Letters to the Editor
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Funny about the MSM
Bush used to claim he needed to get past the filter of the MSM, despite how well the MSM treated him. Now it may be that Obama's hopes of becoming president will rely on his ability to go over the MSM direct to the voters because the MSM is not going to be kind to him (or any other Dem candidate).
Is it possible that the media that was used to check govt, now needs to be filtered out in order to get some good govt?
How sad.
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What we can do.
This is our time to stand up and be heard. Send letters to editors when you read something offensive. Mock them and demand real information. When your friends talk about someone's hairstyle or photo-op, point out that the real question is how good a President (or other elected official) they're going to be. If they repeat it, mock them.
Someone referred to the Republicans as the Party of Fear on this blog the other day; I jumped on that and will never refer to them as anything else again.
This is the time for a strong offense. We have to mercilessly pummel them with logic and reason.
(published anonymously as I'm a non-citizen)
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Good luck...
... because the GOP Slime machine and the mouthbreathers that eat up their vile produce don't DO "logic and reasoning."
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The most amazing thing about that NR piece
was the last sentence:
Time for some investigative journalism about the Obama family's background, now that his chances of being president have increased so much.
You couldn't make up a more journalistically bankrupt sentence: "Someone should check out the half-baked theory I have just thrown out to see whether it's true."
As well as the fact that it's based, literally, on her personal suspicions about people she went to school with. Not even her documented discoveries about people she knew; her personal suspicions about people she went to school with.
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The Kool Kids
It's going to be tough to dampen Obama-mania. People were pretty tepid about Kerry, and he was running against an incumbent and still almost won despite merciless sliming. Four years later it is clear that Bush is an epic failure, and the Republicans have a cranky septuagenarian who is soft on immigration as their presidential candidate. If the Democrats can't win this matchup they might as well fold the tent and go home.
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This is a unique election year.
Truly, the extreme awfulness of the Bush Administration with its attendant wars, economic debacles, lies and scandals has thrown politics as usual off track. That's why an African-American with an Islamic-sounding name and no experience and a woman could even be considered as presidential material. So it's just barely possible that all the slander of the right-wing machine will come to naught. People may just be sick of it this year. They're sick of everything else.
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Evidence for all to see.....
Articulate, with a commanding presence, this was Hillary's to lose and she's done a fine job achieving that. Taking for granted she was the anointed one, her lack of grace under fire quickly became evident when things didn't go her way. She succumbed to one of the oldest tricks in the book; letting petty distractions become her focus instead of giving voters what they were looking for, that being the ISSUES. Maybe her age is the reason she wasn't light enough on her feet to keep flexible and mobile as things required her to quickly roll with the flow. And Hillary has gotten tired, literally, and it shows in her drained sense of humor and lack of spontaneity. But the biggest issue to me was the constant off-issue attack, attack, attack; this was the reason even ardent supporters chilled.
It appears I'm already referring to HRC in the past tense. Like I said, it was her's to lose.
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I Think Obama WIll Beat Them
I watched Obama's speech last night and noticed that he hardly mentioned Clinton at all. He had just won an important victory and seized a real advantage. He knew it was time to set aside personal attacks and look forward.
This seems to be Obama's special gift. He knows when to trade punches with his critics. He also knows when to look past them and talk about the future. He did that brilliantly last night, and I am becoming convinced that he has Reagan's ability (though possibly even greater talent than Reagan) for talking over his critic's heads. We all remember Reagan telling Jimmy Carter, "Well, there you go again . . . ." Vintage Reagan. Push the critics aside and talk directly to the people.
Obama seems to be excellent at this. If he uncorks the same vintage on McCain as he did with Clinton, he wins. The Achilles heel of the Republican hit-man squad is that they have to engage their target. Get him fighting, and bring him down to their level, then take him out. Obama may be able to trade enough blows to hold them off, then speak over his critic's heads often enough to make their attacks meaningless.
The fools of the media don't get Obama's rhetoric. Unlike most other politicians, he is not talking to them. He is talking to the people, removing them from the equation. So far they only partly understand that.
I know the GOP's got Ari Fleisher and Karl Rove. But Hillary Clinton is a better campaigner than McCain can ever hope to be, and Obama has systematically rolled her up.
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Changes are coming
I don't know, Mr. Greenwald; you pointed out that a week's worth of virulent attacks by anti-Obama people produced nothing, and then you puff up the reactionary attack press into Godzilla dimensions. Certainly, their dismal industry has deep pockets, and they'll eagerly hop into bed with McCain versus the threat of a non-Republican being in the White House again. They are masters of propaganda, but like all propagandists, there are limits to their power.
They have a problem in that they've dominated the discourse for so long, they're old hat -- they qualify as "establishment" press, sickeningly enough. We know what's coming, and what they're about, and what they will try to do. The only difference will be the particulars, and how low they go -- but who will they be reaching with this, except the already-converted? At heart, what they're offering is reactionary propaganda of assimilation, which is intended only to keep everybody on the current course -- and clearly the majority of Americans feel America isn't on the right course -- they feel that we're off-track as a country.
So, I think it's going to backfire, and badly, for the right-wing and gliberal media, given that the Press isn't held in much higher esteem than any of the other institutions in this country.
The more shrill, the more hostile they get, the worse they look, and the better Obama looks, the more of a change from the old slash-and-burn politics he will appear to represent. It's weird, but by being so rabidly far-right, they end up making Obama appear more progressive without him having to do much more than not be rattled by it -- and that will win him votes and make McCain look like a clown, or at best, a sock puppet for the outgoing administration.
The right-wing media machine plays best when they play the "us v. them" strategy, but sadly for the machine, the majority of Americans are the new "us" and the reactionary media is the old "them." It's not to say that Obama shouldn't be ready for the onslaught, but I think it's going to be far less effective against him than it would be against more traditional candidates.