Joe Plays the Death Card

Now, I must confess, I think he overplayed his hand: you can capitalize on Death without trivializing the Holocaust. (I know I’ve been accused of insensitivity, but even I do not treat this subject lightly.) Still, this does indicate how potent the reminder of Me can be in garnering votes. Joe, knowing how much I Add Value, just got a bit greedy.Now, what’s particularly interesting about this strategy – raising the specter of Me – is that it’s a form of terrorism: Terrorism Lite, if you will. You scare the living hell out of citizens, and they contribute money to your campaign, then vote for you, then permit you to rape the consitution. And, friends, it works.Now, my sweet Democrats, I’m not counselling you to commit Joe’s Obscenity: no need to desecrate the memory of six million dead. You can use Me in much more subtle ways. Even thwarted Me is useful: wilier allies have made all sorts of hay out of the Almost Death experienced in London. Not so much Death, as Deathiness. (With apologies to Stephen Colbert, who might nevertheless approve.)

Friends, you’re on the wrong side of this battle. You can make a little bit of noise about a few thousand dead US soldiers, and the unfortunate loss of ten times as many innocent civilians (“collateral damage”), but note that this doesn’t have anywhere near the Terrorism Value of suggesting that voters might suck the pipe if they don’t vote for you. That bombs might be placed on their trains. That genocide might be waiting in the wings for them.

The Democratic Party is a sitting duck, and that gun trained on its beak is my gun, purchased at a gun show (no background check) by the Party of Death. Dick Cheney understands the symbolism here: waving around a duck rifle, indiscriminately, is a potent reminder of Deathiness.

You think you have a lock on the next gaggle of elections, but just wait until my good friend Karl Rove gets the threat of Me into the headlines. No Joe Lieberman, Karl: he’s a master of Terrorism Lite. Just wait until the Threat Level is cranked up to Code Fuchsia; and plots to bomb Disneyworld and Walmart are suddenly unearthed; and Democrats who actually fight wars are shown to be closet cowards unfit to guard the republic from Me and my fellow horsemen.

I’m sure my friend Karl has already had a little discussion with my friend Joe about tempering that obscene rhetoric: expect a much more subtle and effective form of engineered hysteria as the elections approach. But make no mistake: Deathiness is in the air, and it’s tolling for thee.