Mitt Gets Worse: One Negative Ad Campaign We Hope Goes Viral

‘MITT GETS WORSE’ PROJECT WARNS OF ROMNEY’S ANTI-LGBT RECORD | Modeled as satire on the anti-bullying “It Gets Better” project, American Bridge 21st Century and Courage Campaign Super PAC have launched the “Mitt Gets Worse” campaign. In testimonials, various activists explain how harmful Mitt Romney’s anti-LGBT positions are and how much worse he would make the U.S. for LGBT people if he were president.

Mitt Romney has already gone on record as an enemy of the poor and disenfranchised. He has bumbled his way through African American voters to the point that being considered a "friend" is now out of the question. Now a group of LGBT activists want you to know that Romney's reign would be one of setbacks, if not one of terror. And they've started what could be one of the most creative series of anti-Romney ads to date.

If you take a look at the wikipedia entry for Mitt Romney's stance on LGBT issues, it paints a portrait of a man whose entire career as governor and Presidential candidate is obsessed with flip-flopping as the political wind blows:

In July 2011, Romney refused to sign a pledge opposing gay marriage, a pledge that was being circulated by "The Family Leader", a conservative Christian group in Iowa.[232] On August 4, 2011, a month later, Romney publicly denounced same-sex marriage by signing the 2012 Presidential Pledge sponsored by the National Organization for Marriage.[233]

And as governor of Massachusetts, Romney also attempted to eliminate much needed services for LGBT youth - some of them homeless youth.


Flip-Flop, The Cave In

The portrait of a man who cares only about winning and mouthing the right words to the right group (albeit unsuccessfully at times) formed years ago, so it is no surprise that vultures are circling a dying "moderate". The pressure put upon Romney to curry favor with the Christian Right due to his Mormonism is almost tactile: you can feel the forces of Tony Perkins, Bryan Fischer*, Pat Robertson, James Dobson and their ilk at work, devouring any semblance of tolerance. And they will not be satisfied until Romney states (as he did with Obama's Affordable Care Act in an address to the NAACP), that he will push through a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage, ban gays from the military and repeal every single advance in gay rights for the past thirty years. And for all his posturing as a moderate "friend" of gays and lesbians, ENDA (Employment Non-Discrimination Act) will become a distant memory if the Christian Right manipulates him. He may have supported gay adoption in the past, but the Christian Right will certainly have none of that.

5 Percent Is 5 Percent

Demographics and studies have shown that over 5% of the U.S. population is gay.** To Romney and his campaign, however, we have seen that even higher percentages (e.g. the number of people living below the poverty line) mean little: the bottom line is in the number of votes and if it takes disenfranchising 5% of the population to placate 16 million Southern Baptists, then so be it.

You know he will: Romney gives off the aroma of one ready to placate at all costs.

Whither Matt Rhoades?

As with the Bain Capital brouhaha, Romney's campaign manager, Matt Rhoades, has had his hands full in delivering spin, weak responses and veiled threats resulting from Romney's checkered past and flip-flops. How Rhoades will handle any response to Mitt Gets Worse is anybody's guess: ignoring it would be a big mistake, trying to present Romney as a "friend" would anger social conservatives, and going totally to the Right would only add to the long list of people he is willing to disenfranchise and sacrifice.

From The Huffington Post editorial by Rick Jacobs of the Courage Campaign (750,000 members):

Unfortunately for millions of LGBT people in this country, we know the Mitt we'll get. He's the Mitt that is moving in the wrong direction (as our Facebook Timeline shows) away from history, not towards it. For millions like us, Mitt Gets Worse. And if elected, the country will get worse.

Below is one of the first Mitt Gets Worse spots - a very, very powerful indictment of a man to whom winning is everything and consideration goes to the highest bidder. The testimonials are most disturbing and certainly provocative. Think about joining the Mitt Gets Worse campaign. It may be the one negative ad campaign in this mess of an election that needs to go viral.




*Fischer infamously delivered a bitch slap to Romney: demanding that he get rid of Richard Grenell, crowing that Romney took his advice (although Renell resigned), then saying that Romney was too weak to be President if he caved in to the demands of someone like Fischer.

** Despite what the Right contends: 1.5 to 2%

Demonizing Gays And Abusing Puppies; How the Radical Religious Right Is Killing Us With Kindness, Neglect, And One Proposition At A Time

I can demonize with the best of 'em. First, because I know when I'm demonizing something or someone. Secondly, I can sense fear and know when to use it. But most of all, I can use hyperbole and make it seem possible. For example, I can say that "the Religious Right wants gay teens to commit suicide." I didn't qualify the statement by saying "some" of the Religious Right. I played upon progressives' fears by using the word "suicide" and demonized by using "wants." Then back up the statement with something, like posting a clip of a pulpit personality ranting about the "destructive gay lifestyle." It's really rather simple, isn't it? 

Which is why "social conservatives" and Religious Right leaders demonize all the time. It has a simple formula that's quick and cheap (unless, of course, you're insecure about your ability to demonize and think you need billboards and stuff). Demonizing, of course, is not new to religion, but Abrahamic religions (Judaism, Christianity, Islam) have strong "we -are-the-only-religion" doctrines and therefore lend themselves to demonizing everyone else on a large, all-inclusive scale: It's alway "us" vs "them" and "them" is immediately demonized. In her book, The Origin Of Satan, Elaine Pagels puts the process of Christian demonizing neatly:

"Jesus' followers did not invent the practice of demonizing enemies within their own group... they drew upon  traditions they shared with other first-century Jewish sects. ..The Essenes never admitted Gentiles to their movement. But the followers of Jesus did - cautiously and provisionally at first, and against the wishes of some members. But as the Christian movement became increasingly Gentile during the second century and later, the identification of Satan primarily with the Jewish enemies of Jesus, borne along in Christian tradition over centuries, would fuel the fires of anti-Semitism."

