Thread by @dcpetterson

The plan hatched by Leeann Tweedon, Sean Hannity and Roger Stone to slime Senator Al Franken with false allegations of sexual impropriety serves a number of dangerous purposes. We need to be aware of what they're doing and why.

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1. First and most obviously, these allegations are designed to weaken a tireless advocate for women and for women's rights. More than that, he's been an effective advocate for civil rights, voting rights, education, the environment--everything Democrats believe in.

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He's being targeted because he has also been effective in holding the Administration's toes to the fire as part of the Senate Intelligence Committee hearings. Hurting him hurts Democratic causes, and even hurts the Trump/Russia investigation.

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2. This attack on Franken also damages the growing movement to believe the victims of sexual assault. As the accusations are proven to be false, this will be used to cast doubt on others. it's an insidious way for the reactionary right to attack the credibility of all women.

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3. It draws false equivalences to accused pedophiles such as Roy Moore and Donald Trump. The behavior in the false Franken allegations, while inexcusable, is most certainly not on the level of raping children or other such heinous felonies.

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Yet the right-wing media is trying very hard to blur those distinctions. This blows offensive behavior out of proportion and both trivializes rape. It is an outright assault on the whole concept of justice.

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4. As an effect of drawing that false equivalence and weakening our system of justice, it will also serve to defend Roy Moore, who is in an unexpectedly difficult Senate run.

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Republicans need Moore in the Senate to enact their agenda. The intent is to weaken the outrage at his habit of child molestation, by pretending Democrats shouldn't be in a position of throwing stones.

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This argument is only credible if people become convinced that false charges of inappropriate touching of an adult are somehow comparable to raping children.

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5. It is an intentional distraction from a whole range of damage Republicans are doing to our nation. Any time and effort spent dealing with this flashy sex scandal is time and effort NOT spent on opposing a dangerous tax bill, or defending Net Neutrality,

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or stopping the avalanche of unqualified extremist judicial appointees. Attention diverted to sexcapades helps blind America to creeping fascism.

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6. It divides Democrats against each other, weakening the unity that the Resistence must have if we are to weaken the neo-feudal fascist regime sezing power in our nation. Just as Russian psyops helped drive a wedge between supporters of Bernie Sanders and

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and of the Democratic ticket in 2016, the false Franken allegations are being used in an attempt to weaken women's support for Democrats--and women are, in general, far more supportive of Democrats than are men.

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This is an attempt to destroy the base support for Democrats all over the country and up and down all ballots.

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7. It is the fascist psyops machine stretching its muscles and gearing up for 2018 and 2020. They're developing and honing a technique of weaponizing Democratic issues to use against Democrats.

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This is one more way they will come at us. Whether it succeeds or fails, this attack on Senator Franken will be used by Republicans and Russians as a learning exercise, to help them improve in their methods of disinformation and damaging propaganda.

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None of these techniques, goals, or assaults on Americanism are new. Republicans have been doing this for decades. They're just getting better at it, and using Russian psyops methods to do it.

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There is a slightly expanded version of this thread, reformatted as an essay, here.
18/17
medium.com/@dcpetterson/h…

Here's a short piece by someone else explaining why the "groping" picture shows nothing of the sort, and isn't about groping anyway.
19/17
medium.com/@daleruff/the-…