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Sunday, Nov 8, 2009
John EMerson
Published Letters: 48 Editor's Choice: 1
The infuriating thing is that if Edwards' hair were messy or shaggy, or if his haircut were tacky or corny, or if he changed haircuts in any way for any reason, they'd flick shit on him then too. The haircut story is a gimme for a lazy journalist -- no thought is required. There's absolutely nothing Edwards (or anyone else) could do or not do to his hair that would protect him from this kind of hit piece.
And in public they dare to represent themselves as skilled professionals, and sneer at us commoners!
If these guys are attacking Bush, it's more evidence that the conservative coalition is disintegrating. Several other more rational conservatives have disengaging themselves from Bushrecently too, and the anti-immigration wackos have been against him for some time.
The Bush coalition included a lot of disparate groups and was held together by the expectation that President Bush would deliver the goods (military victory, an end to abortion, low taxes, and ordinary graft in large quantities.) When people realized that he wasn't going to be able to deliver, they started to go their separate ways, since they don't agree on a lot of issues.
The US will still be 30% wingnut, but if they lose their unity they'll lose their power. The way Congress was run, for most of the last 6 years the US was ruled by the majority of the majority -- moderate and rational Republicans were mostly squashed, and President Bush was more than happy to play along with Delay and Hastert. But they've lost Congress and have no leverage any more.
The media will be the last ones to get the news, of course. They'll be catering to the wingers for a year after the wingers are definitively defeated.
During the Korean war Chinese propaganda developed a mythical war hero of the Ogilvy type. Every Chinese knew about him. Later attempts to find out anything specific about him (birthplace, military unit, etc. etc.) failed, because he was completely fictitious. Unfortunately I can't Google anything up.
Alter affects the grizzled reporter image -- Edward R. Murrow and various fictional guys in noir movies. It's like Matt Drudge's hat -- all image. These are not smart, tough-minded, skeptical guys. These are purveyors of rumors and spin dressed up like smart, tough-minded, skeptical guys.
It's just like Russert, O'Reilly, and Limbaugh. They're not regular guys fed up with the BS and spin. They're millionaire purveyors of BS and spin dressed like fed-up regular guys.
TV, radio, and the movies have ended up suffocating content. Textual meaning just cannot compete with voices, images, personalities and roles.
And as I have said, the broadcast media (unlike the blogosphere) has no memory and forgets everything inconvenient.
The truth of the matter is that the blogosphere came into existence because the official media had become intolerably corrput and had failed disastrously several times.
None of the setbacks of the last year or two have discouraged the Bush team. They seem intent on pushing forward in every area until they're stopped. Most of the media and many of the Democrats will remain complicit, or will protest moderately and wishfully.
McConnell's brazen post-Comey piece was a clear indication that this is true in the civil liberties area. Even worse are recent indications here and there that a.) work is steadily continuing on infrastructure for a major permanent presence in Iraq, including the largest embassy in the world, which will presumably serve as the base for the occupation of the whole Middle East, and b.) indications that the Bush team's Plan B for Iraq is an attack on Iran.
I've always thought that Bush has borrowed Ariel Sharon's "facts on the ground" strategy, which basically means fucking things up so badly that your domestic opponents' proposals become moot, and only a version of your policy makes any sense any more. Presumably if there's an attack on Iran a crisis will be cooked up first, and the intimidation of opponents is presumably already being organized.
I tend toward pessimism and I've been wrong in the past (thank God!) But I still believe that Bush will only stop if he's forced to by very determined opponents within and without government. There's really no room at all for negotiation, bipartisanship, or compromise. I don't think that the Democrats have quite learned that yet.
I'm not a big fan of the "framing" meme, but Democrats really have to learn how to take command of the public debate.
What they should have done was to rename and rewrite the appropriations bill (with the dollar amounts about the same, with strategic additions for body armor, etc.) under the name "Bring the Troops Home Safe Appropriations Bill of 2007" (and with the appropriate details in the body of the text).
Then when the bill is vetoed they'd have to hammer away at the "We passed a bill for the troops and Bush vetoed it" idea. Everybody saying it over and over again one after another.
Given the wretched media we have, we couldn't be sure that the message would get through. But that's what should have been tried.
Much of the initial coverage about Fort Hood turned out to be wrong. Is there anything wrong with that?
The accountability imposed by another country for the CIA's kidnapping and torture reveals much about our own.
Fox News' morning show plays to type, talking about whether Muslims in the Army should face "special debriefings"
The survivor and author is upset about comparisons some on the right are making to genocide
Once seen as a lunatic fringe, reactionary anti-women groups are courting respectability
Salon headlines in your mailbox