  - Elaine Pagels, The Origin of Satan ( Vintage, 1996, p. 34)

OK, enough of Demonizing 101. Let's go on to today's primary issue: how the Radical Religious Right (RRR) will be working its demonizing "agenda" into the country's ballot boxes this November. 


This coming election day, the RRR's "agenda" will be split between Tea Baggers and Republicans. Most of the Tea Party will be focusing on less government (always good for the RRR), while the Republican Party will concentrate on the RRR's other ideals: eradicating abortion, eradicating the "gay agenda," erasing the idea of global warming, slowly promoting the ideas of Dominionism and "Christian Only" republicanism, promoting the status quo (doing nothing), repealing as much "progressive" legislation as possible and promoting capitalism. They will, of course, cover everything with a beautiful cloak they call: "for the good of the country." 


Now let's look at some of the propositions and amendments that are on state ballots. There's a great website called Ballotpedia.org that lists and parses (impartially) all propositions for Nov. as well as ones in previous years and ones that are coming up in  the  future. So, from Ballotpedia.org, here goes (my own demonizing is in red):


MISSOURI: 


Proposition B - "Puppy Mill Cruelty" legislation. RRR: We love puppies, but not to the extent that we have to expand government to protect them. (Translation: "who cares?")


OREGON: 


Measure 74 - State to license marijuana farmers who can distribute crop to medical marijuana dispensaries. RRR: More crime! Costs too much! Too much regulation!! (Plus: We wouldn't be getting any money out of it!) NOTE: There are 26 local propositions concerning legalization of marijuana nationwide.


KANSAS: 


Question 1 - Allow citizens to bear arms in the state. RRR: The U.S. Constitution isn't enough! And tear out that part in the KANSAS Constitution about " no standing armies and militias"! (Bo Gritz will love us forever)
Question 2 - (file this one in the "WTF?" category) Eliminate mental illness as a voting disqualification. RRR: "These people are our friends. They are everyday Kansans. They have jobs, pay taxes and vote." (They also shoot guns)


ARIZONA: 


Proposition 107 - Amend Civil Rights Act to effectively ban all affirmative action legislation. RRR: "We should be judging people on their character and their merit and not their skin color or their sex..."  (But ya do, Blanche, ya do). 
Proposition 203  - Legalization of Medical Marijuana. RRR: "Saying that this is for medicine for sick people is an absolute smokescreen." ("Smokescreen" - get it? How witty!) 

Proposition 302 - Repeal of Arizona's First Things First Program (state's "Head Start" program). RRR: "Unless it's helping people who truly can't help themselves, no, we shouldn't do it." (How compassionate)


COLORADO: 


Amendment 63 - Protect the individual’s right to make health care decisions. RRR: "This is not just to address the mandate in Obama-care, this is to make sure Colorado never becomes like Massachusetts where government puts a gun to your head and says you will buy a private product whether you want it or not." (But how many people won't be able to afford health care's rising costs and premiums, Hmmm?) NOTE: for a list of state attorneys general who oppose "Obamacare," click HERE.
 
CALIFORNIA: 


Proposition 23 - Suspend AB 32, the Global Warming Act of 2006.  RRR: "This has been the blind leading the blind, political correctness that has collapsed the economy in California. California already has the fifth-cleanest air in the country, so why are we doing this when no one else is?" (Gee Whiz! Fifth! Hallelujiah! We can start polluting MORE again!) 


TENNESSEE: 


Amendment: Personal right to hunt and fish within state laws and property rights. RRR: "prevent radical animal rights activists and an increasingly urban state legislature from one day shutting down the activities." ("Durn city folks wants to take away our rights to hunt possum!" - NOTE: the opposition call this bill "frivolous and unnecessary, or as one PETA activist said: "If people have a right to hunt, why not a right to shop or golf?")

Underneath it all

The cool thing about Ballotpedia.org is that it lists all the things that were proposed for state votes but didn't make it - this time. Herein lies the true treachery (demonization mine) of  the RRR: a look at what they're trying to pass and will definitely try again:


Propositions nullifying Health Care Reform: such as Washington State's Health Insurance Freedom Act. States with similar "anti-ObamaCare" measures still in the works: Idaho, Colorado, Oklahoma, Arizona, Missouri, Georgia, Maine, Florida, Louisian, Ohio, Kansas (of course).


Personhood Amendments: Would recognize the personhood of the unborn from the earliest stages of life. States in which the amendment was proposed: Colorado, Nevada 


California Free Exercise of Religion Amendment: Creates Special Constitutional Rule for Speech Based on the Bible. (Reconstructionists want this one in a bad way!)

Oklahoma "Sharia Law" Amendment: no explanation necessary.


Ohio Immigration Reform Initiative: Let's all be like Arizona.


There's also the laws they hope to stop from ever getting off the ground: In particular, the Safe Schools Improvement Act which would include anti-bullying measures protecting LGBT youth. The RRR's reasoning: we don't want homosexual "indoctrination" of our youth. Extension: "we couldn't care less about your queer kids committing suicide, just keeps your filthy hands off our kids. But of, course, we'll tell you that we care about ALL the kids."

So the homophobic, racist RRR wants gay teens to commit suicide, doesn't care about abused puppies, people who use marijuana to ease pain, or planet earth, loves racial profiling, wants anyone who spouts the Bible to be exempt from law,  wants all crazies to carry guns, and wants us all to believe that they're really spewing all this crap "for the good of the country."


OK., that's my demonizing for the day. But before you sign off, take a look at Michelangelo Signorile's take on demonizing as he finally gets enough of the RRR's "blamelessness" in last month's teen suicides: