WE'VE ENTERED THE ALINSKY STAGE OF THE GOP'S CAMPAIGN TO WIN THE POST-MUELLER MOMENT

Here's the 13th and last of Saul Alinsky's Rules for Radicals:

Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it.

Cut off the support network and isolate the target from sympathy. Go after people and not institutions; people hurt faster than institutions.

And here's the GOP right now:

Republicans clamored for House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff's head Monday, demanding he give up his gavel or resign from Congress as part of their campaign of revenge against Democrats who pursued and promoted allegations of collusion between President Donald Trump and the Russian government.

Trump and senior White House aides, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) and other allies of the president on Capitol Hill raced to paint the California Democrat as an overeager disciple of a theory debunked by the Justice Department in a summary of special counsel Robert Mueller's findings released Sunday.

Schiff was pummeled repeatedly on Fox News and other right-leaning media during the last two days. Trump himself picked up on the anti-Schiff tirade, retweeting a "Fox and Friends" interview where the California Democrat was excoriated.

... Top Trump adviser Kellyanne Conway called for Schiff to resign immediately. And Donald Trump Jr. — who bristled over Schiff's question's after a closed-door interview with the House Intelligence Committee in 2017 — tormented him on Twitter.

"Has anyone heard from slimy Adam #fullofschiff Schiff today?" he wrote. "I mean it must be embarrassing to have have [sic] spent the last 2 years as the leader of the tinfoil hat brigade and have it all come crashing down so quick. I’m legitimately concerned for his mental state."

Schiff isn't the only GOP target -- the Republican National Committee is circulating a mocking supercut of Democrats and liberal media figures talking about collusion, while Tim Murtaugh, the communications director of the Trump for President campaign, is doing a lite version of Michael Cohen's old act, thuggishly attempting to intimidate news producers who've booked accusers of Trump and his circle.

But the focus is on Schiff. That doesn't surprise me -- as I've said many times, right-wingers love Alinsky, while liberals don't even read him.

Schiff is barely known to the public, and he should just ride out the storm. There's only a risk for him if idiot mainstream pundits conclude that these fine, upstanding Republicans have a legitimate grievance. But so far Robert Mueller's ambiguous conclusions on obstruction have led at least some of the mainstream press to acknowledge that Republicans are exaggerating Trump's vindication. (We'll see how long that lasts.)

Poor Adam Schiff. If he were a Republican under comparable Democratic attack, he'd be on the verge of superstardom. They'd be talking about a presidential run or a berth on the Supreme Court. Upsetting the other side would make him famous, even if he's not the most charismatic guy. As it, some of us will continue to nod quietly in agreement when he's on cable news, while the rest of the Democratic electorate -- the non-watchers of MSNBC -- remains unclear on who he is.

Soon I guess he'll start showing up in almost as many evil-Democrat memes as Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Rashida Tlaib, and Maxine Waters. Eventually the wingnuts might not even have room to fit Nancy Pelosi.