Sheehan: the search for a narrative

[billvon 3,132]

It's been interesting to watch the Cindy Sheehan story play out in the news and here on DZ.com, which often seems like a microcosm of the rest of the political sphere. it's been especially interesting to watch how both sides have tried to frame the narrative to make a case for their side, and to watch how that narrative has changed.

About a month ago Cindy Sheehan arrived at Bush's ranch on a quest doomed for failure. Had this happened six months ago, or last week, she would have barely rated a story on Page 3, and she would now be about as well known as Paul Rieckhoff, an anti-war protester most people will have to google. But three things conspired to push her story onto the front page.

First, it was a slow news week. Nothing much was going on. There were another six dead soldiers in Iraq (getting pretty old by now) there was a lost teenager in Aruba (who everyone was sick to death of) and there had been some shark attacks (which is really scraping the bottom of the barrel, journalism-wise.) Second, she was carrying a message shared by most americans, if you believe the poll numbers. Third, the right wing reacted as if someone had stuck them with a knife. The right-wing blogosphere was full of vitriolic condemnation. "She's an idiot!" "Bitch in a ditch." "A grief pimp." "Her son would be rolling over in his grave." (Yes, someone actually said that.)

Why were they reacting so strongly when it was pretty much a given that she'd be forgotten about in a few days? Two reasons, I believe. One, she had the potential to garner a lot of sympathy, and right wingers feared people would associate sympathy with political validity. Two, she flew right in the face of their "support the troops, their families and the war" mantra. Here was a case that not only contradicted the central message of that mantra, in this case you _couldn't_ support this mother and the war. This really pissed them off, and they had a standard course of action when something pissed them off - attack.

The left wing, of course, fired back with just as much vitriol. "How dare you claim you know his poor dead son better than she does!" (They, of course, knew him no better.) "I can't believe you're calling her a media whore." And so the volleys flew back and forth across cyberspace.

Then something bad (for the right) happened. They started to look mean. The media picked up the story of the fight and did their usual half-assed job reporting it, and what filtered through was "right wingers attack grieving mother." This coincided with a few incidents where right-wing protesters did nasty things like mowing down a memorial or cursing her out in public. This seemed to cement the idea that right wingers hated her and, by extension, people like her. It was even starting to look like right wingers were committing the unpardonable sin of Not Supporting Military Families, a spin failure of epic proportions.

Something else happened that was even worse. With all the noise being generated by the right's attacks and the left's equally noisy counterattacks, Sheehan's protest became a center of attention, and began drawing both pro-war and anti-war protesters. This was bad news for the right wing, since the media inevitably mentioned who started the whole thing. By this time she really had nothing to do with the proceedings; the fight had taken on a will of its own, and was swirling around her leaving her pretty much ignored. Media reports talked about the anti-war protest and the pro-war counterprotest, but no one talked about what she was saying much. Heck, at one point she left for a week to care for an ailing mother, and the protests continued as if nothing had changed.

Meanwhile, the left was getting some traction with the "haters" theme. Michelle Malkin vociferously protested that she had never actually called Sheehan a grief pimp; she just titled a section of her website that, and someone else had actually come up with it.

For a short time the right proceeded on the "best defense is a good offense" approach, and Malkin, Coulter, Limbaugh et al tried to prove they really _did_ support military families, just not her. They dug through archives and pulled out old quotes to "prove" she was a liar. They trotted out the recently separated husband. They called her a traitor. They winnowed through the rest of her family to see what they could use against her. It didn't work; it's hard to support an invisible husband and attack a very visible woman and claim that you're really supporting such people. The narrative wasn't working, and they needed a new one, fast.

Then they found it. You could almost hear the groans across the country as overloaded blog servers had their content rapidly updated. The new narrative was that the right now _supported_ the poor, insane-with-grief Cindy Sheehan; it was the evil left wing media that was taking advantage of her that they despised. This worked much better. "That poor woman; those disgusting media whores are taking advantage of her! We support her, just not the message that the left wing has crammed down her throat." They had finally found a way to attack the messenger by proxy, leaving the sympathetic messenger alone. It also worked very well to counter the attacks of the left - "I can't believe you are using this poor woman to get your message across. Disgusting. Pathetic, really."

