B77-DES39
The Observer’s Influence: Wellstone, Yellow Dogs, Progressive
Sheep, & The Conservative Media Hegemony
Copyright © by Dan Schneider, 11/11/02
1 of the
great myths of recent decades is that of the ‘Liberal’ media. It has become
probably the greatest of all ‘urban legends’. The basic genesis for this
nonsense was in the addled crannies of President Richard Nixon’s paranoid
mind. Dicky saw demons everywhere- out to savage him. That the media was just as
down on his predecessor, President Lyndon Johnson, for both their conducts of
the Vietnam War, was lost on the delusional Nixon. Of course, this led pretty
directly to the Watergate break-ins, & their exposure, which confirmed in
both Nixon’s, & the Republican Party’s mind, that the media was out to
get them. Now, the fact that the suits at the tv networks, the radio stations
around the country, the newspaper industry, etc. are, have been, & will
probably always be, dominated by rich aristocrats who don’t give a damn about
the common man- well….That’s where the argument stalls, yet even that
stalling serves as fodder for more delusional rationales. Quick question- aside
from CBS’s Dan Rather & the revived Phil Donahue, on cable tv, name me a
blatantly liberal, left wing, or Democratic-minded partisan in the media? Pretty
tough, eh? But how many conservatives can you mention? PBS is chock with John
McLaughlin, Louis Rukeyser, Jim Lehrer, Tony Brown & company. Rush Limbaugh
& Dr. Laura Schlessinger are the best known of a multitude of Conservative
radio propagandists. Bill O’Reilly, & Christopher Matthews head a legion
of Cable Cons. Add in Disney, the New York Times, Wall Street Journal….&
how about Peter Jennings of ABC & top-rated Tom Brokaw of NBC- these are Liberals?
Please.
Aside from Rather, did not all the networks give a free pass to Ronald
Reagan for 8 years, even after the revelations of his being the most corrupt
Presidential Administration since Warren Harding’s? Was not this the same
media that savaged Bill Clinton (albeit often deservedly) for his assorted
nonsense? The point is the Reagan Administration’s nonsense was far more
pervasive & corrosive of American freedoms than anything Clinton’s
did. Yet Clinton suffered manifold more abuse than Reagan. &, excuse me, but
do you think Jimmy Carter or Clinton could have gotten away with the Star
Chamber mentality of the current Bush Administration. & how did Bush Jr.
become such a ‘Great Leader’? That he did not start babbling for his mommy
after 9/11? Ask this- what positive things did he, or fellow Republican ex-Mayor
of NYC Rudy Giuliani, do that cemented their roles as icons & heroes? They
simply did what their jobs required. Nothing more. Had the 9/11 attacks occurred
on the watches of Clinton & Giuliani’s predecessor, ex-Mayor &
Democrat David Dinkins, can you honestly tell me you think there would be a
dramatic difference? Perhaps only in slight positive ways. C’mon-
‘Liberal’ media?
Don’t
get me wrong, I am a disenchanted Democrat who has drifted toward 3rd
parties in recent years. I think the Democrats have sold out the working class
of this country. The 1st step of my disenchantment came in the late
1980s when I was an active member of the Ridgewood (Queens) Democratic Club. I
worked on several campaigns, the last being for a lady who ran for State. She
was a non-bleeding heart, but tough, Progressive, with a great command of local,
state, & national issues. I’ll admit I was eager to volunteer for her
campaign for 2 reasons- 1) she was easily the best person running for the seat,
& 2) I had a bit of a crush on her. Needless to say, as with most of the
politicians I’ve voted for, she lost in the Democratic primary to a guy who
palled around with alot of Goombahs. He was a man with limited vision & a
not-too good grasp on issues. In turn, he lost to an old time political power
broker whose Goombahs were bigger & more Goombah than the other guy’s. My
candidate never stood a chance.
