Astroturf

I hate to disagree with Mike, but I find the talk about Barak Obama's 'campaign of inclusiveness' to be laughable. If I was the youth outreach coordinator for the other campaigns I would be salivating over taking on an idiot who does truly idiotic things like praise a far-right extremist like Tom Coburn (via Talk Left):

"The opportunities are there to create a more effective relationship between parties." Members of the other party he would seek help from include Sens. Richard Lugar of Indiana, John Warner of Virginia and Tom Coburn of Oklahoma.

It's this last guy who should raise some eyebrows. "I would also seek out people like Tom Coburn, who is probably the most conservative member of the U.S. Senate. He has become a friend of mine."

For a little refresher on who Obama's friend is, and what he believes in, we get a greatest hits, or sorts, from Democratic Underground :

Senator Coburn, who said that lesbianism is "so rampant in some of the schools...that they'll let only one girl go to the bathroom."

Senator Coburn, who claims he can tell if someone is telling the truth because of his medical training.

Dr. Coburn, who said: "You know, I immediately thought about silicone breast implants and the legal wrangling and the class-action suits off that. And I thought I would just share with you what science says today about silicone breast implants. If you have them, you're healthier than if you don't. That is what the ultimate science shows...In fact, there's no science that shows that silicone breast implants are detrimental and, in fact, they make you healthier."

Senator Coburn, who thought Schindler's List was smut, an "all-time low, with full-frontal nudity, violence and profanity.

On gay rights, Senator Coburn said: "The gay community has infiltrated the very centers of power in every area across this country, and they wield extreme power... That agenda is the greatest threat to our freedom that we face today. Why do you think we see the rationalization for abortion and multiple sexual partners? That's a gay agenda."

Senator Coburn, who objects to legal abortion in cases of rape, and justifies his position by noting that his great-grandmother was raped by a sheriff.

Now, I'm not in charge of any of the youth campaigns for any of the candidates, but I can tell you that if any of them start going after Obama within the younger demographic they will have plenty of ammunition to use. In 2006 I did youth outreach in Philly, and by far the things that made young folks listen to me when I would tell them about Rick Santorum were quotes of Rick's concerning gays, women, and abortion. If I was running those campaigns I would tell every kid that I could: "Do you know that Senetor Obama plans to work with a guy who thinks that gay people are on a mission to take over the government, who wants to tell you who to have sex with, who thinks that lesbianism is rampant in our schools, who wants to illegalize all abortion, etc?"

Obama's "inclusiveness" is just a bunch of hollow words, and pretty e-mails. In reality the guy wants to work with the very people who want to exclude "undesirables" from U.S. society. And I hope that the other campaigns can help to dispel the mystique around this "New Democrat" and reveal the "good" Senator as the hack that he is.

Over the past few weeks Greg Bloom has been posting an extremely important series dealing with Grassroots Campaigns Inc. (CGI), the DNC, and MoveOn over at MyDD. The first series was called Strip-Mining the Grassroots and looks at the horribly self-defeating and short-sighted "outreach" tactics employed by CGI and the DNC during the last election. Here is the initial question Greg poses:

...as someone who personally hounded thousands of people on the streets of New York City, pushing them to give hundreds of dollars, again and again -- turning away people who wanted to volunteer, shrugging at people who wanted to register to vote, cutting off conversations about what the Democrats and John Kerry actually stood for so that I could make my quota, working sixteen hour days under the false pretense of beating George Bush -- I had to question whether the ends justify the means. I have come up with difficult answers.

And while Greg's multi-part series of the DNC's operations were harsh, his critique of MoveOn, that "beacon of light" for the progressive momvement, is brutal: