Did they really think only old white men would hear the dogwhistles?

[phantom power]

I think the answer is: sure, they *are* "so used to speaking in code to one audience while bamboozling another audience". And the fact is, for the last 40 years it worked just fine for them. It worked so well for so long that they no longer remember how to win elections without it. About two generations now have grown up entirely within the universe where the Souther Strategy reigned supreme, so supreme that Ari Fleischer literally proclaimed that they could now create their own reality from here on out.

In the intervening four years, the Republican message against Obama has been nothing but one long racist tirade.

...

Did they think African-Americans wouldn't notice? Did they think only white people could hear those dogwhistles and outright racist primal screams?

Did they think Latinos wouldn't hear the last four years of vitriol thrown at them and their families by Fox News and the fever swamps on the AM dial? That they could celebrate Jan Brewer's and Joe Arpaio's sick sadism and that Latinos would take heed?

...

Did they believe that women would forget that the GOP platform wants to force them to carry their rapists' babies, and insist that they continue to cheated out of 25 cents or more on every dollar in the workplace? Did they believe that they could do this to the amazing Sandra Fluke and that young women wouldn't know exactly what to do about it?

...

Are boardroom and parish Republicans so used to speaking in code to one audience while bamboozling another audience that they thought no one would notice?

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2012/11/did-they-really-think-only-old-white.html

[SoCalDem]

1. It no longer mattered to them. They started using bullhorns because

the drank their own koolaid & convinced themselves that they were a majority.

[phantom power]

2. That is the problem with propaganda -- the next generation takes it seriously.

[hfojvt]

3. yeah sure

because otherwise they'd have picked up 40% of the black vote if not for the things they said.

PS - I happen to be an old white man, thank you very much.

[Arugula Latte]

4. Social media is helping expose the dog whistles and show these fuckers for what they really are.

It puts things in themes and provides a context for people. My favorite is the way their "War on Religious Freedom" (you know, those poor religious child molesters in stupid pointy hats have the right to deny women contraception and make sure they carry rapists' babies to term!) was turned on its head and became "The War on Women." People could see the bigger theme emerge without relying on the equivocation and false equivalencies of the mainstream press.