The next year the Democratic Club hosted appearances by the mayoral
candidates. The 3 most prominent men running that year were incumbent Mayor Ed
Koch, seeking a 4th term, whose 3 successive terms had been marked by
increased corruption & inefficiency, former NYC Schools Chancellor Richard
Ravitch, whose incompetence in the post in the 70s & 80s had decimated the
public school system (right at the time I was in it!), & Manhattan Borough
President (& eventual winner, 1st black NYC Mayor, &
subsequently a poor mayor) David Dinkins. Although not that high on DD I
supported him as the lesser of 3 evils- or 4 if you count the Republican
Giuliani, who lost to DD, then beat him in a rematch 4 years later. But before
DD was even scheduled to speak Assemblywoman Cathy Nolan, who ran the RDC,
decided the RDC would endorse the boobish RR. I argued to do so before listening
to all the candidates was wrong, if not outright racist. & how could the
club use the term Democratic (even in its lower case form) if they were to do
this? I was naïve. They did it & soon I left the RDC & a year or so
later I left New York. I saw how political corruption, even on the smallest
levels, begins. To this day I shake my head in amazement when I see people over
30 who still actively campaign for candidates. I think how naïve & deluded
they are- whatever their leanings. & while my working class constitution
will never allow me to vote for a Republican- I’m just not selfish enough to
be a country clubber, nor psychotic enough to be a religious wing nut- I have
found blind allegiance to the Democrats has allowed them to stagnate & not
reach out to people in the middle. In 1996 & 2000 I voted for Ralph Nader
for President. In 1992 I chose Clinton over the evil Bush pere & the eviler
little dwarf with a twang, but by 1996 I was fed up with Clinton. He had sold
out environmentalists & the working class with his cowardly, ½ hearted
approach to Health Care reform. I decided that year I would never again vote for
any evil- lesser or greater. In all honesty, is there a working person who can
honestly argue that a President Nader would not have been a boon for the little
guy & terrorized the monied elitists? I was also sick of folks who complain
about gridlock, & no real change occurring, & then voting for straight
line Democrats, even as they chided those who did the same with Republicans for
being small-minded.
As example I will mention a friend of mine- oh, let’s call him Joe. Joe
is a good friend & a good man. But, he basically adopts a craven philosophy
he gleaned from the Star Trek tv series- that is, Ferengism;
i.e.- what do I get out of this? Joe calls himself a ‘Yellow Dog Democrat’.
This is a play on the more Centrist [read- Conservative] Minded
DLC (Democratic Leadership Council) term for themselves as social liberals &
fiscal conservatives: Blue Dog Democrats. That the DLC & its ilk
basically became Republicans Lite is 1 of the main reasons why the Democrats
(lacking a strong leader like Clinton) are now back in the Mosaic Wilderness,
especially after this recent election cycle. Still, Joe blithely votes for the
dead weights Democrats foist up, reveling in his Yellow Dog status. As Joe puts
it, in defining himself: ‘If the Republicans nominated the nicest, most decent
person & the Democrats nominated a yellow dog, I’d still vote for the
Democrat.’ Lost in Joe’s illogic is the fact that there ARE alternatives.
Yet, people like Joe always say that they want them, but they really don’t.
Here in Minnesota, 4 years ago, we elected the simple-minded, boorish,
& petulant Jesse Ventura for governor. 3rd party enthusiasts saw this as
vindication of the Perotvian Campaign for President in 1992. In truth, JV won
because he was a media celebrity. This year, running on Ventura’s Independence
Party ticket was ex-Democrat & moderate Tim Penny- by far the best of the 4
major candidates. Any impartial observer of their debates would reckon that.
Penny was informed, made no outlandish promises, & left open many ideas for
discussion. Green Party candidate for Governor, Ken Pentel, also had some nice
ideas, if seeming a bit over his head. Unlike the Green’s candidate for
Senate, Ray Tricomo, he was at least not a Froot Loop. The 2 major party
candidates for Governor were DFL (Democrat-Farm-Labor) Party candidate, &
State Senate Poobah, Roger Moe. Moe was ending his 3 decade plus career with a
final run for glory. The problem was the man had no ideas. At the debates he
simply sat, uttered pabulum, & 1 could almost see his skin dry & flake
away in front of the cameras. It was like watching scenes from the recent Mummy
films, where the Mummy reconstitutes- except in reverse. But, it was his
turn to try for the top slot, just as 4 years earlier Hubert ‘Skip’
Humphrey II got his shot to end his political career as the nominee for
Governor, finishing a distant 3rd behind Ventura & Republican
slimeball Norm Coleman. The Democrats, across the country, operate this way.
This is why Al Gore went up against Bush in 2000, rather than the infinitely
better Bill Bradley. Democrats kill their own best Progressive hopes in their
primaries. & I mean true Progressives, not loons like the
Left Wing Wellstone. In truth, I think the downfall of modern politics came when
the primary system supplanted the old system where the parties chose who they
best thought could win. Is this democratic? No. But it resulted in better &
more serviceable candidates- & candidates who were best suited for the
particular position. Nothing binds modern political parties from going back to
that. The DFL killed off a terrific candidate for Governor at their state
convention- a common sense State Auditor, Judi Dutcher, a young, attractive
woman who left the Republican Party for their misogynistic anti-abortion views.
Even Republicans still respected her skills. But the dinosaurian Moe got the nod
& many Democrats saw the same old same old & stayed home. Eventual
gubernatorial winner, Republican Tim Pawlenty, is a young politician who is,
basically, an attractive marionette. At the debates, which Penny dominated, all
Pawlenty could do was be vague about how he’d fix the $3 billion state
deficit. He simply parroted the typically moronic Republican ‘No taxes!
No abortion!’ mantra, & won the election going away. Progressives,
who should have supported Penny, instead drove Moderates away from him & Moe
by sliming Penny with false claims about his past.
In the 1990s Penny, as college professor, authored some papers for the
neo-con Cato Institute where he proposed doing away with or modifying Social
Security, & other such Conservative delights. Democrats seized on this to
slime Penny as a sellout to Republicans. Even labor unions, my own included,
bought this nonsense. Yet, a quick search online can prove that these
were merely intellectual exercises Penny authored. He did not support these
initiatives, &- in fact- DEBUNKED them convincingly! Moderates shied
away from Penny, turned away from the DFL, & sucked in the pabulum of the
mannekinesque Pawlenty. Game, set, & match to Republicans.
Still, old Yellow Dog Joe, takes satisfaction in being ‘in the right’, even
as Republicans prepare to torpedo civil rights & attack the working class,
because people like him sat on their asses, smugly content in their moral
superiority. BTW- why is it that the family values that
Republicans support do not include higher wages so that both parents do not have
to work to support a household? & why do they not want universal health
care, so that all people- families, too- can be healthy? These 2 initiatives
would go alot farther to supporting families than calling abortionists murderers
& jailing pot smokers- no? Just asking.
But, let me return to the concept of the ‘Liberal Media’. After the
airplane crash death of Senator Wellstone on 10/25/02 it seemed that public
sentiment would elect whomever the Democrats would nominate to replace him.
DFLer Wellstone had turned a close race against the oleaginous DFLer-cum-Republican
Norm Coleman into what was looking like an easy Wellstone re-election. A dead
heat was looking like a 10-12% point walk. Coleman’s political career, after
back-to-back losses to Ventura & Wellstone, would have been dead. Walter
Mondale was nominated to replace him. I was happy as I could not in good
conscience vote for Wellstone, simply because he was dumb & ineffective,
& counterproductive to true Progressive causes. But, many a Republican I
knew hoped that Wellstone would pay for his breaking his promise to not seek a 3rd
term, & saw the righteous avenging hand of God in his death. Mondale looked
like he would cruise to victory. I had worried that, had Wellstone lived, I
would have had to skip my vote for that office of vote for Loony Tune religious
nut Green Party nominee Ray Tricomo, or callow, & mousy Independence Party
nominee Jim Moore. I was ecstatic about Mondale’s return to public service.
Here was an effective Progressive who could hondle with the coming Republican
majority. Then the ‘Liberal Media’ did its thing. I jokingly call it the
‘Liberal Media’ because what transpired at the Wellstone Memorial was a
textbook example of the Conservative Media spinning things their
way; & I must admit they did it brilliantly.
Am I being conspiratorial? No. Just ‘outing’ the media
for what it really is. The Memorial for Wellstone, & the other crash victims
came on Tuesday, 10/29/02. Local Minnesota tv carried it for hours on end. Some
national outlets carried it. Most folk I knew, at work, friends, acquaintances,
neighbors, squawked the next day that most of their favorite tv shows were
cancelled. That was the major bitch. Some watched out of a sense of duty, others
because they need tv noise, no matter, & others surfed the internet. I cared
not 1 way nor the other. The next day no 1 I worked with, nor pals I later
talked with, had a single thing to say about the Memorial. Most slept through it
or tuned it out as what it was- a Democratic Rally. Who expected any less?
(Let’s face it, most people use the Homer Simpson approach to religion in
their own political life: Wake me up when it’s over, &- oh, yeah- tell me
who won- God or Satan?) Did not the Republicans turn Nixon’s 1994 funeral into
a rally, ignore his crimes, & use it as a rallying cry for that year’s
‘Republican Revolution’? Of course. Who expected any less now that the
Democrats had their martyr? Nobody, not even the media. That is, in private. But
the Wellstoners’ gaffes were perfect fodder to turn to their own Conservative
Agenda’s advantage.
Yes, the Republicans, too, eagerly seized the Media’s opportunity to
spin the Democratic Rally into a national condemnation of the Democrats. True,
there was an insipid & stupid cry for votes from Wellstone partisan Rick
Kahn, where he looked fey & foolish in his urging Republicans to somehow get
a heart, & Iowa politico Tom Harkin whooping up a Populist storm. But the
public, in Minnesota, especially, expected no less. But, Republicans- following
the Media’s lead- claimed this rally as disgraceful. They flooded the media
airwaves for the next few days brandishing shame at the Democrats. Media pundits
& radio hosts, some honestly not knowing they were being manipulated by
their bosses, railed against the Wellstone Memorial for ‘not being simply a
Memorial’- even though they, & both parties knew damned well what it was
gonna be. Had not, 8 years earlier, Democrats known they would get their ideals
& ideas trampled on by Nixonians? Still, on that 1st day, a
Wednesday, no one in the real world gave a damn that the Memorial became a
Rally. But by that Thursday the media fury, & insatiable thirst for stories,
had created a desire to know why there was a furor- even as they had helped whip
it up! Relentless prodding by radio hosts & media gurus made every
appearance by Democratic leaders an act of shaming. Republicans played it all
brilliantly. They knew the callow, & simple-minded Wellstoners would shoot
themselves in the foot, & they made sure the media (largely owned &
controlled by Big Business Conservatives) would show every bloody toe that the
Democrats had butchered- in slow motion, in excruciating detail, in full
widescreen color! Of course, the media & radio folk said they were merely
covering a story. They were being impartial! & there’s still
a Bridge in Brooklyn you can get for a steal!
Yet, the real story was that most Minnesotans were far more angry over
missing their favorite tv shows. Democrats & Republicans alike knew the
Memorial was really a Rally. Am I excusing the booing of Republican leaders, or
the vapid platitudes & condescension by the Wellstoners? No. But, this is
the very stuff the balding mighty midget, Wellstone himself, had indulged in for
years. This is why he was a self-marginalized national laughingstock- & an
ineffective Senator, to boot! What was shameful was not the Wellstoners’
partisanship, but the media’s faux indignation at such
partisanship, & worse- whipping up a frenzy over it, 1 that went national,
& played to the basest instincts of the ever-gullible electorate! This is
impartial journalism? Maybe in Argentina or Israel, but not in America. But to,
after this, ever call the Media ‘Liberal’ again, is an exercise in illogic.
Let’s look at some of this impartial, or Liberal, media’s coverage. This
from CNN (that supposed bastion of Progressivism!): [I shall comment along
the way to Oz!]
MINNEAPOLIS,
Minnesota- The
partisan tone of the memorial service for the late Sen. Paul Wellstone stirred
anger Wednesday in some Republicans, political consultants and radio talk show
hosts who say some of the comments and behavior were inappropriate.
[So
far, true. The public cared more about missing its Baywatch reruns-
c’mon, a dead Senator or Pamela Anderson’s flotation devices?]
