I’m beginning to think that, as irritating as it is, this drawn out primary is going to have one good side to it. At least the nominee, whoever he or she may be, will have had a chance to get some coverage before the full-blown onslaught of fanboy enthusiasm for McCain from our ridiculous mainstream press kicks in. I’m entirely unsure how the hell a Democrat is supposed to have a fighting chance with the ridiculous, deceitful McCain worship from the press.
STUDENT: We can see that this isn’t completely absent, uh, political motivation isn’t completely absent, yet we were told this isn’t a political event. So, what exactly is your purpose in being here, not that I don’t appreciate the opportunity, but I’d just like some clarification.
Seriously, watch the video. The student’s tone is even more measured and respectful than you would imagine reading the already bland transcript. I swear to god, if trends continue, before long, it’s going to be called a “terrorist act” to ask McCain any question other than, “May I fluff your pillow, Senator? Would you like another chocolate, Your Eminence?”
I’m entirely unsure how America is supposed to survive an onslaught of devious assholery like this. More than ballot box issues, even more than tampering with voter rolls, the mainstream media’s willingness to openly campaign for Republicans and to mislead the public about Republican politicians undermines fair elections. People hate the war, people hate the economy, and many of us are smart enough to hold the Republicans accountable for the shit they have gotten us in. But with the media willing to invest all its energy into portraying McCain as a god on high sent to save us all, there’s going to be a lot of people thinking, “Gosh, he’s not like those other Republicans.” Will it be enough to swing the election? How many votes can a few billion dollars worth of free campaigning from the mainstream media buy? The media is going to be deeply invested in the lie about Republicans having a big tent with a lot of diversity between politicians in order to sell the lie that McCain isn’t Bush II, and it’s going to take a momentous effort to resist that.
We may not be doomed. We have some advantages. Both candidates, but especially Obama, will be able to wipe the floor with McCain in a debate. The internet is more popular than ever, so voters can use Google to find out information about McCain—specifically that he differs from the majority of Americans on most major issues—that the mainstream media will try like hell to hide. There’s that quote about staying Iraq for 100 years that is quick and to the point and therefore can be the anchor in various campaign commercials. People are really scared about the economy and will suck up their antagonism towards “liberals”, knowing that liberals have managed to help the people faced with economic catastrophe in the past. Environmentalism is hip, finally, which deprives Republicans of one way to call Democrats “pussies”. All these are major advantages that give me a lot of hope.
Are they enough to overcome what is going to be a media campaign for a candidate that will make their open campaigning for Bush look fair in comparison? I don’t know. Please convince me that we may be saved yet. Will it help if we get him to admit he called his wife a “cunt” to other people? I can’t imagine what I’d do if I heard a man call his wife a cunt.
38 Responses to “Please convince me we’re not doomed”
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Perhaps the press is concerned about being accused of ‘elder abuse’?
I wouldn’t really worry about it…Obama will be the nominee and the debates in the Fall will look exactly like the last time an ex-POW was on the stage.
The stark truth of this campaign, which everyone is carefully trying not to say, is that McCain is a confused old man on his best days - and it will be glaringly apparant to all who watch.
There is no way the ‘middle of the roaders’ are voting for a possibly senile angry old man over a well spoken lucid younger person.
The extreme right cannot stand McCain, so 5% of the right will stay home.
McC will win Florida simply because most voters there see him as a ‘nice young man’ - and probably some rust belt states, but at the end of the night, Obama is our next President.
Relax and wait for the debates.
The respectful treatment McCain receives is obviously tied to his status as a war hero, and in particular a POW. In a culture where the military is hardly ever questioned lest one be considered unpatriotic, it’s no surprise that McCain gets handled softly. I suppose age is a factor as well. We adore the military in this country. For example, most of our public landmarks are tributes to various masculinist, military endeavors. McCain is the ultimate war survivor. Whoever is the dem nominee will have to find a clever way to deal with the media worship of him. I hope the public opposition to the current war will be enough to make John McCain a unelectable candidate. Fingers crossed.
McCain called his wife a c*nt in front of reporters for saying that he was a “little thin on top” re: his hair.
His nuclear meltdown will be a sight.
Loved the student. Makes me feel good about America. Reasoned query and non-partisan.
They gave Ronnie Reagan a pass, considering that he had symptoms of Alzeimer’s during the first administration. Why can’t they do the same for McBush?
I think the best part of that story is he also called her a trollop. When was he born? 1790?
Um… fluffers don’t do *pillows*.
(Probably an insult to the porno business, though.)
The thing that slays me?
The endless hysteria over the fact that Obama’s PASTOR might have said something racist, while the media ignores McCain’s “gook” comment from 2000:
“I hate the gooks. I’ll hate them as long as I live.”
John McCain
Considering that we’ll have some MIGHTY sensitive diplomacy with China and North Korea in the future, maybe his animosity towards Asians is a bad sign…
That CNN guy really needs to take a step back and get some perspective. If his head gets put any farther up McCain’s ass it’ll come out the throat.
And it doesn’t really surprise me that McCain would call his wife something like that. But in public, in front of several other people? And they didn’t call him on it? That’s just seriously depressing.
“The endless hysteria over the fact that Obama’s PASTOR might have said something racist, while the media ignores McCain’s “gook” comment from 2000:”
Interesting.
And, as we know, McCain voted against the MLK national holiday proposal way back when. Wonder what he does to celebrate that day now. And he had the nerve to go to Memphis last week.
“Both candidates, but especially Obama, will be able to wipe the floor with McCain in a debate.”
I’m not sure that’s to our advantage. Keeping in mind the Gore Syndrome, where the smartest person in the class
gets beaten uploses the election just for being smart, I can see Obama clearly winning a debate and then people rallying to McCain because they’d rather have a beer with the “regular guy”, or some other bullshit.I have been, am now, and probably will continue to be unable to understand how a rich white guy (Reagan, GHW Bush, GW Bush, McCain) can be made into a “regular” guy, while somebody that pulled themselves up (B. Clinton or B. Obama), and who actually was “regular” is treated like some political traitor. WTF?…
I think I’m beginning to understand why the press is so favorable to GOP candidates. It’s quite simple, really - they are lazy. Liberals tend to want to look at details, at nuance, at perspectives other than those of the upper middle class. The GOP has simple answers, simple slogans, and they work entirely within frames that are comfortable to people of the class the press is drawn from.
Maybe it’s an endearment…
“Good night, trollop”
“Good night, Geezer”
“What?”
“GOOD NIGHT GEEZER”
“What- you’re freezing?”
I can definitely understand someone who was a POW in southeast Asia having a negative visceral emotional reaction to people from that part of the world. It isn’t right to blame a whole continent for what the North Vietnamese did, but I can see feeling that way.
Fifty years later, running as candidate for president? Not appropriate, at the hell all.
The owners of mainstream media favor the Republican candidates because the Republicans have been steadily enabling media mergers, and many Democrats oppose further mergers.
It matters little what the editors and the reporters think.
In Clinton news, the talking heads spent all weekend calling her a liar for something that, uh, she wasn’t lying about.
If the press isn’t using the First Amendment, can we take it away from them?
I hope they have youtube for this event …
- trollop
- gook
oh yeah.. the guy is ripe for macaca moment for real. My best shot strategy, put an asian woman and ask tough question. He’ll blow up in front of camera for sure …
It’ll be “you can’t handle the truth” moment (Jack Nicholson/A Few Good Men)
Or better yet, perhaps we could borrow the First Amendment for a while.
Much as I’d like to believe that the press will love nominee Obama as much as they do candidate Obama, I’m afraid that won’t be the case. Nope, it’s nothing to do with McCain The War Hero; Dole and Kerry were war heroes too and the press was tough on them. It’s because Obama (and Hillary too) are too smart, and they don’t bother to hide it. Better the befuddled old man who calls his wife a “trollop” (What is this; Masterpiece Theater?) than the egghead wonk who likes to explain pie charts.
The respectful treatment McCain receives is obviously tied to his status as a war hero, and in particular a POW.
A POW who was tortured, and then voted against a ban on torture, for no other reason than political expediency. You’d think that’d be a story.
In a culture where the military is hardly ever questioned lest one be considered unpatriotic, it’s no surprise that McCain gets handled softly.
IOKIYAR. Don’t forget Max Cleland and John Kerry.
MikeEss, #10: Gore Syndrome? Stevenson Syndrome . . . Carter Syndrome . . . it’s been going on for over fifty years, generally to the benefit of Republicans.
Agreed that Clinton got unfairly hammered over that one, but seriously, when you’re running a campaign in which you
arewere paying a top strategist $2MM a month, you would think someone would have the brains to completely verify your anecdotal tales on the trail before you put your foot in your mouth…Actually, DTG, Mnemosyne’s right and the hospital is wrong, as the original patient says.
as I understand it [and I had to work for some of this so maybe its a crock but its MY crock] there are a few strains of hero worship that blend together in this mounting tide of McCain love.
My take is that people confuse the wounded warrior with the war.
Ray Lizza writing in New Yorker says McCain is unusually charming to a goodly segment of the press corps:
http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2008/02/25/080225fa_fact_lizza
I happen to think their deference is more along the lines of guilt and awe for the war hero unconsciously transfered to the candidate [but the candidate damn well IS aware and uses it] in a way the suspends critical thought.
Jay Rosen has an exhaustive examination of explanations and framings for the “press likes mccain” complaints.
http://journalism.nyu.edu/pubzone/weblogs/pressthink/2008/03/31/developing_as_m.html
and
http://journalism.nyu.edu/pubzone/weblogs/pressthink/2008/03/26/mccain_bank.html
as I understand it [and I had to work for some of this so maybe its a crock but its MY crock] there are a few strains of hero worship that blend together in this mounting tide of McCain love.
My take is that people confuse the wounded warrior with the war.
Ray Lizza writing in New Yorker says McCain is unusually charming to a goodly segment of the press corps:
http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2008/02/25/080225fa_fact_lizza
I happen to think their deference is more along the lines of guilt and awe for the war hero unconsciously transfered to the candidate [but the candidate damn well IS aware and uses it] in a way the suspends critical thought.
Jay Rosen has an exhaustive examination of explanations and framings for the “press likes mccain” complaints.
http://journalism.nyu.edu/pubzone/weblogs/pressthink/2008/03/31/developing_as_m.html
and
http://journalism.nyu.edu/pubzone/weblogs/pressthink/2008/03/26/mccain_bank.html
According to the Raw Story piece linked in the post, McCain said on “Fox News Sunday” last week:
Who or what would he have been referring to?
I feel that if we can keep the nominating process going until the convention the Democrats can ride the Olympic media wave right up intil the nominee is announced. The only way to keep the media barons focussed on the Democrats is to make the story so juicy that McCain and the Republicans would have to produce actual real results to get more than a picture of them waving to a crowd.
The media may be lazy but as long as the news is selling ads then the interesting story wins.
It’s quite simple, really - they are lazy.
There’s definitely that. I often wonder if there is not another, more important factor: the Republicans are percieved by the owners of large media corporations as being more favorable to corporate profits. The media corporations, therefore, tune their message so that it favors the Republicans.
“When I see the waste and corruption in Washington, I get angry.”
Who or what would he have been referring to?
Charles Keating?
It’s kind of fascinating how the Rethugs can campaign as “crusading outsiders” who solemnly vow to “clean up” Washington - whose dire condition was caused by earlier versions of Rethug “crusading outsiders” who solemnly vowed to “clean up” Washington.
When we’re REALLY lucky, the same people who personally made the mess will vow to clean up the same mess - after blaming libruls for what the Rethugs did.
Sometimes I feel like we’re living in Groundhog Day crossed with a Marx Brothers movie…
Think about it a different way. Republicans are good TV. Republicans are controversy. Republicans get people tuning in.
Keeping things as competitive and on the edge as possible is the current goal of the media establishment. It’s all about the 50/50 split. If things were actually reported, do you think that split would last? The actually ideological split is actually somewhere between 65-35 and 70-30. That’s actually what the elections should be each and every time out, at least until the GOP decides to change. Probably would be forced to be a whole lot less radical. Less contrarion. Less controversial.
It’s all about ratings and readership. Even looking for deeper corporate conspiracies I think is missing the forest for the trees.
seriously, when you’re running a campaign in which you are were paying a top strategist $2MM a month, you would think someone would have the brains to completely verify your anecdotal tales on the trail before you put your foot in your mouth…
How is it putting “your foot in your mouth” when the story is true?
You may want to follow both my and Blue Jean’s links before you decide this is some kind of gaffe on Hillary’s part. It’s actually more like when Al Gore said that Erich Segal told him that the main character of Love Story was partially based on Gore and the press decided that Gore must be lying even though Segal himself confirmed it.
Funny thing you mention Love Story, Mnemosyne; Eriposte has a post on that exact same subject up on The Left Coaster. As she points out, FDR had a way of exaggerating things too; he probably wouldn’t be elected today with this press corps and this blogosphere.
The more I read about the attacks on Hillary, the more I feel it’s Republican ratfucking all over again. Just like the “Somali garb” story was a Republican ratfucking “twofer”; by releasing the photos and blaming Hillary for them, the GOP got two for one. They got to feed doubts about “Obama The Secret Muslim”, they got a chance to make Hillary look bad and they got to sow division in the Democratic party, all without getting their own hands dirty.
Will this get better if/when Obama is the nominee? No, I’m afraid it will only get worse.
I don’t know why you find a primary that gives more and more people a chance to vote to be “drawn-out” and “irritating.”
My favorite is still how the press managed to sell the son of a president and the grandson of a US senator as a Washington outsider. Especially one who had worked for his father’s presidential campaign. But of course, Al Gore was the ultimate insider because his father was a senator. Or something.
I can’t quite distort my brain to the degree required to be a Republican. Maybe I need a sharp blow to the head or something for that to make sense.
“I can’t quite distort my brain to the degree required to be a Republican. Maybe I need a sharp blow to the head or something for that to make sense.”
You just haven’t experienced the mind-altering properties of Wingnut Koolaid…
McCain’s behavior as a POW was not typical for him; it was an exception. He was the son of privilege who expected to coast; he boasted about crashing jets, and after he was released from the Hanoi Hilton he went back to his ordinary scummy ways. He cheated on the wife who waited five years for him because she’d gained weight before marrying his current wife; he didn’t defend his daughter when she was attacked by Rove; in fact, he joined forces with Rove in what will have to be his last final attempt to best his father and grandfather—both Admirals. And let’s not even mention how he traded influence for campaign donations during the Keating Savings and Loan scandal.
Meanwhile, Hillary Clinton gets nailed for…telling the truth. The woman’s family confirms it. So what the fuck?
Obama (or Clinton) will soundly beat McCain.
This primary has been good for the Democratic party. The numbers from Pennsylvania have just been released, and there has been a surge in new Democratic voters. Both Montgomery and Bucks counties, long Republican redoubts, now have Democratic majorities of voters. Remarkable.
This is happening in state after state. Waves of energized Democrats getting involved in the campaigns. And it is a pipe dream to think any but a small fraction will end up in the McCain camp when this is over.
Not just the Presidency will fall to the Democrats, but statehouses across the nation.
I hope you’re right, epistemology, but I still have my doubts. As Digby has stated, the corporate press isn’t just against Democrats, it’s against Democratic ideals like universal health care. They don’t need to convince everyone, just that “small fraction”.
I wish I could convince you, Amanda, but I can’t even convince myself.