetoric: If a message is working for one candidate, the message is put into a different version of the same message. The candidate with the most campaign money establishes the stolen message as his own by domination of the broadcast media. Repeat words often enough and they become truth. The stolen message becomes the message of the candidate with enough money to buy the most time for Radio and TV ads. Money dominates prime time. Money becomes the TRUTH.

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Stolen political rhetoric goes back beyond the birth date of any living American. The tradition has been part of our bipartisan two-party system for over two hundred years. Recent examples are abundant.

Examples: Bill Clinton stole the message of Ross Perot in 1992 to beat George Bush, the older. Bush, the younger, stole the message of John McCain to win the 2000 Republican Primary Process. Then “W.” disguised himself as a “Compassionate Conservative.” Bush claimed he would act as a great mediator to end the war between the bipartisan left and right in Congress. Congress remains more polarized than ever. Bush claimed to support moderate views to get votes. In the debates, Gore and Bush agreed on most of the questions discussed. Many issues were left out of the discussion, deftly sidestepped by Bush and Gore. There was no populist nonpartisan in the debates to introduce important issues not mentioned by the bipartisan “two-party” candidates. Debates on real problems, the most urgent issues, were stolen from the viewer. With debate severely limited as agreed by two candidates, no real debate took place. Audience share was very low in response to total lack of meaningful content.

This year John Kerry stole the message of Howard Dean to steal the 2004 Democratic Primary Process. The Democratic Party stole the nomination from the young and independent Dean supporters. The accelerated primary schedule guaranteed a win by the biggest money raiser. After Iowa and New Hampshire, the two retail face-to-face primaries, money became the main factor in getting a message to all possible primary voters in the media controlled primaries.

The rest of the primary wins are paid for in high cost TV and Radio campaigns. The media helped Kerry to steal the political process. The so-called “Howard scream” was used by the media to sabotage the Dean campaign on what appeared to be direct orders from Democratic Party insiders. The crowd that inspired the “Howard scream” was never shown, a visual lie of omission.

In 1994, Republican Congressional candidates stole the rhetoric of the Perot campaign to write The Contract With America, authored by Newt Gingrich. None of the stolen reform ideas in the “contract” were implemented. Political reforms were briefly bathed in public light to get votes. The new congressional majority passed tax cuts and the usual right-wing Republican priorities. Any real political reforms were pushed to the bottom of the legislative agenda. The Contract for America turned out to be “The Contract on America,” a set of lies told to voters to elect Republican majorities to both houses of Congress to serve powerful financial interests and Republican incumbents. For instance, most of the people who ran on term limits are still in Congress way beyond the limits they promised to impose on themselves. Six-term Steve Chabot, OH1, is one of the term limits liars. Chabot pledged six years and out, three terms. Rob Portman made the same pledge.

A watered down bipartisan McCain-Feingold campaign finance law was passed nearly ten years after the “1994 Republican Revolution.” The McCain-Feingold bill further entrenches the bipartisan incumbent dictatorship controlled by the Ds and Rs. Unlimited soft money can still be raised by state parties in each state. The hard money individual contribution limit was doubled for all federal elections. Money contributed by Political Action Committees (PACs), the other unlimited source of corrupt money, was left untouched. The law was changed to guarantee a huge increase in campaign finance dollars raised for the 2004 Federal Elections. This latest campaign finance law favors incumbents, the bipartisan two-party system, and corruption. It nearly eliminates political competition from outside of the two parties. We are many steps closer to a political dictatorship controlled by the bipartisan two-party system.

The basic reform issues are left untouched:

1. Term Limits (Incumbent Turnover)

2. Real Campaign Finance reform (Can’t Vote, Can’t Contribute)

3. Limitations on Lobbyists (Information Only)

4. The National debt is still the “crazy old lady in the basement.” Up from three trillion to over ten trillion dollars since 1990! A large National Debt is still a major cause of our international financial instability.

Perot was at 44% in the polls in May and June 1992, when Clinton started to steal the Perot rhetoric. When Perot received about 21% of the popular vote in November 1992, the two-parties had to make some concessions to the issues raised by the Perot campaign. The tax increase of 1993 indicated to the world our intentions to be more fiscally responsible. We regained some creditability in foreign markets. It strengthened the dollar. Even so, Clinton gave only lip service to the basic political reforms he promised in the rhetoric stolen from Ross Perot.

Reducing the national debt was put on a responsible footing. That small change made eight good economic years possible, and was due in no small measure to the political rhetoric introduced by a populist nonpartisan candidate. Those 21 million “wasted votes” for Perot gave us eight good responsible economic years. Votes for the rhetoric of the Perot campaign made it become reality. There is no such thing as a “wasted vote” cast for a candidate who changes the political rhetoric to state the truth. Your nonpartisan vote can introduce a new political rhetoric needed to reform our corrupt bipartisan monopoly political system.

A vote for populist nonpartisans increases integrity in the conduct of government business. When you go to vote make your populist nonpartisan rhetoric part of the political system. Vote your conscience. Don’t waste your vote on a Democrat or a Republican. Sign the pledge.

Meaningful Votes: On November 2, 2004 will you waste your vote on a Bush or a Kerry? In the future, you can vote for every populist nonpartisan candidate you can find. The political rhetoric you make available will be infinitely more interesting. Voters can have a coherent and unified voice to favor nonpartisan government. You can have a voice in government if you do not waste your vote on bipartisan two-party candidates. Occupy Elections, sign the pledge. Print/Share

We must take power from (and within) the D and R parties to have open elections so all voters have a vote in all elections. Elect populist candidates voters put on the ballot to defeat establishment D and R candidates. Occupy Elections. Everybody Vote! “We must become proactive good citizens to have a voice in public policy.”

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rls/April 25, 2004; February 22, 2024

edit: 11-14-05, 07-24-06, 10-03-06, 12-25-06, 05-11-08, 09-23-08, 03-23-09, 07-04-09,

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