Democrats
defended the nature of the service, but they also apologized to anyone who might
have been offended.
[Do
the Democrats, these days, ever say anything besides ‘Baaahhhh!?]
Minority
Leader Trent Lott, R-Mississippi, was booed Tuesday night when he entered
Williams Arena at the University of Minnesota for the service. Scattered boos
also greeted independent Gov. Jesse Ventura, who Wednesday lashed out at
Democrats for what he called a "political rally."
[Yes,
Trent Lott also expects to be hugged at NAACP conventions, & Jesse thinks
that when he gets only 1 mint on a hotel pillow that it’s the media’s doing.
Although, kudos to him for appointing Dean Barkley to fill Wellstone’s term
out. I voted for him in the past & would have voted for him in a Senatorial
run in a heartbeat! Yet, Jesse only did it out of spite because Minnesota Public
Radio shamefully excluded the Green & Independence Parties from the Mondale-Coleman
debate; won by Mondale easily, yet which the damned ‘Liberal’ media declared
a draw, in a show of gutlessness!]
The
crowd cheered loudly for former Vice President Walter Mondale, who announced in
a letter Wednesday that he would run for Wellstone's seat.
Some
Republicans in Minnesota demanded equal time from the local television stations
that carried last night's memorial, attended by a crowd of more than 20,000. But
officials at local television stations pointed out that they will cover
President Bush's expected trip to Minnesota this weekend, when he will campaign
for Republican Norm Coleman.
Vin
Weber, a former congressman from Minnesota, lambasted Democrats for what he
called a "complete, total absolute sham."
"To
them, Wellstone's death, apparently, was just another campaign event," he
told the Minneapolis Star-Tribune.
[This
from a party who felt trailer trash Paula Jones was a major issue in the 1996
Presidential election. Note how the story neglects to tell you that Weber was 1
of the most Right Wing politicians in recent Minnesota history.]
Dave
Ryan, a radio talk show host in Minneapolis, said the airwaves have been full of
talk about the service, which featured speeches from Wellstone family members
and friends who urged the crowd to remember Wellstone when they cast their votes
next week.
"I
guess the local stations here were swamped with phone calls from people who were
angry because they had been sold a memorial service that had turned into a
political rally," Ryan said in an interview with CNN. "And I really
thought that was kind of shameful. I really did."
[Each
day saw the public get more & more outraged, fanned on by the media. Day 1
was relatively quiescent- the furor was strictly by Republican partisans hoping
their tail would wag the media dog. It did!]
Democrats,
who initially dismissed the criticism, later apologized for some activity, but
said the event was unscripted and reflected the strong emotions people felt
about Wellstone's death.
"We're
sorry if some of the comments went too far in a political direction," Jim
Farrell, the former press secretary for Wellstone, told CNN.
[Baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!]
"The
Republicans in the middle of a memorial service decided to call it
politics," said Mike Erlandson, chairman of the Democratic-Farmer-Labor
Party, as the Democrats are known in Minnesota. "It wasn't politics; it was
Paul Wellstone."
Erlandson
called the boos "unfortunate and inappropriate," but said the service
was "something that was very emotional."
"While
it had a little bit of a rally feel, and they were talking about public policy
and public policy issues, that was Senator Wellstone through and through,"
Erlandson said. "I mean, he did not talk those issues for politics; he
talked these issues for passion."
[At
neo-Nazi rallies they often speak of the 3rd Reich’s great railway
system, & how Hitler loved playing with dreidels.]
The
criticism didn't just come from Republicans.
Ventura,
who walked out of the service, said Democrats "should hang their head in
shame."
"The
first part of it I thought was excellent. When Rick Kahn got up, I left the
building halfway through what he was doing," said Ventura, who could
appoint an interim senator to take Wellstone's seat until November 5.
"I
feel used. I feel violated and duped over the fact that that turned into nothing
more than a political rally," he said.
[Jesse
is known for his keen insights- always razor-sharp This from a man who
politicizes farting.]
Health
and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson, who represented the White House at
the service, said the partisan nature of the service did not surprise him, nor
did it bother him.
"I
was not offended by it, but some other people might be," he said.
[That
the majority of folks at the service felt the same, even some I talked to- of
all political stripes, & said there was no ‘buzz’ afterwards- it was
what was expected, there was giddiness in Republican circles. The Democrats had
stepped into the snare & now would swing in the breeze!]
Boy,
those damned Liberals, again! Don’t get me wrong, I’ve opined before how
modern Liberals have bastardized the term & spiked real Liberal causes. But
their utter media ineptitude is astounding. Here’s some online chat room
nonsense from the days after the Memorial, & then after the election:
Rick Kahn, one of Wellstone's close friends, definitely had a part in turning the tone of the evening when he urged people to keep Paul's vision alive by voting Mondale into office. It was just short of an all-out campaign speech. The thing that made me the saddest (and probably the most uncomfortable) was when Wellstone's own son, David, ended his speech (I call it a speech, not a eulogy because it definitely did not seem to be a eulogy) by shouting over and over, "WE WILL WIN! WE WILL WIN!"
Kahn was the moron-cum-scapegoat who is now Public Enemy #1
in Democratic circles.
I don't know if this is how
Paul Wellstone would have wanted it. I would hope not. I think he would have
wanted everyone to feel comfortable at his memorial and I also think that he
wouldn't have wanted his death to be used as a campaign ploy.
Geez, was
this the same Senator who sold out his gay supporters in his re-election bid in
1996? Hmmm….
Saletan is incapable of
stepping out of his reporter shoes, of seeing politics as anything other than a
horserace. When he sees people saying "win this election for Paul," he
thinks they are trying to score political points, because it is inconceivable to
him that anyone could actually care who wins the election. It's not about
points, its about policies. And anyone who doesn't force himself into ironic
detachment has to see that the policies Wellstone would have wanted--the reason
he was there, and what makes him different from many other senators--depend on
us winning this election for Paul Wellstone.
At least this guy is honest about his blatant politicizing- how’bout
the media?
it's inconceivable to celebrate wellstone's life and not get fired up
about his passions...the common american, the rights of the little guy, the
environment, etc etc. how anybody could expect people to memorialize wellstone
and not wind up rallying the troops is beyond me.
as i said elsewhere, when the rational gets equal time to balance out
rush limbaugh, then i'll worry about the repub's cry of politics at the
wellstone memorial.
1st ½ = nonsense. 2nd ½ is smack-on.
I
didn't personally watch Wellstone's memorial service, so I have only second-hand
reports and a few sound clips to judge it on. But it seems incredibly stupid to
have turned it into a giant campaign rally.
If the speakers honestly thought that the best way to memorialize
Wellstone was for the Democrats to win the election, then what they did was
highly counterproductive and sharply increased the risk that the Dems will
instead lose the election. So by their own standards those speakers were doing grevious
harm to Wellstone's legacy.
Mondale may still win, but the Democrats are now on the defensive, trying
to explain why their actions should not be viewed as crass and politically
motivated. Prior to the memorial service they had the high moral ground, and
were in a position to condemn as insensitive virtually any campaigning that
Coleman engaged in and any attacks that Republicans lobbed at Mondale. Now
Democrats just look hypocritical if they complain about Republican campaigning.
It would have been
so much more politically effective to have put on a somber, dignified memorial
service. Republicans like Trent Lott and Dick Cheney and other of Wellstone's
Senate colleagues should have been invited to eulogize him. Minnesota would have
been soaked in bathos, and Coleman wouldn't have had the slightest chance of
overcoming that. Instead the memorial service featured rah-rah election cheers,
and that photo
of Clinton and Mondale laughing and having a great old time.
Stupid, stupid,
stupid.
This guy represents the vast majority of Minnesotans. Yes, about 55% of tvs were glued to the coverage, but only about 1 in 3 Minnesotans watch tv at night. That means about 17% of the public saw it. Note the regurge this guys spews. This is a textbook example of someone being fed soundbites & buying everything media spinmeisters spin.
Shockingly, unlike virtually every national Democrat, Wellstone's kids
don't seem to think they are required to constantly kowtow to the opposition in
the vain hope that they won't get mad and metaphorically beat the hell out of
them. They recognize that liberals have a right to hear someone give voice to
their beliefs once in a while, just like every other American.
The Wellstones had the memorial they wanted. If it results in Mondale
losing his race, then so be it. I'm tired of calibrating every little thing to
the calculated phony sanctimony of the GOP selective morals police.
And, it's just possible that for every shocked GOP Miss Manners who found
the memorial so shockingly inappropriate (much as their delicate sensibilities
were supposedly offended by that nasty oral sex), there are 2 liberals who will
be motivated to vote after hearing such a stirring call to action.
scary, scary,
scary...
This guy was at least honest, but oblivious to Republican control of the media monster.
It always facinates me to see that when the Democratic Party gets
together for a party like the so called Wellstone Memorial. The venom and hatred
that they spread is ignored by the major media outlets. Try to imagine what
would have happened if Trent Lott had died in a Plane Crash. The Liberals would
probably have been cheering, and the mainstream media would be making excuses
for them. For those of you who don't understand what the major outlets are it is
the following groups.(ABC,NBC,CBS,CNN)
PS-Keep sounding
like a group of extreme left wing nuts, and nothing Paul Wellstone ever
supported will ever see the light of day.
Did he say ‘Ignored’?
Here are more of the troglodyte sheep who bleat out about the Liberal media even
as Progressivism is strangled, bullied, & diminished at every turn by those 4 Horsemen Of the Apocalypse
he rails at.
The Wellstones had the
memorial they wanted. If it results in Mondale losing his race, then so be it.
And so it was.
At least they and you can
console yourselves that it was worth the price.
I'm sure Mondale is resting
more peacefully now.
1
gets the sense that this guy smugly speaks for all Republicans, giddy over the
Democrats stupidity in not recognizing the media would destroy them.
The obvious partianship and venom of the Democratic Party finally
backfired on them. Thank God. Finally people are coming to their senses.
Not too mention the obvious partisanship & venom of the Conservative
Media.
Oh
yeah-- unlike the sweetness of the Right circulating videos accussing Clinton of
being a mass murder-- see the Clinton Chronicles.
It was the rightwing continuing their nastiness, attacking the children
of a dead man for emotional statements. To quote Joseph Welch, have they no
shame. Sure it was partisan, but so are all sorts of events.
It was rightwing assaults on a family memorial that helped galvinize the
rightwing. Hey, they used abuse of mourning friends and families as their
whipping boys and it worked. Peggy Noonan actually used the voice of Paul to
chastize his own children-- an obscenity that seemed to work.
But don't talk to me about mean-spiritedness. There was nothing
mean-spirited about the memorial, only the response by the rightwing.
But then they have decades of spreading lies and distortions.
Too
bad this kind of astuteness comes only AFTER the fact!
Baloney. The
Wellstone Memorial was the true colors of the Democratic Brat attitude coming
through loud and clear. It was clearly mean-spirited and childish. Nobody
twisted anybody's arm to make these people act the way they did. And Wellstone's
children might act like children, but they are adults and should know better. Oh
well, can't blame them too much. They learned it by example. The Democrats have
set a precident on acting like children. And it cost them dearly as it should
have. Low-class all the way, or should I say no class at all.
As far as the video tape is concerned. I live in the South and more of it
is true than you want to believe. But , then again, what can you expect from
someone like Clinton? After all, he's the enbodiment of what it is to be a
Democrat.
The Democrats are the one's who have no shame, thay care about nothing
but winning and they will lie, cheat, slant, spin, fabricate, distort, buy-off,
or do what ever is necessary to accomplish this goal. They are paying for it now
and if there is any justice left in this world they will pay for it even more
heavily in 2004.
You just know this fool truly believes that this election was won DESPITE
the media’s coverage!
So, there you have it. The ‘Liberal’ Media conspiring to put
Democrats in office. Democrats embracing my pal’s Yellow Dogmatism &
seeing Progressivism flower anew. All is right with the world. Except
it’s all fantasy. Just like the myth of the ‘Liberal’ Media.
People claim to want political choices, but they reject 3rd parties-
even when their candidates & ideas are easily the best, & more
astoundingly, even when those ideas are exactly what the public majority claims
to desire! Those who vote 3rd, or 4th or 5th,
party are belittled & condescendingly told their vote is a waste. People
lament that the parties put up poor candidates- yet when faced with a choice,
even in either major party, of safety or boldness, they choose
safety. If not the 2000 election would have been Bradley vs. McCain, & there
would have been no deadlock, although I don’t honestly know which way it would
have swung. The truth is voters are sheep, mere bleating idiots who love to
complain, & expect someone else to fix their problems. They do not read up
on important elections, then complain when the idiots they elect break the
promises no sane person expected them to keep. Watch as Governor Pawlenty does
his best George Bush, Sr. impression, & raises taxes to fix the financial
mess that Ventura, he, & DFL schlub Moe created. Republicans will scream betrayal,
say it’s a direct outcome of abortion. & watch DFLers delude themselves in
to thinking they will win back the Governor’s seat by default, nominate
another corpse for the post, & deride true Progressive 3rd party
alternatives as backstabbers. Not too mention enlisting their activist bases
(feminists, environmentalists, labor, NAACP, etc.) to echo such self-defeating
sentiments. & some bad candidate- either a DFL mummy or a Republican
marionette- will win again, while good candidates in either party are
cannibalized, & their 3rd party counterparts ridiculed.
This is how the nation got just what the media wanted, a status quo
Republican political hegemony perfectly in sync with the media’s own leanings.
The increasingly angry middle bought in to the chant of ‘It’s the
Liberal’s fault’ even as they ponder simple-minded regressive conservative
policies, like replacing graduated income taxes with sales taxes that
disproportionately strafe the poorest in society, & think everything is
peachy keen.
We don’t live in a perfect world. In a perfect world the media would
truly be unbiased. It would be that scientific paragon of the detached observer
without influence on its observation. Since we know it’s not, that the media
does have biases, the public & voters should at least expect the media to
come clean about their leanings. Dan Rather & Phil Donahue & the few
Progressives out there we know, as do we the hordes of actively Conservative
pundits & gurus. But let’s face facts: the more background media will not
openly declare their loyalties, even though they are overwhelmingly for the
status quo- by definition conservative. Just don’t expect
the public to hold the media accountable, no matter how much they scream- since
they do the same for politicians, even as there’s less turnover in
Congressional elections than in the old Soviet Politburo. The election of 2002
is vindication not for the Republican Party, but for a long dead Canucker,
Marshall McLuhan. This is the year that proved, doubtlessly, that the
media IS ALWAYS the message! This is what makes knowing WHAT THE MEDIA
is so important. Yes, the Democrats’ problems are apparent, a flawed party
structure that puts forth candidates based on length of service rather than
quality of service. Minnesota is an excruciating example of this. But
conservatism, at its core, is a bankrupt philosophy. But that won’t be its-
& Bush’s- undoing in 2004: it will be a few more years of economic blues,
a failure in the Middle East wars, or continued corporate scandals. Not its core
bankruptcy. This is why it will periodically rebound. Here’s a fact: True
Liberalism always wins in the end! History vindicates this in all
societies throughout time.
150 years
ago America’s Conservatives were defending slavery. 100 years ago they were
defending sweatshops & child labor. 50 years ago it was Jim Crow &
anti-miscegenation laws. No Senator, not even Jesse Helms, would today publicly
voice such sentiments. Today it’s denying women control over their body,
denying health care for all, or denying homosexuals the right to have legal
domestic partnerships. Come back in 50 years & there will be no argument-
all 3 will be long & firmly ensconced in the American psyche. Our children
& their children will look back at us & tsk-tsk over Millennial
society’s Neandertalism. This is what the media really cannot stand, that
despite years of attempting to control the public society goes on its own way.
Madison Avenue is strong, but American idealism is stronger. More often than not
the observer has no influence on the observed, despite intentions in the
opposite. But we, as voters, must
recognize those rare instances when they do influence, so that we do not fall in
to the same traps again. Would that the stolid & benighted leadership of
Democratic & Progressive causes learn that too. Then, again, we would not
get to hear the down home strain of Yellow Dogs baying in the Conservative
Media’s night!
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