George Allen posted his first TV ad today. He's going to start running it as soon as tonight. It's entirely positive, well made, and clearly designed to solidify his position in Virginia politics. It's also very telling in that it uses three words to describe George Allen that almost nobody would ever think to use, but that are CONSTANTLY used in association with Jim Webb:"Smart", "Independent", and "Courageous".
How fun is this?!
While it's true that CNN's Wolf Blitzer did say this about Allen:
George Allen is a formidable senator from Virginia, a formidable potential candidate, very bright, very smart.
Larry King quicky reminded Wolf of one pressing concern:
Tough race against him though, in the senate.
I'm guessing that Larry King wasn't talking about Harris Miller. Stephen Colbert famously praised George Allen as "Dumb as a post", and if you quickly search for the number of times Allen has been less flatteringly associated with terms denoting an absence of intelligence, the internet becomes a seemingly endless source of colorful commentary. Check out Al Gore's choice words when he realized that George Allen is a Global Warming "Flat Earther".
While Jim Webb's Courage and Independence are legendary and widely noted. One is hard pressed to find these terms ever associated with George Allen. Affible? yes. Charming? yes. Well-liked? yes. Doughy and red faced? of course. But courageous? Well, yes. While, one columnist, Melanie Scarboro, did write in the Washinton Post of Allen that "he exhibits courage". She's such a well known partisan of Allen/Gilmore politics in Virginia that she also famously suggested former Governor Jim Gilmore for the post of Secretary of Homeland Security. Now that's courage!
Even the Allen campaign didn't bother to justify their claim of Allen's supposed "Independence". Allen has voted with George Bush over 96% of the time in the US Senate. His entire career has been guided by the American Legislative Exchange Council(ALEC), an organization that uses massive corporate funding to control legislation at the state level, nationwide. Allen is ALEC's most senior standing member, and an enduring* proponent of their unfolding and expansive agenda. Apparently, if you just make stuff up and throw it out there people believe it. Maybe if the Allen campaign just says Allen's "Independent" enough, people will think that he actually is. Maybe that's the point. Maybe, for example, if I tell enough people I'm a billionare, I can buy my own Senate campaign. There's a thought, call me Mr. Gates.
All kidding aside, what we have here is a wonderful insight into the early tactics of the Allen Campaign for the general election. As an author, journalist, war hero, independent thinker, and Democratic political traditionalist Jim Webb has always been identified with these three terms: Smart, Independent, Courageous. If the Allen campaign can own these terms in the minds of voters, if they can buy enough airtime to buy that space in the minds of voters, the potential power of Webb's candidacy can be blunted.
What's most telling is that they chose these three words, three words so intimately associated with Jim Webb's character. They didn't choose words associated with Harris Miller. They didn't choose, "Well-Connected". They didn't choose "Wealthy". They didn't choose, "Politically devoted to his party." The fact that they chose "Smart", "Independent", and "Courageous", tells us everything about what the Allen campaign expects from Tuesday's primary, and tells us a great deal of what they fear in the General Election.
[NOTE: If you've ever wondered how in the heck George Allen gets off claiming any association between his backwards economic policies and anything conceiveably "Jeffersonian", you can thank ALEC for that little bit of newspeak. Starting with this award, and continuing throughtout their entire agenda, ALEC despite all historical context to the contrary freely assoicates corporate aristocracy, worldwide environmental degredation, and predatory corporate socialism with Thomas Jefferson. The mind reels at the hypocrisy.]
Does Allen even know what "Jeffersonian" means? I guess he figures nobody else does, either.
Interesting approach he's taking, early on. Is the appeal to the right-wing fundamentalists over--you know, the strategy that led him to suggest General Bonkers for Joint Chief of Staff?
I know that Allen knows what "Jeffersonian" means TO HIM. The word means votes. By couching himself in Jeffersonian garb, claiming the Jeffersonian heritage and wrapping himself in the vestiges of the Jeffersonian myth, Virginians vote for him. Jefferson is a god in the pantheon of secular deism and Allen has abandonded the spirit in favor of the flesh.
Of course, early on he needs to come across as a regular guy without an extremist agenda. Look at it this way, his ad will convey his well-camoflaged propaganda to hundreds of thousands of Virginians. My little deconstruction will probably be read by 2 or three.
believe that.