That's painfully true. There have been, though, broad long-term plans that succeeded. Here are two classics:
* "Attack on American Free Enterprise System" (1971), by Lewis J. Powell.[1] This is the founding document of the modern conservative agenda. Powell later became a Supreme Court justice. He proposed heavily funded groups to push a conservative pro-big-business agenda, with the U.S. Chamber of Commerce taking the lead. This was quite successful, especially noting how politically weak big business was at the time.
* "The Overhauling of Straight America" (1987), by Marshall Kirk and Erastes Pill (pseud. of Hunter Madsen). This is the founding document of the modern gay agenda.
This, too, was quite successful. It outlines a detailed program, and most of the goals listed were achieved.
"The Overhauling of Straight America" seems to be eye-poppingly accurate on first read because one can easily trace back the past 10-20 years and identify events that fit much of what was written... However I think I'd label this one moreso prophetic than any sort of targeted plan.
By that I mean if you were to pick any behavior that is generally unacceptable to society and attempt to change the tide of public opinion, the game plan would come out looking very similar to this document, with simple substitutions for the behavior.
I say that because there is a direct Biblical reference in this article to spiritual warfare - the shield and sword of that accursed "secular humanism" - which is a dig at Paul's instructions to Christian believers on how to remain on-guard in their faith (Ephesians 6:10-17).
So the fact that the strategy in this article mimics what Christians would recognize as spiritual warfare is not really surprising... The article's "six things" are very similar to how Satan works to deceive (John 8:44) and move just about any sin from abhorrent to acceptable -- desensitizing, redefining truth, identity attacks, guilt/shaming, social pressure & ostracizing, etc.
So I've seen that playbook before, and it wasn't written in 1987.
To make something happen politically, both a plan and an organization are needed. This was the plan part. The organization was the Human Rights Campaign Fund, originally a political action committee (PAC).[1]
A plan without an organization behind it is just an essay. An organization without a plan just thrashes around. That's what happened to Occupy. They never had a coherent agenda.
I'm halfway through [1] and it seems to capture the spirit of the times very well. I'm interested in a better understanding of US politics. Do you know any more classics in this genre?
The "Attack on American Free Enterprise System" paper was circulated to CEOs of large companies, many of whom replied. The replies are here.[1] The beginnings of fund-raising for right-wing news are in those letters. Fox News was still 20 years away, but the roots are here.
This is where CEOs of US companies started to become an organized national political force. Until then, they mostly saw each other as competitors. Small business owners were generally anti big business. Banks, railroads, and chain stores were powerful enough to crush small businesses, and they looked to government to keep from being run over. But this free enterprise coalition was able to pull together big and small businesses under the banner of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.
* "Attack on American Free Enterprise System" (1971), by Lewis J. Powell.[1] This is the founding document of the modern conservative agenda. Powell later became a Supreme Court justice. He proposed heavily funded groups to push a conservative pro-big-business agenda, with the U.S. Chamber of Commerce taking the lead. This was quite successful, especially noting how politically weak big business was at the time.
* "The Overhauling of Straight America" (1987), by Marshall Kirk and Erastes Pill (pseud. of Hunter Madsen). This is the founding document of the modern gay agenda. This, too, was quite successful. It outlines a detailed program, and most of the goals listed were achieved.
[1] http://lawdigitalcommons.bc.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=... [2] http://library.gayhomeland.org/0018/EN/EN_Overhauling_Straig...