BULLIES AND COWARDS: PART TWO (END)

As a whole, Democrats have shown themselves indifferent to or ignorant of the power of effective language.

Many of them—such as former President Barack Obama—believe: “I’m not going to get into the gutter like my opponents.”

Thus, they take the “high ground” while their sworn Republican enemies undermine them via “smear and fear” tactics.

In the early 1950s, slander-hurling Wisconsin U.S. Senator Joseph R. McCarthy demonstrated the effectiveness of such tactics. Wrote Pulitzer-Prize winning author David Halberstam, in his monumental study of the origins of the Vietnam War, The Best and the Brightest:

“But if they did not actually stick, and they did not, [McCarthy’s] charges had an equally damaging effect: They poisoned. Where there was smoke, there must be fire. He wouldn’t be saying these things [voters reasoned] unless there was something to it.”

Joseph McCarthy

Tyrants are conspicuously vulnerable to ridicule. Yet, just as Democrats proved unwilling to use this powerful weapon against McCarthy, they have failed to do so against Donald Trump.

For example: Trump has often expressed admiration for Russian dictator Vladimir Putin.

But not a single Democrat has dared nickname him “TrumPutin,”  “Red Donald,” “Putin’s Poodle” or “Wannabe Czar.”  Similarly, his vice president, Mike Pence, could be labeled “Vice Putin.”

Trump has repeatedly assaulted the press, judiciary and Intelligence agencies. Yet no Democrat has damned him as having a Fascistic agenda.  

Nor, as a whole, has the press dared to respond in kind to his increasingly vicious attacks on the First Amendment.

Trump has labeled established news media as “fake news.” He has called reporters “the enemy of America.”  He has tweeted images of a “Trump train” running over a CNN reporter and of himself beating up someone covered by a CNN logo.

His target of choice is CNN, which has been particularly effective in uncovering the truth behind his almost daily lies.  On at least one occasion, he told a CNN reporter: “You’re fake news.” 

Yet no reporter—for CNN or any other news outlet—has called him a “fake President.”   

CNN has started running an ad featuring a shiny red apple, while a voice-over intones:

“This is an apple. Some people might try to tell you that it’s a banana. They might scream banana, banana, banana over and over and over again. They might put BANANA in all caps. You might even start to believe that this is a banana. But it’s not. This is an apple.” 

Unfortunately, many viewers might mistake the “apple” for Apple. Many Americans fail to grasp the subtleties of symbolic imagery. Thus, a more effective ad could feature a picture of Trump in an SS uniform, complete with swastika, and the following message: 

“This  is a Fascist. Some people might try to tell you that he’s a democrat. They might scream democrat, democrat, democrat over and over and over again. They might put DEMOCRAT in all caps. You might even start to believe that he is a democrat.  But he’s not. This is a Fascist.”   

Nor, in this YouTube-obsessed age, have Democrats assailed Trump with a ridiculing music video. In the hands of a creative writer, for example, the classic rock-and-roll song, “Rockin’ Robin,” could become a Democratic party anthem:

TRUMPY TRAITOR
(To be sung to the tune, “Rockin’ Robin”)

He Tweets in the White House all the day long
Screamin’ and a-schemin’ and a-doin’ what’s wrong.
All the Special Agents in the FBI
Hope he goes to prison to the day he’ll die.