There were a few practical problems with the new narrative, of course. By condemning anyone who uses a military family for political purposes, they would have problems when a pro-war military family speaks out. The right wing then has to condemn them (and go off-message) support them (and appear as hypocrites) or ignore them (usually safest.) Generally this is only a problem when a sacred cow like Bush or Rumsfeld does this, since they can then neither condemn nor ignore them. Overall it's an excellent narrative.

The left is now scrambling to figure out how to respond to this latest one. So far they have reacted by largely ignoring the issue and instead attacking the right wingers themselves, going after Malkin for her Sheehan smears (for example.) Which will soon lead to the right attacking _them_, and things will return to normal.

One of the more interesting phenomenons here is that you see these rapid narrative changes and apparent organization within "the right wing" when in fact that term refers to a very loose collection of bloggers, talk show hosts, authors and political action groups. Any appearance of organization is created by a simple common purpose and the amazing rapidity with which the web can spread memes.

[Gravitymaster 0]

Gee, the latest tactic from the Left brought to you by DZ.Com.

[AlexCrowley 0]

Actually GM, I think it's summed up pretty well - even if you take a centrist stance on how its written.

The facts are exactly as laid out, except I'd once again blame the crappy media for needing a conflict.

Once the 'Bush vs Sheehan' story was done the media needed somethign else to give the story legs, there's still no major stories.

Ok, quote some of the usual Right mouthpieces who will say sensationalist shit just for ratings. So far so good, the right wing bloggers will eat it up since they dont seem to think for themselves.

Luckily the Left are the same way and attack the big bad Right wing for attacking defenseless sheehan.

The more intelligent Right snickers and then accuses the Left of using Sheehan.

The Left responds with ...............uhhhhh......ohhhh.

I think Bill's spot on with his last paragraph, it's mostly an illusion caused by a rapid news cycle and the incestuous nature of the blogging community.

It's pretty easy for any of us to list 3 or 4 of the main websites for both the left and the right, and they all attack each other in some sort of sadomasochistic circle jerk. Reading SC for any length of time and it's easy to see which posters simply spew whatever happens to be a headline topic on the blogs of the day, whichever side of the fence they sit on. Unless they're Rhino and then it'll be whatever the aliens whispered in his ear the night before

TV's got them images, TV's got them all, nothing's shocking.

[jdhill 0]

I think she believes the hype though... There was a clip on the news (I don't recall which station, but it was a local) Sunday... she made a statement at a rally the other day, that in essence said when she was in the history books, the people at the rally would be able to say they had met her...

J

All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. - Edmund Burke

[Gravitymaster 0]

Except he's continuing to post about Cindy Sheehan while at the same time accusing others of refusing to let it die. I find that very hypocritical. Now out comes a summerization which is heavily biased in that it specifies specific "right-wing sources etc. without a mention of Moveon.Org as an equal perpetrator. Those organiztions are left in kind of a shadowy cover (which is how they normally operate).

[billvon 3,132]

>Except he's continuing to post about Cindy Sheehan while at
>the same time accusing others of refusing to let it die.

Why - you're right! Check out the post right above this one - someone else mentioning Sheehan! It's a conspiracy I tell ya.

[Gravitymaster 0]

Quote

>Except he's continuing to post about Cindy Sheehan while at
>the same time accusing others of refusing to let it die.

Why - you're right! Check out the post right above this one - someone else mentioning Sheehan! It's a conspiracy I tell ya.

Not a conspiracy, just hypocritical. Does the latest tactic now involve instigating a discussion and then accusing others of complicity?

[AlexCrowley 0]

I guess I read it from a more centrist point of view so it wasnt so offensive.

Moveon wasnt mentioned but I probably had my internal 'ignore freerepublic.com' filter on.

TV's got them images, TV's got them all, nothing's shocking.

[jumper03 0]

what gets me about the entire ordeal, if Bush would have just meet with the woman when she showed up, talked to her for just half an hour, then this would have all be non-existent.

Scars remind us that the past is real