Volunteers, ideas needed

You have probably heard the expression, "The first casualty of war is truth" or some variation of it. Apparently it is not entirely clear who said this first, but the concept is certainly one that rings true for many of us. And even though George Lakoff warned us against using the expression "war on terror", those words seem to have gone unheeded. George Bush has cast himself as a "war president" (with many in the "mainstream media" acting as his willing accomplices) and the war is an ambigious one without a clear target or end. So with the so called "war on terror", the American people also seem to be on the losing end of the "war on truth".

And "telling the truth" is what gets Howard Dean in trouble, at least in the perception of the people who get their news from the usual channels. That and being "too angry", but recently I saw this headline: GOP's 'anger' strategy has Dems defensive. WTF? When they do it, it's a *strategy*? But when Howard Dean was righteously angry about being misled into an illegal war, he was "craaaaaazy Howard Dean".

Ugh. I'm sick of this. I really am--I'm sick of fighting. And sick of having to fight on so many different fronts, while at the same time trying to keep up with work, family, paying bills, etc. But we can't stop fighting, because that means the bad guys win, and they keep making things worse for the rest of us.

The other day, I wrote a post entitled, Supporting Howard Dean: Why it's personal, and crossposted it several places, including Daily Kos and Booman Tribune. I've linked to those posts specifically because they are the ones that generated a number of positive responses--about Howard Dean giving people hope for the future and for the Democratic party.

Howard Dean could have taken things easy after dropping out of the race for the presidency. Instead, he has chosen to take on what can often be a thankless job, often keeping him in a position where he is attacked by both Republicans and those Democrats who think they can score points for "distancing" themselves from him. Yet he continues to speak the truth. It's the same truth that many of us speak in our own living rooms, but we aren't in a position to get our message out to as many people. So, when people attack Howard Dean for telling the truth, they are also attacking us and our values.

I figure if he is going to put himself out on the front lines for us, the least we can do is make sure he's got backup.

So, how do we do this? And how do we streamline our efforts as much as possible? My first thought was that we needed to have some sort of resource center that is easily accessible, which is why I set up this blog. I also have added links to Media Matters and the Rapid Response Network.

What next? Well, the thing that keeps coming to mind for me is Snopes.com--the site where people can check out various urban legends and find out if there is any truth to them. It would really be useful to have something comparable where we can check in and get the real scoop when people start spouting lies or half-truths about Howard Dean. And, if a number of people participate, the workload shouldn't have to be daunting for any one person.

Thoughts? One thing I know for sure that I need are people to be contributors. At least for starters, all I think we are going to be doing is keeping an eye on the new right wing talking points and media spin that we see being bandied about, and posting the information that fellow supporters would need to respond to that. No writing skills are required, unless you would like to post a letter to the editor that *you* have written to rebut some current alleged "gaffe" of Howard's. But if all you do is link and excerpt an article to say, "Here's what Howard Dean really said--in context!" or "Here's an article that shows what he said to be absolutely right", that's still a big help.

If you're willing to be a contributor, please email me at howardempowered at gmail.com and I'll send you a Blogger invite.

Debunking, a full time job

This is from Howard Dean's interview with Randi Rhodes on January 23:

Randi started the interview by saying "We've been playing your clip over and over again for like the last week, where you succinctly said 'There is no Abramoff Democratic money. He gave no money to Democrats.' She goes on to say that people in the media have continued to try to portray the Abramoff scandal as bipartisan in nature, and that Tim Russert had put up a pie chart saying that 34% of the money had gone to Democrats.

Howard: Well, you know, I like Tim Russert, but that's just not true.

Randi: I know that's not true.

Howard: The truth of the matter is, this is a Republican finance scandal. Exclusively. There is nobody implicated in this except for Republicans. Not one.

Randi: Do you know how he had to couch it to get away with this kind of lying--

Howard: You know, I'm surprised that Tim would do this because I know Tim and he's an ethical person, but that's just not true. You know, these guys have got to get off their butts and look at those numbers. Here's the deal, Randi, *not one nickel* from Abramoff ever went to a Democrat. Not one nickel, every dime of it went to Republicans. Secondly, there's no evidence whatsoever that any money was *directed* by Abramoff to any Democrat. So this is just crap, and it's the RNC, and it's disappointing at this late date after all this corruption exposed on the Republican side, that the mainstream press would fall for this. They've got to do better than this.

Debunking right wing talking points is a full time job, but it can be easier if we work together.

As I was posting on various blogs and discussion boards, trying to get people to join in the brainstorming about how to celebrate Howard's first anniversary as DNC chair, I was occasionally met with this sort of nonsense:

"...but Howard Dean has misused the money and got to raise huge amounts of dollars between now and election day. It's a question of if he doesn't do it he might lose his job."

Bull--er, that's just crap! And we usually know this stuff is crap when we see it (or smell it) but I know I don't always have the facts needed for rebuttal right at my fingertips. So how about pooling our resources and creating one place on the web where we know we can find the resources we need when rapid response is needed?