The Alinsky-ization of Brett Kavanaugh. Forget about Christine Braley Ford
The Alinsky-ization of Brett Kavanaugh
Rich Logis
Forget about Christine Braley Ford for a minute. This is where the rest of the Democrats' plan comes in.
September 21, 2018
The Alinsky-ization of Brett Kavanaugh
By Rich Logis
Republicans and conservatives are fond of referencing Chicago community organizer Saul Alinsky, but how many have read his body of work? I've always referred to Alinsky's secular agitator bible, Rules for Radicals: A Pragmatic Primer for Realistic Radicals, as the sequel to The Communist Manifesto. Published in 1972, shortly before Alinsky's death, Rules was a significant part of President Obama's and Hillary Clinton's political upbringings – although he more influenced Obama, who followed in Alinsky's community organizing footsteps in Chicago in the '80s.
Alinsky's thirteen rules are effective. The first step to challenging them is actually recognizing them.
Here's how Democrats and the DMIC (Democrat Media Industrial Complex) Alinsky-ized Brett Kavanaugh, in the lead up to, during, and after his U.S. Supreme Court confirmation hearings.
1: "Power is not only what you have but what the enemy thinks you have."
Outnumbered 51-49, Senate Democrats know that the arithmetic isn't on their side. If the Democrats and Republicans each hold court along party lines, Kavanaugh is our next justice, thanks to the nuclear option employed by Kentucky senator Mitch McConnell last year to get Justice Neil Gorsuch confirmed.
But a two-senator lead means the tie-breaking voter, Vice President Mike Pence, had better be on call when the roll call vote to confirm Kavanaugh is held. Democrats undoubtedly consider Republican senators Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski, of Maine and Alaska, respectively, to be free agents, particularly over Roe v. Wade. Kavanaugh was relentlessly questioned by Democrats over abortion; the goal was to create doubt that Collins and Murkowski would vote to confirm him. If uncertainty exists, it's unlikely that Democrats from states President Trump won in 2016 will cross the aisle. If Democrats somehow secure 51 nays, we'll have the modern-day version of Borked: Kavanaughed.
2. "Never go outside the expertise of your people."
Alinsky wrote in Rules that "the issue is never the issue." The reason the Democrats were obsessed with the documents withheld by the president has nothing to do with the documents; it has to do with the fact that the Democrats on the Committee on the Judiciary were unwilling to have substantive legal discussions. Why? Simple: because Kavanaugh would have made the Democrats – several of whom are trained attorneys – look like first-day law school students. Having authored 307 opinions, from 2,700 cases, during his 12 years as a federal judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals, along with dozens of speeches to law schools and legal groups, Kavanaugh's jurisprudence bona fides are not only rock solid, but also very public. There is zero we don't know about Kavanaugh's interpretive approach and acumen.
3. "Whenever possible go outside the expertise of the enemy."
I suspect that this rule guided The New York Times' and Associated Press's show-me-the-woman-and-I'll-show-you-the-crime expedition two months ago for the work emails of Kavanaugh's wife, Ashley, who was hired earlier this year as town manager of Chevy Chase, Md. The Times requested any emails that contained the words "gun," "abortion," "federalist" or "gay." Perhaps the Times believed that Mrs. Kavanaugh was fond of attending The Federalist Society lectures about concealed carrying lesbians who believe that abortion is creepy. The Times' request was a big dud; 85 pages of emails later, and, I'm sure, much to the newspaper's chagrin, nothing incriminating, and nothing about guns, abortion, gays, or federalists was discovered. The AP requested all of her work emails but hasn't yet reported on its findings.
4. "Make the enemy live up to its own book of rules."
Though there weren't explicit questions about Kavanaugh's Catholic faith, he noted his work with Catholic Charities. This rule was the basis for California senator Cuckoo Kamala Harris's lie that Kavanaugh called birth control abortion-inducing drugs (have you noticed how often I've already written about abortion?). And here's the ACLU's predictable fear-mongering that Kavanaugh would usher in a theocratic oligarchy. In fairness, I'm not angry at the ACLU, because voting is a lot like any decision or purchase: it's done based on fear or greed.
5. "Ridicule is man's most potent weapon."
Kavanaugh has been in Washington for decades; he's what many of us would call an "establishment" figure. This has provided an opportunity for the DMIC to attack his establishment "elitism," which President Trump swore to reject by draining the swamp. The median household income of Kavanugh's ZIP code is $12,000 a month, his house cost $1.2 million to purchase, and Kavanaugh racked up tens of thousands of dollars in credit debt to buy Washington Nationals season tickets. As coach of one of his daughters' basketball teams, his moniker is "Coach K." If the nickname Coach K doesn't smack of elitism, I don't know what does. The DMIC showed no qualms in portraying Kavanaugh as an out-of-touch Beltway insider. Oh, yeah, and people will die if he's confirmed.
