Enemy Combatant
Thursday, January 16, 2003
Can YOU find the astroturfbuilder in YOUR local paper?
from the Santa Rosa Press Democrat, Jan. 14th:
Genuine leadership
EDITOR: When it comes to the economy, President Bush is demonstrating genuine leadership. The economic growth package he recently proposed takes us in the right direction by accelerating the successful tax cuts of 2001, providing marriage penalty relief and providing incentives for individuals and small businesses to save and invest.
Contrary to the class warfare rhetoric attacking the president's plan, the proposal helps everyone who pays taxes, especially the middle class. This year alone, 92 million taxpayers will receive an immediate tax cut averaging $1,083, and 46 million married couples will get back an average of $1,714. That's not pocket change for a family struggling through uncertain economic times. Combined with the initiatives to help the unemployed, this plan gets people back to work and helps every sector of our economy.
TREVOR CARLSON
Santa Rosa
Now, here's the deal . . . besides wondering whether ol' Trevor here wasn't really Tucker's twin brother (or more likely -- Tucker himself, in fake nose and glasses), I also wondered if this letter wasn't "spammed" by the RNC, nationwide . . .
And guess what? It was!
Atrios of Eschaton points out that the same letter praising W's self-stimulus package and sporting the phrase "demonstrating genuine leadership" (a poll-friendly subliminable message) is simultaneously appearing under different names in newspapers nationwide. The practice of such unreality is called astroturfing.
You can google the phrase for a current look at which lazy-ass editors have been hoodwinked by propagandist drones most recently.
skimble
{ 10:10 AM }
As a consequence, I emailed the following letter to my local paper (I've added hotlinks, for your convenience):
Dear Editor:
I read with great interest the letter from Trevor Carlson in your January 14th issue, waxing rhapsodic about how George W. Bush is "demonstrating genuine leadership" with his new (self)-stimulus proposal for even more tax cuts. However, I have to say I found the argument unpersuasive.
In fact, it was no more persuasive than I have found it -- presented in the identical words, published under various signatures over the past few weeks -- in letters to the editors of, respectively, the Merced Sun-Star, the Honolulu Star-Bulletin, the Lynchburg, VA Ledger, the Klamath Falls, OR Herald and News, the International Herald Tribune, the Tucson Citizen, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution -- even the Houghton, MI Daily Mining Gazette.
This scam is called "astroturfing" -- because it's "artificial grassroots," designed to make it seem that there's a groundswell of opinion out there supporting these ideas. There isn't. I'm surprised, though, that you would allow your Letters to the Editor section to be "spammed" like this -- isn't it Press Democrat policy to publish only ORIGINAL letters?
Sincerely,
Michael P. Scott
