And then they fight us...

And here I was, beginning to have hope for the mainstream media. In the last few Republican debates, it almost seemed that Dr. Ron Paul was almost getting a fair shake. Perhaps that perception stemmed from the fact that many of the more recent debates were missed by the "first-tier", or perhaps it was because Fox News is far more shameless and less subtle than the other networks. Either way, after tonight's debate in Florida, one thing is now clear. The authoritarian media establishment no longer views Paul as a farcical side-show; rather, he's now a serious threat, and to be marginalized as such.

The marginalization began early, before the debate had even started. Frank Luntz, the noted Republican political pollster and operative who has so mastered the art of ideological manipulation that he was featured in the PBS Frontline documentary The Persuaders, was tapped to "moderate" a focus group of twenty-five preselected people (the methodology of their selection was not revealed in the broadcast). Luntz is someone who is not exactly an impartial fellow; according to cited references in his Wikipedia article, he has been "accused of skewing research results to reflect more favorably on specific clients. In 1997, he was reprimanded by the American Association for Public Opinion Research and in 2000 he was censured by the National Council on Public Polls." Therefore, it without great surprise but with disappointment that I watched him guide the group through a textbook example of groupthink. One member even went so far as to refer to plant the seed, before the debate was even begun, that Ron Paul was crazy.

Finally, the debate started, and immediately it became apparent that the structure of the questioning functioned to create an in-group, out-group dynamic. The first questions centered on things that Fred Thomson had said about other "first-tier" candidates. This drew the rest of the pre-selected "first-tier" into a network of responses and counter-responses that created a sense of dialog. This lasted at least ten minutes before the "bottom-tier" got to speak. At this point, the effects of this first ten minutes of top tier dialog became apparent. Whereas the top tier seemed to be part of a community of competitors, Paul, Hunter, and Tancredo seemed more to respond to isolated questions. This created an entirely different atmosphere when they responded; almost as if we were watching a separate amusing, but irrelevant, debate. I believe the top tier, and the media groups that support them, have recognized that allowing Paul to engage in dialog with the "contenders" gives him credibility and was the driving force behind the materialization of the Ron Paul RevolUTION. Therefore they, by the structuring of the questions and dialog, were able to subtly split the candidates into two groups. By treating the group that Ron Paul was consigned to as less important, they were able to avoid any messy confrontations and minimize the effects of his far too occasional responses.

Paul was further hindered and marginalized by the makeup of the crowd in the auditorium. It actively booed him on many issues, which had not happened in earlier debates, and he implied in the Post-debate interview that the organizers purposely limited the number of Paul supporters in the hall by issuing each candidate the same number of tickets. With pro-war supporters outnumbering anti-war supporters 7:1, the crowd was guaranteed to be hostile to Ron. Ron is smart enough that he called Hannity on this when Hannity tried to imply that the crowd was more representative than the phone poll. Fox, realizing what a liability that the text-in poll has become with Ron Paul's consistent domination, again called upon Frank Luntz to utilize the deceptive manufactured consent of his focus group. He asked for a show of hands of who thought Ron Paul had won the debate. No hands were raised. Luntz peered into the camera meaningfully, as if a hand selected sample of 25 pre-screened individuals was a better indication of electoral strength than thousands of dedicated activists voting.

Fundamentally, this debate taught us a few things. We've learned that Ron Paul supporters MUST NOT become complacent, thinking that the momentum from the jump-start that the campaign has experienced will carry Ron to the White House without massive further effort. Ron Paul in power would be incredibly detrimental to the ruling elite of our country, of which the media elite are but one segment. He would cut off the free flow of grants and Federal largess to their pet projects, would favor labor over speculation as a way of making profits by shoring up the dollar and eliminating the income tax, and would end the enormous profiteering opportunities of continuous warfare. Now that they see Paul as a potential threat rather than as an eccentric oddity, they will fight his candidacy with every tool at their disposal. Experts like Luntz are only the visible tip of the iceberg of the massive social scientific apparatus that can be arrayed against the Paul campaign. We'll have to continue to participate in the main stream media games, but they'll no longer bring the massive jumps of support that the first few debates brought us due to the new tactics of the "first-tier". Rather, we need to continue exploiting those media that WE dominate in order to level the playing field and we must continue enthusiastically spreading the revolution virally. Keep those shoes pounding the pavement and those blog posts rolling in. We're in a battle over who defines public discourse, and victory is by no means guaranteed. However, for the first time in my life, I feel like we have a chance for real, constructive, radical change, and I'm going to do everything in my power to ensure that that chance doesn't slip away.