Betcha didn't know the south won the Civil War?

Everything you know is wrong. Just ask Firesign Theater.

Better yet, just ask Rush - Democrats created the economic meltdown.

Digby responds, at her best:

The right wing understands something that progressives just refuse to engage in and that is that most people, particularly the media, understand their world through stories. And so they consciously craft plots and narratives to explain events that favor their worldview. Right now, after eight years of Bush and a decisive election repudiating Republican rule, it seems impossible to believe that their story makes any sense to people. But they will tell it anyway, full in the knowledge that within a few months any talk of Bush will be as stale as Rickrolling and the focus will be completely on Obama. And they will already be well on their way to setting forth an alternate reality that slides neatly into familiar grooves worn smooth by decades of right wing propaganda.

[. . .]

Nobody has yet repudiated conservatism or explained why the country is in this mess, because Democrats decided that they didn't want to play the blame game. And if we're lucky, it won't matter because the country will turn around quickly, the Democrats will get the credit and the modern conservative movement will slink off into obscurity having been rendered irrelevant for all time by the the irrefutable progressive success of Barack Obama and the Democratic congress. But I think it's a mistake to assume that's how it will go.

Along with good policy, you need rhetoric and narratives that give people something to believe in --- and someone to blame. History has shown that it's never smart to let demagogues go unanswered under the assumption that people will see through them, particularly in a time of great stress and dislocation.

And the dingo ate the Rush's baby.