Bernie won! What do we do now?

tactical agility

With 92% reporting (on day 3):

Sanders: 24.37
Buttigieg: 21.51
Warren 18.58
Biden: 14.91
Klobuchar: 12.71
Yang: 5.06
Steyer: 1.77

So now we can safely say that this was an unholy cross between goats and rats.

Fairly obvious now, to me at least, and even in the face of my own skepticism of conspiratorial accounts, that the DNC was neck deep in the goat-f*ckery and rat-f*ckery of the Iowa Caucus. It is equally obvious that network news was in on it.

So what next? They made their play. It’s done and dusted. The principles of tactical agility tell us to orient to the newly emergent situation, decide on a counter-action that disrupts the decision cycle of the opponent and takes back the initiative, then doing it.

What do I mean by “take back the initiative”? Our side has the initiative when the opponent is forced to respond to our actions, making them re-active as we become pro-active. Ideally, by taking action faster than they can formulate a coherent response, this forces errors on their part, whereupon we keep exploiting those errors until they are on the back foot before delivering the coup.

Of course, this means turning on the amplifiers through our own social media meshworks, but it also means forcing the issues into public view. What might we then amplify? First and foremost, and oddly enough because we now have Trump and Cult as unwitting allies, we need to accurately and unmercifully expose and attack the DNC, Tom Perez, the media, and the media personalities. We need research, analysis, and synthesis of their histories — including personal histories, and their intramural associations.

More than that, however, we need to find those weak spots where they have no defense. Media ownership is indefensible. The DNC’s staff is indefensible. These are easy, but there need to be everything from protests at headquarters (CNN in Atlanta, MSNBC in New York), hitting them with flash protests as they go about their business, letters to editors, in-depth articles, and flooding their boxes. Be creative.

The real vulnerability, however, is naked hypocrisy. This is where the Trumpers are already bearing down . . . because it is so damned easy . . . in most cases.

One of those hypocrisies, and I sound like a broken record here, is Jeffrey Epstein. This is one that Trump won’t touch, and which hits the Democratic establishment in its Clinton groin. I really believe it is time for a flood of Epstein-and-Weinstein-related material that focuses on Bill Clinton’s sexual predations, Hillary’s attacks on his victims, and revives the #metoo discussion in a way that forces errors for the Demestablishment. This is a gaping vulnerability, and yes, let the chips fall where they may. It also surfaces a deeper discussion of what feminism means and allows us to expose the weaponized faux-feminism of the Demestablishment.

I’m sure others can think of more.

Do not overlook the power of ridicule and aggressive humor (not racist, sexist, etc.!!). At the top of that list, and here we check our orientation to the present, might be Michael Bloomberg — who could very well be their latest savior with his half-a-billion dollar ad buys. Not only the way he bought a box on the debate stage through the crooked DNC, but the fact that “The Democratic establishment is running a Republican against Bernie Sanders.” There’s your headline.

Folks can think of much much more, but the main consideration has to be forcing them into a defensive posture. Force them to answer the questions, and make sure those questions have no answer that does not further demonstrate their hypocrisy.

Meanwhile, how do we turn the lemon in Iowa into the proverbial lemonade? They denied Bernie his media bump — that abrupt rise in the polls that might have come without the f*ckery. That’s their playbook, a playbook that is like 50 years old. The social democratic movement that has coalesced around the Sanders candidacy doesn’t use that playbook; they use bypass media and ground game.

I remember back when dinosaurs roamed the earth and I taught at West Point. West Point had a football team that was on average about twenty pounds lighter per capita than other college ball teams. But they were fast as little Jesus-lizards, though, so they used something called the wishbone offense — a relentless wide running game that trumped bulk with speed.

That’s us. Over the days between now and the New Hampshire Primary in five days, we need to hit our allies and enemies again and again with Bernie’s win in Iowa, never missing the opportunity to demonstrate Demestablishment f*ckery, even as we prepare (inoculate) the public for the next f*ckery . . . like hyping a movie premiere, so we can employ their ham-handed machinations as entertainment. We know what they’ll do. Let everyone else know in advance.

Get ready. Write those letters. Join those actions. Re-transmit your social media pieces. Remember the heart attack . . . it made the recovery an advantage. Make this attack its own recovery, and build the momentum that was lost into a reversal of DNC advantage and another comeback narrative for Sanders.

Start . . . now. Give them chaos, and make that chaos our ally.