I agree with 4 and 5, especially 4.  But 1 seems kind of silly and 2 even more so.

3 is just ridiculous.  You go ahead and start referring to 30-40% of the American population as "regressive, destructive, extremist, fringe, fundamentalist, violent, hateful, and anti-family" and see how well your political movement does. In fact, it directly contradicts the very good point you make on #4.

Policies promoted by conservatives have regressive effects.  Some conservatives are regressive people.  But calling everyone who self-identifies as conservative "destructive...violent...hateful" just seems tone-deaf.

In concept, yes.  But in application, not so much.

For example, it should be a long-term project to "tarnish conservatism" as Chris argued in the aftermath of the 2004 election.  So I have to disagree with 3.  After all, they have been unafraid to demonize "liberal"--even though we live in a liberal democracy, and liberal comes from the same root word as liberty.

OTOH, 2 just sounds like either gratuitous namecalling, or giving too much credit (there are fundamentalists who don't think like them).  A far better term is theocrat(ic). People may not know what that means. but that's a good thing, a chance for education.  And once it's out there, how can that be good for them?

4 is a good point.  Affirmative declarations are important.  But that doesn't necessarily mean dropping critical comments.  After all, research shows that contrast ads (Candidate A does X, but Candidate B does Y) are highly effective.  And even if pundits confuse them with attack ads, ordinary people generally do not.  So it would make sense that the same applies to other forms of communication as well.

5 is a good point, but it has its limits.  Comparing The Daily Show and Democracy Now is ludicrous.  They do entirely different things.  You want to beware of being funny when it's not appropriate.  There was a good treatment of this on Studio 60 last night.  But, again, I agree with the basic point.

As for 1, well, I agree that up and down, for example, would be better than left and right.  But start talking like that, and people will look at you like you're from Pluto.  So what's the alternative???

In reply to Baldrick, I think dropping the terms "left and right" is really important.  It seems to me that the terms are abstractions designed to plot policy ideas along some sort of imaginary X- axis (which is another disadvantageous frame--because left in this case would equal negative, right would equal positive).  I don't know when these terms first appeared in our language in reference to politics--perhaps as an outgrowth of the social sciences trying to be more like the "hard sciences"?  The abstractions are meaningless in themselves but when attached to real words that have real meanings (substantial majority verses permanent minority in the case of "handedness") they give the wrong impression.

I agree with Baldrick that not everyone "who self-identifies as conservative is 'destructive...violent...hateful.'"  Certainly those who vote Republican are not a monolithic bunch (paleolithic sometimes but not monolithic).     I think it's a good point to be careful how we refer to a group of people. But in talking about policy, when a policy is destructive or violent or anti-family we should describe the contents of the policy as such rather than just using the shorthand "conservative" (because usually the meaning of that word does not accurately describe the contents or outcomes of the policy).  And it seems to me that particular people (Dobson, Robertson, DeLay), who have a demonstrated track record of fundamentalism, extremism, or representing the fringe, should be referred to as such rather than using the polite euphemism of "conservative."    

I agree with Paul that critical comments and contrast ads are important and effective.  Likewise, I think he makes a good point that The Daily Show and Democracy Now occupy two completely different spheres and so they're not great for comparison.

Thanks for the thoughtful comments!