The top of the page story on HUFFPOST was a political analysis essay rather than a news article this morning.

In the piece Paul Blumenthal, a senior reporter with the HuffPost Politics team, interviews Daniel Schlozman, a political scientist at Johns Hopkins University and an expert on political party history and behavior. Rather than summarize this illuminating article I recommend reading it here.

I had one reaction that I do want to share. It is from one term (my bold) in the last sentence here:

That is not the ethos of the contemporary Republican Party. When that is not your ethos, then the question arises: What is this party all about? It’s about the dominance of social forces that are behind figures like Matt Gaetz, but in ways that prioritize their own desires for chaos, troublemaking and betrayal narratives.

The creation of narratives that are themselves a justification for action. It can even be a justification for explaining betrayals when other Republicans are collaborating with liberals, who are the enemy. For a lot of Republicans, it is, “If we collaborate with McCarthy, who is passing bills with the Democrats, then we are complicit in the great crimes of liberalism. If we really, really want to own the libs, we cannot countenance the ordinary politics of getting a House in order that means the libs and Joe Biden, and behind him, the dark forces that are modern liberalism, are given legitimacy and power. We then need to take measures that are beyond what our lily-livered predecessors would have done.

HuffPost

This is the derivation of the term lily-livered (which means cowardly):

The basis of the word lily-livered lies in an old belief. Years ago, people thought that health and temperament were the products of a balance or imbalance of four bodily fluids, or humors: blood, phlegm, black bile, and yellow bile. It was believed that a deficiency of yellow bile, or choler, the humor that governed anger, spirit, and courage, would leave a person’s liver colorless or white. Someone with this deficiency, and so white-livered, would be spiritless and a coward. Lily-livered and white-livered have been used synonymously since the 17th century, but lily-livered is now the more common expression, probably because of its alliteration.

Webster

Here’s is a good way to look at what the chaos creatures that have taken over the House GOP have managed to do: they have supercharged their lilly-livers. If they were cars in a competition they’d driving their 600 horsepowered vehicles like they’re in a demolition derby.

The problem is that while the Democrats don’t have lilly-livers they have normal livers.

Back to the car analogy, Democrats need to amp up the horsepower in their engines and drive them like Grand Prix drivers not like the meth head members of the House GOP.

I tried to put my two-cent opinion about some of what they can do into this Oct 14th blog about using tried and true advertising methods for Democrats to make their case here.

I don’t think the Democrats should behave like thier counterparts across the aisle. Said aisle might as well be the River Stix (the boundry to Hell) in the Illiad. I doubt the Democrats could even do this given both their dispositions and commitment to civil governance. They won’t behave like the unhinged narcissitic Republicans.

Wikipedia defines asymmetric war as follows:

Asymmetric warfare (or asymmetric engagement) is a type of war between belligerents whose relative military power, strategy, or tactics differ significantly. This type of warfare often, but not necessarily, involves insurgents or resistance movement militias who may have the status of unlawful combatants against a standing army.

Wikipedia

There are several different types in military warfare. Sometimes it is a small force fighting a larger better equipped force as Ukraine is doing.

In civilian terms we can think of the Democrats being engaged in asymmetrical warfare with Republicans who aren’t a larger or better equipped force. It is that they use vastly different weapons and tactics. They are not unbeatable. They haven’t accomplished anything remotely like what the Nazi’s did in their European blitzkrieg. While not an expert, my impression is that World War II began as an asymmetric war while heroic resistance groups fought asymmetrically as American participation increased it became symmetric.

The Republicans are very beatable if Democrats can develop a strategy to employ their own rarely used, if not unique, weapons and tactics. I wish I knew what they might be. Hopefully they can figur.e it out.

Addendum:

Democrats must recognize some basic science about human nature. Consider this: Choosing Ignorance: 40% Shun Consequence Knowledge for Selfish Gains:

Summary: New research unveiled that when faced with a choice, 40% of individuals opt to remain ignorant about how their decisions impact others, often leveraging this unawareness to act more selfishly.

The researchers equate this behavior to consumers who turn a blind eye to the problematic origins of products they purchase. Within the studies analyzed, evidence surfaced indicating that when participants were made aware of the consequences of their actions, there was a 15.6% rise in altruistic behavior.

This suggests that while many might act out of a desire to maintain a positive self-perception, much of the perceived altruism could be rooted more in societal pressures and self-view rather than a genuine regard for others’ well-being.

Substitute voters for consumers above.

Key Facts:

1. When given an option, 40% chose not to learn the consequences of their decisions.
2. Willful ignorance led to a 15.6 percentage point drop in altruistic behavior.
3. People informed about their action’s consequences were 7% more likely to act generously than those informed by default, indicating true altruism.

If the Democrats can use science to make Republicans 15.6% more altruistic this could have an election deciding effect.

Unfortunately the narcisstic personality disorder that many members of the GOP House can reasonably be diagnsosed as having and Deomcrats have a challenge to overcome to be able to defeat them.

Previous blogs here.

Today’s post: