Tag: American Election

Reckless Media: They’re At It … Again

It’s too early to talk about the American election (neither party has even had a convention yet) and too late to talk about Pussy Riot (they’ve already gone to jail) but oddly enough both are currently in the news.  Not only that, but each of them is causing a media storm the likes of which we haven’t seen since the glory days of Dick Cheney.  Everybody from the newly affiliated BBC and The New York Times* to the Tallahassee Truck Trader is bending themselves in knots voicing an opinion.  At the risk of crying “Collusion!” they’re all remarkably similar.  Coincidence?  I think not!

Ever since Mitt Romney named Paul Ryan as his running mate, the media has been ever-so-gently warning the public that the Republicans are now committed to throwing grandma, grandpa and 99% of the homeless in America under the corporate bus.  It’s amazing how many times you can call somebody a “mad dog” conservative — without using the “mad dog” part — and still get your point across.  There’s gotta be a Pulitzer in there somewhere.  Plus, quite a few opinionators have taken to giving Obama gratuitous election advice (whisper/whisper – it’s about Florida, stupid!) and they’ve even provided the president with a pro bono campaign slogan: Mediscare.  Actually, the prevailing media wisdom (outside the flyover states) is a Romney administration will be both stuck with Ryan’s insane financial plan (which can’t work) and at odds with it (which is unworkable.)  We call that working both sides of the street.

This is the same media that has given Joe Biden a all-inclusive “Get Out of Jail Free” press pass for the last five years.  No matter how many times Joe opens his mouth to stuff in the other foot, nobody in the media seems to mind.  As resident Canadian curmudgeon Rex Murphy observed recently, Delaware Joe may be the Jar Jar Binks of the Democratic Party.  And remember Joe was the guy who had his own presidential campaign cut short in 1988 when it was discovered he was a serial plagiarist – and not even a good one.  As I’ve said before, this may be the only time in history when an incumbent president is running against the other party’s vice-presidential choice!

Meanwhile, over in Russia, even before Vladimir Putin decided to march Pussy Riot off to prison, the western media was practically peeing its pants with excitement.  It was as if they’d won the Christmas Morning/Birthday/Valentine’s Day lottery.  Oh My God!  Feminist rock band!  Political protest!  Orthodox Church (Orthodox?  They’re Christians, right?) and neo-Czar Putin!  The thing was practically writing itself.  Then when Madonna and a few other celebs threw themselves into the fray, editors all over the world started passing out with the adrenalin hit.  Even the name “Pussy Riot” shouted Saturday Night Live and a Cooper Anderson (Anderson Cooper?) special.

I’m just going to stop the truck for a moment.  To clarify — I totally agree with Pussy Riot’s inalienable right to call Putin a putz if they want to.  Czar Vladimir the first is what happens when macho meets paranoid with a side order of tetchy.  Nobody’s calling Russia a liberal democracy, but two years in jail for name calling is treading on Kim Jong what’s-his-name-this-week territory.  Anybody who isn’t outraged by this kinda Classico-Soviet crap isn’t paying attention.

Okay, back to our story.  The thing that bothers me about this media funfest is nobody this side of Vistula River seems to be the least bit concerned that Pussy Riot was practicing their brand of girl power in an Orthodox Cathedral.  Again, just to clarify.  An Orthodox cathedral is a place of worship, a place of comfort and solace, a place where people seek to transcend the human experience and reach, however briefly, for spiritual guidance and well-being.  It is a place for contemplation and meditation.  For millions of people, it is a sacred place that is a tangible symbol of their personal journey to find meaning in this life.  If we have any respect for our fellow human beings on this planet, we most certainly must respect the need for spiritual well-being just as we respect the need for physical well-being. Even the nastiest of the secularists among us will admit that.  Yet, here we are on the business end of a media feeding frenzy and there’s not one hint that Pussy Riot’s uncontrollable urge to bring their message to the Russian people may have offended millions of them.  Or that it was wrong to choose a place of worship as the venue for their YouTube extravaganza.

These are just two vehicles on the information superhighway.  The American election is going to go on and on until everybody’s just about sick of it, and Pussy Riot will probably be forgotten in a week or two.  They’re two totally unrelated stories, yet they clearly demonstrate the same lockstep reporting that dominates contemporary media coverage. One of the essential components of a democratic society is a free and functioning media.  However, when that media is bleating in unison, it might as well be state-controlled — for all the good it does.

