The “nutcase defense” — The DNC creates the RNC’s November ad campaign

Progressive activists have been raising the red flag for almost two years. The message to Democrats has been simple: if you don’t present a grand unified vision of what Democrats stand for, the rightwing noise machine will step into the vacuum and frame everything you do as part of a liberal conspiracy to destroy America.

The progressive message has not gotten through. The result is now a wave election, with Democrats scrambling to avoid a total wipeout. In this state of chaos and confusion, Democrats are now resorting to the “nutcase defense” — trying to tell voters that they are ‘crazy to vote for crazy people.’ But this is a gross misreading of the rise of the Tea Party, the age of Palinmania and America’s sudden rightward shift. Case in point: this DNC ad could easily be released by the RNC and would be an effective GOTV tool:

UPDATE: Sarah Posner expresses a similar view:

I covered 9/12/09. It was pretty “crazy” looking, but at the same time, I talked to plenty of people who weren’t carrying Obama-is-the-Antichrist signs and were, it seemed to me, looking for someone to give them some easy answers about why the economy was in the crapper. (See here and here for my perspective on the events.) They were looking in the wrong place, obviously, but the Democrats won’t win by telling these people they’re crazy or cavort with crazy people. But that always seems like the easiest way to go.

That’s not to say that nativism, racism, and other ugliness shouldn’t be reported and reviled. But Democrats shouldn’t be “gleefully noting to reporters” anything about Beck. Until they have their own brilliant plan to rally the faithful, glee shouldn’t be part of their vocabulary or their talking points.