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Alinsky's Rules For Radicals
Rule 1: Power is not only what you have, but what an opponent thinks you have. If your organization is small, hide your numbers in the dark and raise a din that will make everyone think you have many more people than you do.
Rule 2: Never go outside the experience of your people. The result is confusion, fear, and retreat.
Rule 3: Whenever possible, go outside the experience of an opponent. Here you want to cause confusion, fear, and retreat.
Rule 4: Make opponents live up to their own book of rules. “You can kill them with this, for they can no more obey their own rules than the Christian church can live up to Christianity.”
Rule 5: Ridicule is man’s most potent weapon. It’s hard to counterattack ridicule, and it infuriates the opposition, which then reacts to your advantage.
Rule 6: A good tactic is one your people enjoy. “If your people aren’t having a ball doing it, there is something very wrong with the tactic.”
Rule 7: A tactic that drags on for too long becomes a drag. Commitment may become ritualistic as people turn to other issues.
Rule 8: Keep the pressure on. Use different tactics and actions and use all events of the period for your purpose. “The major premise for tactics is the development of operations that will maintain a constant pressure upon the opposition. It is this that will cause the opposition to react to your advantage.”
Rule 9: The threat is more terrifying than the thing itself. When Alinsky leaked word that large numbers of poor people were going to tie up the washrooms of O’Hare Airport, Chicago city authorities quickly agreed to act on a longstanding commitment to a ghetto organization. They imagined the mayhem as thousands of passengers poured off airplanes to discover every washroom occupied. Then they imagined the international embarrassment and the damage to the city’s reputation.
Rule 10: The price of a successful attack is a constructive alternative. Avoid being trapped by an opponent or an interviewer who says, “Okay, what would you do?”
Rule 11: Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, polarize it. Don’t try to attack abstract corporations or bureaucracies. Identify a responsible individual. Ignore attempts to shift or spread the blame.
Rule 2: Never go outside the experience of your people. The result is confusion, fear, and retreat.
Rule 3: Whenever possible, go outside the experience of an opponent. Here you want to cause confusion, fear, and retreat.
Rule 4: Make opponents live up to their own book of rules. “You can kill them with this, for they can no more obey their own rules than the Christian church can live up to Christianity.”
Rule 5: Ridicule is man’s most potent weapon. It’s hard to counterattack ridicule, and it infuriates the opposition, which then reacts to your advantage.
Rule 6: A good tactic is one your people enjoy. “If your people aren’t having a ball doing it, there is something very wrong with the tactic.”
Rule 7: A tactic that drags on for too long becomes a drag. Commitment may become ritualistic as people turn to other issues.
Rule 8: Keep the pressure on. Use different tactics and actions and use all events of the period for your purpose. “The major premise for tactics is the development of operations that will maintain a constant pressure upon the opposition. It is this that will cause the opposition to react to your advantage.”
Rule 9: The threat is more terrifying than the thing itself. When Alinsky leaked word that large numbers of poor people were going to tie up the washrooms of O’Hare Airport, Chicago city authorities quickly agreed to act on a longstanding commitment to a ghetto organization. They imagined the mayhem as thousands of passengers poured off airplanes to discover every washroom occupied. Then they imagined the international embarrassment and the damage to the city’s reputation.
Rule 10: The price of a successful attack is a constructive alternative. Avoid being trapped by an opponent or an interviewer who says, “Okay, what would you do?”
Rule 11: Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, polarize it. Don’t try to attack abstract corporations or bureaucracies. Identify a responsible individual. Ignore attempts to shift or spread the blame.
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2009
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January
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- Your Weekend Lesson
- So You Don't Misunderstand Us
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- Re-Posting A Song Of Thanksgiving
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- Suicide Brigade
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- Iceland to appoint gay woman minister to PM post
- Rights group asks Obama to release Bush-era memos
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- He Lives!
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- Paul McCartney set for `Colbert Report' visit
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- The Hell We Are!
- Welcome To The Mainstream
- Change We could Not Have Dreamed Of
- A Reader Writes
- Dispatching Bilbo
- Oh Great, Now He's not being Helpful In Other Realms
- The Change We've Been Waiting For
- Sarah Palin fan unknowingly buys effigy with noose
- Boy, 14, dupes police, patrols Chicago for 5 hours
- Ill. governor considered Oprah Winfrey for Senate
- States may gain power over emissions standards
- Impeachment trial to proceed without Ill. governor
- Democrats: Stimulus plan no quick fix for economy
- 100 Hours Post-W
- We're Doing Our Best To Piss Off The Last Third
- Retarded Ohio Man Surrounded By His Care-Takers
- Take Five
- Welcome Back George
- I've been Meaning To Post something Like this
- I Wanted To Note ...
- And Like A Bad Dream, It was Over When We Woke Up
- How Beautiful Are These
- A Touching Farewell
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- AP Poll: People optimistic on Obama by 3-1 margin
- Obama poised to put imprint on Iraq, Afghan wars
- Judge OKs 1st suspension in Gitmo cases
- No title
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- One
- Don't Ask, Just Watch?
- What HBO Missed
- Obama honors King on final pre-presidency day
- Schedule of events for Obama's inauguration
- Future of abstinence-only funding is in limbo
- 'Anything possible,' Obama tells joyous crowd
- He's Coming!
- What A New York Miracle Looks Like
- The First Movie
- Wrong To The Very Last
- Proudly Hurting American People
- They Kept Us Safe
- The Death Of Comedy
- Sources: Obama ready to end harsh interrogations
- What Our Friends Overseas Have To Say
- Go, And GWOT No More
- More Proof
- An Exchange Waiting To Be Spoken
- Not All Artists Are Fans ...
- So True
- Obama's AG pick earns praise, GOP support
- And Rush Too
- SPIN METER: Bush puts his record in best light
- A Song For George
- Required Reading
- Thanks For The Memories
- It's Coming ...
- Yes It Is!
- No Class
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- Run-DMC, Metallica lead list of 2009 Rock Hall
- Texas carries out nation's first execution of 2009
- GOP's Graham cites worldwide good will for Obama
- House votes health insurance for 4M more children
- The Greatest Horror Story
- Barry, 24/7!
- Now The Video
- Why Have We Not Been Hearing This For, Like, Years?
- Enough!
- Did You Notice ...
- A Brilliant Southern Strategy
- Pentagon official says 9/11 suspect was tortured
- Thank You George
- A New Found Understanding
- Not That She'd Win
- Can't Do Nuthin' Right
- I Might Be Wrong
- Something New For Us
- Justice Rising
- In Which I Lazily Rip-Off Wonkette
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