"I'd walk a mile for a Camel," "Winston tastes good, like a cigarette should," "There's a Ford in your future," "Miller Beer: Tastes great and is less filling."
For us older guys, these are slogans that we remember. They became imbedded in our minds. They were repeated, repeated, and repeated again.
The Bush administration could have created many different slogans following 9/11, but they didn't. The contemporary White House "sales pitch" slogan became "The War On Terror". What a great line for this disingenuous administration to use, It has a certain ring to it, and of course is immediately connected to the Bush White House who are the people who will wage this war, and of course keep us safe from the bad guys, as no one else can.
This allows or indeed supports the campaign of the administration that "we will protect you from these evil people, and the Democrats would provide them with health care and food stamps." Since 9/11 the Republicans promote the theme that the Democrats are weak on terror? Silly, but it sells.
Karl Rove has orchestrated another mid term election campaign that has worked for him in the past. He has organized a series of "announcements" in order to put the president on television ALL OF THE TIME! It doesn't matter what he says when he is on, what matters is his being on television, looking presidential, and repeating the mantra of "the war on terror" over and over again.
While he is at it he must avoid discussions of future plans concerning the war in Iraq other then "stay the course" or to connect Iraq to the global war on terror. He explains constitutional violations by saying that it is all part of the war on terror.
The Republicans are desperate to change the subject away from the real war that we are in, and create the latest chapter of "we are strong on terror." The president, I believe, does not care if we torture prisoners. What is really happening is that the White House has divined an attack on the Geneva convention which will for the coming weeks allow them to say to America something like "We want to protect you from terrorism, and in order to do so we must allow the CIA and others to use whatever techniques are required to get the job done. I care more about my fellow Americans then I do for the terrorists who only want to kill Americans."
They probably knew that a group of prominent Senators would vehemently oppose them on this "revision" to the Geneva Convention. In my opinion, this opposition serves them, and will serve them well.
Not only can Bush say that he is fighting to protect Americans from terrorists, but he once again COMMANDS TELEVISION coverage, first another meaningless press conference where he can attempt to be clever when not answering David Gregory's questions, and then for the next few weeks or longer media attention will be focused on this issue, and not IRAQ. Perhaps Bush and Rove have noticed that a mid-term election is coming up and it serves them to once again change the subject away from the failed policies in Iraq, to point out to America that there could be terrorists under their beds, but that the administration will find them and send them to Guantanamo.
Meet the Press, Face the Nation and all of those Sunday shows as well as the Cable News Networks will be all over this story for at least a week, but probably longer.
The dialogue is not about a failed war in Iraq or Americans getting killed and maimed every day, but rather what the president will bring up every day to get on television.
The Democrats sadly have no "balls", and in any event can't get on television the way the president can. They, in my opinion need to re-characterize the war on terror into a war on criminal activities engaged in by criminals who are trying to harm us. They could say: "It is our intention to protect America by increasing our law enforcement activities and budgets. We will increase the CIA, FBI, NSA, and other law enforcement agencies expenditures by whatever amount that the agencies consider they need. We will stamp out the terrorists activities to keep our homeland safe. We will enlist our allies for an all out effort to curtail the criminal activity of terrorism. We will fight these criminals with law enforcement experts who know their jobs and how to do them."
Meanwhile I wonder who is looking in my windows and monitoring my television viewing, reading my internet traffic, and listening in on my phone calls.
A former smoker, who never thought that Winston tasted good like a cigarette should, or walked a mile for a Camel, had a Ford in his future, and who hated Miller Beer even if it tasted great and was less filling.
Norman Horowitz