I've only briefly looked through Horowitz's rules for the first time in years, but it's interesting that both he and Alinsky take a mainly psychological approach that plays off the subrational aspects of human nature. I don't think such an approach is compatible with republicanism, which is based on the belief(fact? hope?) that people are capable of acting reasonably most of the time, or at least more capable than style-savvy aristocrats and monarchs.
Horowitz claims some people try to treat politics as a religion, where one cannot compromise at all. Well, there is certainly such a thing as a civil religion, and the politics he and Alinsky promote tend to undermine that. Alinsky, as I recall, says outright that this is a good thing. I don't know if Horowitz has addressed the question.
Letting your opponent set the terms of the debate is an easy way to lose it. Letting your opponent make the rules of political warfare seems much the same to me.
thanks very much.
the marxist left is chilastic or milleninarianist in its outlook. i think that's why it sticks with so many people for so long, even after reason and experience have displaced it.
horowitz in "radical son" wrote that his father never gave up the idea of a communist revolution in his adopted america. he died embittered.