The Spin Doctor is in

A guide to "advanced democracy".

Emotions run high, and sometimes it is difficult to distinguish between the need for a good story, spin doctoring and utter dumbness, to wit The Daily Banter, Hero or Villain?

In the case of Establishment With Pants Down vs. Mr. S., the spin doctors are so busy and bustling that we can draw one conclusion: it is serious.

The following overview was drawn up with the assistance of a friend of the K-Landnews.

What are the spin masters up to?

Deny
Mr. C.' s  resounding yet awkward no, when asked about data collection. Once out, stick to Verizon.

Diminish
The president himself and a host of officials and supporters. Key phrase "only metadata".  In the chaos, trust that Joe Biden's clip on the 10 June Daily Show and the outing of Paul Revere via metadata never happened.

Broaden official support base
Diane Feinstein, Mr. Rogers (no, dummy, not the one from the hood), "informed sources" to saturate the limited air time and print space.

Set up false either - or patterns
Either 100% security or privacy, either Hero or Villain. We like it simple, so, Sir, would you prefer spuds or potatoes?

Close rank
In the U.S., closing rank is a bit harder than in old Europe. Rand Paul stuck out, a couple of Democratic officials with a conscience stuck out, but the majority of Democrats and Republicans closed ranks relatively well.
In Germany, only the Agriculture Secretary was vocal until they shut her up, too.
The spooks who were caught calling for "disappearing" the man, were shut up minutes after the news broke. Everybody in the "community" got their shut up message.

Conduct polls
This is one for the better spin doctors. We live in a polling age, and the spin masters love it because it is easy to set up the correct spin polls and exploit the more legit polls, too.

Tout successes
They immediately offered "lives saved" but were initially slightly hampered by their own constraints, then came up with a couple of arrests. No information is provided on what program, of the many we have, produced the success.

Make it appear the battle is already over
There is no privacy anyway. The big secret: it is not true in this sweeping sense.
If it were true, they would not be spending billions and billions and employ an army of people to do away with privacy.

Go all out - there is no business like show business
William Hague's "If you have nothing to hide" has to be our gold standard.
If the 25% of the population who will believe anything from the govt. stick with the program, life is okay.

Mash up all spooks
The leaks were about specific programs, the "success stories" were about "the NSA" or "intelligence agencies".  This is how German spin doctors did it. It appears, there was one definite anti-terrorist success (Sauerlandgruppe) where NSA information got the Germans on the trail.
Neither VERIZON nor PRISM were quoted by the spooks, but any straw is a good straw.

Do not talk about return on investment
National security is priceless. A concept as broad as national security is great when you do not want to discuss costs vs. benefits. Together with "lives saved", we have a winner. Repeat ad nauseam (until we are sick of it).
At all costs, suppress real cost-benefit analysis. Billions spent to save a few hundred lives must never, ever be put against the numbers of people dying in your own country because "there is no money" for this or that program.

Deconstruct the messenger
The problem with a 20-something is that there tends to be little real dirt. Anything goes. ANYTHING.
Too young, too old, too bright, too not bright, disgruntled, demented. Use "informed sources" or "former officials" to shape the debate a little, and you can trust the hungry but lazy media to go for anything personal.
In the case of Mr. S., the most effective angles so far have been "ah, Hong Kong, oh Free Speech", "rent-a-spook", "high school dropout", "only 29 years old".

Divide the dirty work
Those tasked to come up with the prosecution must not be caught calling the man a traitor. Leave that to politicians and friendly sources.

Lump together and conquer
Divide and conquer is for the physical battlefield and the simple "traitor" calls.
For the big shitstorms, go with "lump together".  It has worked in the Cold War -- don't like this policy, you must be a communist. Don't like being spied on, you are supporting terrorists.
Our allied spin doctors in Germany gloat over the fact that libertarians and leftish folks are against boundless informants.

Hit the journalists
Make the journalists look as bad as you can. Leave the personal attacks to "friends", especially if you fucked up recently by alienating the press.

Emotional triggers
Terrorists, it's all about them. Broaden the case to cyberattacks. They are real, fluff them up a bit and get the guys of ZDnet to saturate the web. Add more emotional trigger words. Tax evasion anyone? Child abusers? 

International support
We were there on 9/11, we know what it felt like, and the whole world was with us. Ten years later, on a good day, we sometimes sit back and wonder why so many people all over the world still like the U.S.*
Sure, some of the international support comes from people who have lied to their own population way too much. But who cares.
The Germans have behaved really well.

Time is on your side
Not that the Europeans have any backbone. We know it sounds harsh, and there are good, smart people everywhere who have good reasons to distrust any secret court but they cannot stay focused on this forever. People need to work, the day has only 24 hours, and another crisis will save your sorry asses.

One more thing: Let the comedians do their shtick
Many a government, like today's Egypt, has a problem with comedians.  If you can be leave the comedians alone, you give the ungovernable and the kumbaya brigade some breathing room. You don't have to like them but they are not dangerous as such.

*Hint: They like the American people, the music, the movies, the moon landing.