*Mark Thompson, the ex-honcho at the Beeb has been hired to run the show at The New York Times.  I guess, they’re all one big happy family.

MITT ROMNEY … OR ELSE (Part III)

Rumour has it that nothing concentrates the mind like getting shot at.  I don’t have much firsthand experience, but I’ll take it on faith that dodging a bullet makes you think clearly.  Let’s hope so, because a couple of weeks ago in South Carolina the Republican Party almost shot themselves in the foot.  Yesterday, in Florida, they dodged that bullet and now, therefore, should be able to think straight again.  I’ll do it to you once more without the metaphor.  In the South Carolina primary, a couple of weeks ago, Republicans went (temporarily) insane and voted for Newt Gingrich.  Yesterday, in the Florida primary they came to their senses and voted for Romney — overwhelmingly!  This should settle things.   If it doesn’t, there’s going to be an awful lot of time, energy and expense wasted trying to dodge the next Gingrich bullet — which could very well kill any hope of the GOP relocating Barack Obama’s residence in November.

The Republican Party needs to nominate Mitt Romney.  They need to do it sooner, rather than later, or risk tearing their rightwing umbrella full of ideological holes.  Offering Gingrich any modicum of hope for the nomination will just invigorate the political infighting and open the door to prolonged civil war.  Not only that, but if Newt thinks he’s got some support, there’s no tellin’ what he’s capable of.  He might (perish the thought) just go “Third Party” and FUBAR the election to maximum effect.  No, Gingrich needs to be seriously ballot-boxed out of the equation, since it doesn’t look as if he’s willing to leave voluntarily.

I’m not going to go into the wherefores and the whys and all the political arguments for and against Newt Gingrich.  At this point, it doesn’t matter: it’s too late.  There are exactly nine months until the election.  The Republicans need to concentrate every minute of every waking hour on November.  Wasting energy on a primary fight is not in their best interest.  Everybody needs to understand that the single most overwhelming argument in favour of Mitt Romney is this: Barack Obama is in the White House, and no amount of right wing wishful thinking is going to get him out.  Bluntly, Newt can’t beat Barack; Mitt can.

We need to remember that, before all the hype, Obama was a dolt out of the blue, leading into 2008.  He was all things to all people because nobody had a clue who or what he really was.  Frankly, most folks didn’t care.  He wasn’t George Bush; that’s all that mattered.  It’s actually ironic that, in the end, he was the best dolt for the job, given what the Republicans mounted against him.  But that was a one-off.  Four years later, Obama isn’t surprising anybody anymore.  In fact, he’s disappointing quite a few.  Again, I’m not going to detail the misadventures of Barack Obama, but even a casual observer can see he’s vulnerable.  Ever since the 2010 Congressional elections, he’s been taking just about as much flak from the left as he has from the right, and tons of disillusioned people in the centre are ready to abandon the brand.  Politically speaking, a reasonable presidential alternative could turn into a real alternative — with luck and a lot of hard work piled on.

Regardless of whether you agree with Newt Gingrich’s politics or not, he is not a reasonable alternative.  First of all, he’s carrying enough political baggage to sink the Titanic.  He’ll have to spend most of the campaign defending that, because Obama’s not going to let the country forget it.  Secondly, despite the bounce he got from John King in South Carolina, it’s going to be open season on his personal life.  Under the guise of comic relief, the media will tear him a new navel over what will probably be called his personal life choices.  The writers from Jon Stewart, Stephen Colbert and SNL are burning up laptops, even as we speak.  They will make him look as ridiculous as possible.  Finally, and most importantly, the guy’s stuck in an ideological straitjacket.  Obama is already framing the campaign as “Them” vs “Us.”  Without political flexibility, Gingrich will be trapped into defending “Them” on ideological grounds, losing his core message in the meantime.  After that, all Obama has to do is point a finger and say, “See?  I told you!  He’s one of them.”  The end result is, if Gingrich is the Republican nominee, he will spend most of the presidential campaign on the defensive.  Obama won’t have to convince the country he’s the better candidate.  All he’ll have to do is convince them he’s not Newt Gingrich.