6. "A good tactic is one your people enjoy."
Democrats know that most of their voters are out for blood, and a "good tactic" was to inextricably link Kavanaugh to President Trump, an "unindicted co-conspirator," according to Harris and Connecticut senator Richard Blumenthal, due to the plea deal of Trump's former personal attorney, Michael Cohen.
In the old days, Democrats weren't quite as politically loony as they currently are and were definitely more likable. Unlikability is a good tactic for the Democrats; the temperament of a justice is important, and the more unlikeable Democrats were in their questioning, the better the chances Kavanaugh would lose his cool. But alas, he kept his cool, especially during Harris's entrapping questions about possible conversations he had with Trump's lawyer's firm regarding the Mueller investigation. The Democrats tried to force Kavanaugh into the role of de facto spokesman for the president, but he was ready for them.
7. "A tactic that drags on too long becomes a drag."
I didn't watch every second of the hearings, but I watched more than 75 percent, and Democrats said Trump's name dozens of times. New Jersey senator Cory Booker handled Trump fatigue by putting on a theatrical production worthy of Broadway: Booker, whose claim to fame was interrogating Mike Pompeo about sodomy during his secretary of state confirmation hearings, dared his Republican colleagues to expel him from the Senate. As was expected, President George W. Bush's name popped up. Kavanaugh worked for Bush, and the implication is that Kavanaugh has always been associated with illegitimate presidents.
8. "Keep the pressure on."
This is one of the easier rules to follow, because specifics aren't necessary. Attorneys who litigate before the Supreme Court know to expect random barrages of questions, and the Democrats kept up the pressure by interrupting Kavanaugh dozens of times, not including the interruptions from protesters. The interruptions failed in knocking Kavanaugh off his game – same for the objections to the hearings, coordinated by Democrats.
9. "The threat is usually more terrifying than the thing itself."
If I had to pick one rule sold the hardest by Democrats, it's this one. The "threats" posed by Kavanaugh sound a lot like the threats posed by Robert Bork, nominated by President Reagan in 1982. Said Massachusetts senator Edward Kennedy: Bork's America is a land in which women would be forced into back-alley abortions, blacks would sit at segregated lunch counters, rogue police could break down citizens' doors in midnight raids, schoolchildren could not be taught about evolution[.]
Of course, had Bork been confirmed, none of those things would have occurred. But that wasn't important; it was the "what if?" threat of those things. In Kavanaugh's case, workers will have zero rights, felons will own machine guns, and women will be forced into back-alley abortions and die.
10. "The major premise for tactics is the development of operations that will maintain a constant pressure upon the opposition."
If Kavanaugh is confirmed, the Democrats will have lost the battle, but they will consider the larger war still winnable – especially considering that he's expected to be confirmed a month before the midterm elections. It was quite apparent which Democrats were thinking about running for president in 2020 (Harris and Booker) and which weren't (Partrick Leahy of Vermont). Those positioning themselves for a White House run will incorporate their self-aggrandizing "resistance" to Kavanaugh into their campaigns.
11. "If you push a negative hard and deep enough it will break through into its counterside."
In the case of Kavanaugh, this is a slight overlap of Rule 1. Trump has gotten 60 federal judges confirmed, is reforming the Supreme Court to how the Founders envisioned it, and has 100 pending federal judicial appointments. These realities are red-meat selling points to Democrat voters: "Look at the havoc Trump has wrought! We must prevent him from further destruction!" Just how deep it will break into the counterside remains to be seen, but desperation is all Democrats have left (although projected demographics, if not engaged, don't bode well for America First).
12. "The price of a successful attack is a constructive alternative."
To have a chance of winning long-term political battles, there must be self-immolation and sacrificial lambs within the Democratic Party ranks. Adaptation is key. This is already underway, as evidenced by the rise of "democratic socialist" primary winners nationwide. In America, Leninism has always been implemented in creeping doses, until one day, it's mainstream. The constructive alternative will continue to be the message that overt, out-in-the-open socialism is necessary to prevent future Brett Kavanaughs.
13. "Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it."
In Clintonian fashion, the Democrats will persist. Remember: Kavanaugh can't prove he's not racist, or that he won't vote to send abortion battles back to the states, where they belonged in the first place. The Democrats will continue to color Kavanaugh identically to how we describe Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Sonia Sotomayor: as an untrustworthy judge who legislates from the bench.
My prediction: Kavanaugh will receive 54 votes to confirm, with Collins and Murkowski unlikely to defect.
Rich Logis is host of The Rich Logis Show at TheRichLogisShow.com and author of the upcoming book 10 Warning Signs Your Child Is Becoming a Democrat. He can be found on Twitter at @RichLogis.
