"Intelligence in 21st Century America" by Joseph Cotto explains how Americans can elect an empty suit like Barack Obama, and come close to electing ones like Al Gore and John Kerry.  "It was found that most people rank below average."  Intelligence apparently follows not a bell curve, but rather a skewed distribution in which the median (50^th percentile of the population) is well below the mean or average.

Adolf Hitler was therefore right (as in "accurate" rather than "ethical," "decent," or "honorable") when he said, "All propaganda has to be popular and has to adapt its spiritual level to the perception of the least intelligent of those towards whom it intends to direct itself."  Joseph Goebbels added, "Arguments must therefore be crude, clear and forcible, and appeal to emotions and instincts, not the intellect. ... Hatred and contempt must be directed at particular individuals."

This kind of propaganda persuaded Germans to elect the Nazis to power, but it was not a Nazi invention.  Hitler's Mein Kampf cited Triple Entente propaganda that demonized Germans as monsters who brutalized women, put infants on their bayonets, drowned children on the Lusitania, and so on.  It was sufficiently effective to draw credulous Americans into a war in which we lost more than 110,000 men.  The Yellow Press, meanwhile, used images of savage apes in Spanish uniforms to draw the United States into a war with Spain.  Henry Ford defined this kind of manipulation as "psychological crime," but then he fell victim to it himself when he believed and acted on Boris Brasol's anti-Semitic propaganda.

The takeaway is not that this entitles us in any way to lie to other Americans the way the Nazis lied to the Germans.  The instant we lie to the Propaganda Man, the person we seek to persuade, we deserve to lose his trust and respect.  The anti-Second Amendment Million Mom March self-destructed in this manner after it was exposed for lying to its own donors and volunteers about its real agenda, which was to use tax-exempt money to support the campaigns of House candidates along with Al Gore.

We must, however, tell the truth in such a way that the Propaganda Man will pay attention long enough for objective evidence to convince him.  Reasonable and intellectual arguments about genuine issues proved to be no match for empty slogans like "Hope and Change," and Obama Girl dancing in a bikini, in 2008 and 2012.  Obama's picture on Amber Lee Ettinger's T-shirt, directly between her substantial mammary assets, embodied Goebbels's advice to "appeal to emotions and instincts, not the intellect."  It worked.

We now have people who advocate the election of Hillary Clinton for the sole purpose of giving the country its first female president, much as Barack Obama's election underscored the fact that affirmative action means hiring, appointing, or electing people for the color of their skin rather than the content of their character.  This supports the contention that most people are below average in intelligence, and we should also remember that the population of Aldous Huxley consisted primarily of Gammas, Deltas, and nearly mindless Epsilons rather than Alphas and Betas.  Slogans and pictures must therefore appeal to the Epsilon level, but the facts behind them must persuade even the most intelligent person who checks for himself or herself.

The Rule of Names

A fundamental principle of psychological warfare is that the side that controls the language of the argument controls the argument.  This could explain ancient myths and legends that the power to name a thing conveys the power to control or destroy it.

Consider, for example, the  antagonist Mula-ay in Gordon R. Dickson's Spacepaw.  The giant alien had earned the name Barrel Belly for his enormous appetite.  When he was knocked out in a fight, he claimed that he had hit his head on a wall.  Then, when the Dilbians confronted him with the obvious but not dishonorable explanation, he protested that he wasn't drunk.

"So, naturally, he got his name changed," explained one of the bear-like Dilbians.  The protagonist from Earth "was aware enough of Dilbian attitudes now to realize that Wasn't Drunk was as much a liability of a name as Barrel Belly had been an advantage to Mula-ay. What it boiled down to was that the Hemnoid had become a figure of fun to the Dilbians and his usefulness to the Hemnoid purpose on Dilbia was at an end."

The Allies similarly named the German general Fedor von Bock "Der Sterber," or "Let's go get killed" after he spoke of the German soldier's duty to die gloriously for the Fatherland.  This conveyed to his men the image of a glory hunter who was willing to expend men's lives for nothing.  We can and must use similar techniques to prevent Hillary Clinton from appointing more unqualified Supreme Court justices like "wise Latina" Sonia Quotamayor, and from reappointing the EPA director who is trying to implement Obama's illegal carbon regulations.