Mitt Romney might be the Man from Bland, but that’s exactly what the Republicans need in 2012 – a reasonable alternative.  If the American people have a realistic presidential option Barack Obama will have to stand and fight.  And the only weapon he has is his record in the White House.  If I were a Republican, I’d take that bet — today — rather than waste a lot of time and money taking potshots at one another and dodging bullets.

MITT ROMNEY … OR ELSE (Part II)

Nobody likes Mitt Romney.  The progressives don’t like him because he’s too conservative; the conservatives don’t like him because he’s too progressive.  The media doesn’t like him because he’s not Barack Obama.  Personally, I don’t much care for the guy either.  He’s way to “Man from Glad” for my liking.  If I had a dog in this fight it would be Jon Huntsman — if for no other reason than while Romney speaks French, Huntsman speaks Mandarin.  Do the math!  Fortunately, I don’t have to like Mitt Romney, and neither does the American public.  They just have to elect him because, if they don’t, the road to hell is paved and right now America is using up all four lanes trying to get there.

To those of us who don’t live between Maine and Malibu, it looks pretty seriously like America is coming apart at the seams.  This isn’t journalistic hyperbole; it’s real time observation.  The litany of problems is exceeded only by the list of stumble-bum ideas currently on the books to solve them.  You can disagree if you want to, but you’d better check your pulse because you may be in a coma.  I realize that over the last two centuries our neighbour has had its share of little ups and downs.  I also understand that America is still dancing at the coolest party on earth.  They still hold all the records for achievement above and beyond any other place in the world, and accounts of their imminent demise are greatly exaggerated.  However, here in 2012, it looks remarkably like the ground is shifting out from underneath its feet.  Open any media website and you’ll find a whole lot of “Ain’t it awful?” and not very much “Wow! That was close.”  This has got to stop.  If it doesn’t, those grandchildren in Nebraska are going to find out what comes after WTF.

The problem is for the last four years, America has been on vacation.  In 2008, after eight years of George Bush, 9/11, colour-coded Home Security, war, terrorists, economic meltdown, disease, pestilence and floods, they needed some time off.  And they took it.  The timeshare condo guy came wheeling through with his “Hope” and “Change” sales pitch, and they bought in — without ever thinking it through.  Now, like all vacationers, they’re back home with no money, a couple of trillion dollar mortgages and a suitcase full of useless crap that’ll probably end up in the yard sale next summer.  Oh, yeah — and most of them are about to lose their jobs.  They’re pissed.  The last time Americans were this mad was 1776, and that ended up with everybody reaching for their muskets.

This election is not going to be about “Hope” and “Change”; even the most ardent Obama supporter has given that one up.  But it is going to be about change.  Americans are fed up with politicians.  It doesn’t matter whether it’s a Tea Party rally or an Occupy Whatever! campsite, Americans have had it up to their teeth with petty politics.   They are a pragmatic people, and they’re tired of spending the real money they don’t have on political crap they don’t need.  They want something done about it — yesterday.  This is going to result in a seismic shift at the ballot box.  The Populist candidates (Republican or Democrat) are going to win and they’re going to win big.  Congress will be so down home they’ll be installing porch swings and issuing banjos.

This is not necessarily a good thing.  The will of the people is sacrosanct to Americans — even if it means shooting themselves in the foot.  We’ve been witnessing that for the last two years, as a reluctant president skirmishes with a recalcitrant Congress.   It’s only going to get worse after November when a pile of “We the People” politicians start flexing their muscles on what has already become a lame duck president.  As Niall Ferguson said, they’re going to want to start turning back the clock to a time before Franklin and Eleanor were sitting by the fireside, and there won’t be anybody there to stop them.  After all, Obama couldn’t pull off Healthcare properly back when he had Pelosi on his side.  What’s going to happen when he’s counting his friends on one hand?  Government gridlock will look like a reasonable option.

Romney as president solves this.   He’s the centre-right executive that America needs right now.  America doesn’t need any more ideology; the place is oozing with it.  It needs someone pragmatic, someone who can get the government of the people, by the people — and in spite of the people — moving again.  But, most importantly, Romney can beat Obama; Newt, Paul and Perry don’t have a hope.