As suburban independent woman recently began to succumb to the "She's
just like me" complex, I developed a deeper appreciation of Rovian
tactics. He knows how to pull the levers of identity politics.The
victims comply on cue.

Obama's only hope seems to be to hammer
McCain-Palin for lying and hope that the media join in enough to seal
the deal. I like his tactic, because there's such compelling proof that
they're lying. I only wish  he would make a bit more pointed statement
to the independents who are swinging to McCain-Palin. I have a modest
proposal here.

I'd say, "I know that many people identify with
Gov. Palin. She seems like the kind of person many people would  like
to know and feel they could be friends with. She seems like the kind of
person who knows many of you well enough that she can represent you.
She seems to be as trustworthy as one of your good friends. But she
only seems that way."

"Sarah Palin is not like you in extremely
important respect. You're not bald faced liars determined to deceive
people into liking you. She is. So is John McCain. She got up on one of
the biggest world stages, The Republican National Convention, and told
a huge lie. She tried to make you think that she is one of you, that
she is a person who wants to put at end to wasteful spending. She
presented herself as a reformer who's on your side concerning
government spending. She tried to back up that claim by lying, by
deceiving you in the grossest manner. She said that she was against the
Bridge to Nowhere, the frivolous, absurd project to build a
multi-million dollar bridge to an island with only ab out 50
inhabitants. The news media called her a liar, and it wasn't only the
so-called liberal media. It was also the conservative Wall Street
Journal. Now, a month later, she had to admit that she didn't tell lthe
truth, because news journalist Charle Gibson confronted her with
detailed facts about the bridge.

The politcal tactician who
ran Bush's campaigns and is running this one is well-known for advising
clients to lie, because he knows that, as Lincoln said, You can fool
all of the people some of the time. We hunger for a politician we can
trust, and it's very difficult to figure out whether a politician is
trustworthy. So we often rely on our sense of the person, on whether
they are like us enough to be on our side. That is a powerful idea that
Bush, McCain, and Palin exploit. Don't let them do that to you. Don't
let them fool you.

Lincoln also said, "You can't fool all of
the people all of the time." No you can't, because most people
eventually get burned enough by a powerful idea that they begin to
question it. Americans have been burned to a crisp by George Bush, by
his lies and manipulations of your sympathies, by his good old boy
manner and his aw shucks personality.We're  lost huge amounts of money
and lives on a war that he fooled us into. He even fooled Colin Powell.
And he fooled us about cutting taxes on the rich down to nothing and
about outsourcing jobs. He's been the flim flam artist, and now McCain
and Palin are continuing his tactics. Don't let them fool you.

Take
more time to look at their positions. They want to keep Bush's tax cuts
on the rich. They want you to keep paying more than your share. They
also want to keep outsourcing jobs and thereby making your lives more
difficult. McCain thinks of the war in Iraq as a big success. He says
we are victorious. General Patreaus disagrees. He was recently quoted
as saying that he thinks there will never be victory in Iraq. Take more
time to think about these big ticket items that directly affect your
lives and the life of the nation. We absolutely cannot afford another
four years of these policies and the lies that enabled Bush to get
enough support to push them through.

I may not be the person you
want to go to the mall or barbeque with, although most of the middle
and lower class people I have one-on-one relationships disagree. They
end up liking me and feeling that I'm on their side. And my stated
polices that are supported by most democratic leaders are truly on your
side. There's no disputing that. I'm giving you a tax break. I'm
cutting back onoutsourcing. I'm ending the war and making America safer
by going after Al-Queda in Pakistan and Afganistan. I'm on you side
much more than you think than if you just think about my personalitly
and my life story. Think about it.