Hillary Clinton and the Million Mom March Scandal

Hillary Clinton was closely associated with the Million Mom March (2000-2001), which used children as human shields (note the new language of the argument) to defraud its own donors and volunteers.  The Million Mom March lied to the public, and to its own volunteers and donors, about firearm misuse killing 12 or 13 children a day.  This is true only if one counts "children" old enough to vote, sign contracts, and, more to the point, join gangs like the Crips, Bloods, and Latin Kings.

The Million Mom March also misused 501(c)(3) tax-exempt money to influence the 2000 election.  The Brady Campaign is even stupid enough to admit this on a current web page!  "Moms mobilized on the Internet; many called their members of Congress for the first time. They offered photo ops, and passed out apple pies to some Congressional leaders, while promising to put others in time-out chairs."  The web page even admits openly that "MMM President Mary Leigh Blek, on behalf of the moms, endorsed Hillary Clinton for the U.S. Senate at a New York MMM meeting in New York."  It is outright illegal for 501(c)(3) organizations to endorse candidates.

It is therefore vital to use "Hillary Clinton" and "scandal" in the same sentence as often as possible in this context, along with phrases like "diversion of tax-exempt money to influence an election."

Hillary Clinton, Margaret Sanger, and Eugenics

We won't use the accusation that Planned Parenthood sells parts from aborted fetuses because it has not been proven that Planned Parenthood is doing it for profit.  Remember that the instant we lie to the Propaganda Man, or even embellish a story, we deserve to lose his trust and respect.  What is not open to question, though, is that Hillary Clinton accepted the Margaret Sanger Award, and that Sanger espoused Nazi-like ideas about eugenics.  Ms. Clinton also said, "I admire Margaret Sanger enormously, her courage, her tenacity, her vision.  I am really in awe of her.  There are a lot of lessons we can learn from her life."  PsyWar 101 says that anything you say can be used against you, and this is a prime example.  This is what Hillary Clinton just put herself on record as supporting.

• "Birth control is not contraception indiscriminately and thoughtlessly practiced. It means the release and cultivation of the better racial elements in our society, and the gradual suppression, elimination and eventual extirpation of defective stocks – those human weeds which threaten the blooming of the finest flowers of American civilization."
• "We do not want word to go out that we want to exterminate the Negro population, and the minister is the man who can straighten out that idea if it ever occurs to any of their more rebellious members."
• "All of our problems are the result of overbreeding among the working class" (that is, the Democrats' traditional constituency).

Here is a cartoon, with public domain (due to age, or an official U.S. government photo in Clinton's case) that explains the situation very clearly.  Note that the Propaganda Man can verify for himself that Margaret Sanger said these things, and also that Hillary Clinton expressed her admiration of Margaret Sanger.  The Planned Parenthood controversy, which may turn out to be a weak or defective argument, is not even included.

Shotgun Joe

Suppose that Joe Biden is the Democrats' nominee instead.  Two people have already been arrested for following Shotgun Joe's advice to fire a shotgun into the air to drive off suspected criminals.  Biden's fitness to practice law in Delaware can be questioned because unjustified discharge of a firearm could constitute felony aggravated menacing.

Shotgun Joe also has a long record of exploiting his family's tragedies for personal political gain, and this is how we should phrase the issue.  He used the accidental deaths of his wife and daughter as an excuse to falsely accuse the other driver of killing them while drunk (a felony in most states), and he used his government-funded Senate web page to do it.

Biden therefore used his power as a U.S. senator to brutalize an ordinary American family so he could grandstand about how he felt the pain of the 9/11 victims, and that makes him a bully[.] … To this may be added his prostitution of the memory of his own wife and daughter, whom he used for the same purpose.

Now Biden tells us that his son's dying wish was for him to run for president.  I can almost hear the violins, but the problem is that this kind of argument actually appeals to those of lower intelligence.  When the Propaganda Man wakes up to the fact that he is being manipulated, though, he will turn against the manipulator very quickly.  This is why we must argue that Biden exploits family tragedies for personal political gain.

William A. Levinson  is the author of several books on business management including content on organizational psychology, as well as manufacturing productivity and quality.