The liberal media was at it again tonight.
Liberal Media, you gasp?
Yes. Yes. Yes. Our media is liberal from the inside out. Front to back, right to left, left, left and up one side and down the other. I don't care what Eric Alterman says.
And when I say *liberal media* -- I'm talking about the characteristic so prominent within liberals to think and ponder all sides of an issue. I know, I know there are liberals who are as pig-headed in their views as James Dobson is -- but, I think, generally speaking, you can say that a trait of a liberal is to see more than one side of an issue. A liberal can better peel back the onion, so to speak. Much to their detriment in the political world, they can wrap themselves in a riddle, get tied up in knots easily and not know how to punch themselves out of a paper bag.
Oh round and round and round we go. Where we'll stop? Nobody knows. Well, we know. And lately, it ain't been the White House.
The other side sees things in black and white. We take pride in seeing all the shades of grey.
I'm not sure the Republican's actually planned it this way or not. I can't imagine that the execs from Disney, GE & Viacom were in a boardroom 10 years ago, discussing their news divisions, dissecting the personalities of the liberal mind. Whispering to each other through clenthed teeth as they rubbed their hands together in quiet, shushed troll-like excitement: "They are ours! We'll confuse the bejeezus out of everyone! We'll play their game! We'll let our Kens and Barbies talk to every person who has a differing viewpoint on every issue! Whether it makes sense or not! And if it doesn't make sense -- all the better!! It will be confusing. We will muddy the waters! The tax cuts will be ours and we'll all die richer men! Bwaa-ha-ha-ha!"
Our media gives so much play to every single side of any issue these days that they are the ones creating riddle after riddle, while their viewers don't know whether they are coming or going.
Recently in a post about Cindy Sheehan, Wolcott wrote, quoting Arianna Huffington.
It's one thing for the O'Reillys and the Limbaughs to spew anti-Cindy venom. The problem arises when, under the pretense of offering both sides, MSM figures regurgitate the GOP attack machine's most contemptible hits ('she's a puppet,' 'she's anti-Israel,' 'her own family is against her') as if there are always two legitimate sides to every story. I wonder if the civil rights protests were happening today, who at the cable shows would feel compelled to give equal time to the John Birch Society?"
Actually, the rightwing has gotten more sophisticated than that. If this were the Sixties redux, they wouldn't put on a John Bircher opposite a civil rights leader, they'd find some Southern Negro to testify that they don't need some interloper like Martin Luther King marching into their communities and stirring up more trouble than it's worth. Or some Larry Elder or Larry Cain lift-yourself-up-by-your-own-bootstraps pro-business cheerleader to argue that federal intervention isn't needed to uproot segregation, that the free market will remedy black society's ills if only these self-appointed troublemakers would butt out.
That's how the game is played now.
I am getting extremely tired of it. Used to be, I never understood how people could actually end up spitting at soldiers during the Vietnam War. Used to be, I never understood how our own National Guard fired shots and killed their own at Kent State.
I was so naive to think that we had all learned important lessons during those years. We all lived through them, yes? All it would have taken is to have paid attention, yes?
But after tonight's cable news shows, I'm coming to understand better how tempers rise. How groups are pitted one against the other. How the media can create an atmosphere where the usual normal person just cannot take it anymore.
First, Norah O'Donnell, sitting in for Chris Matthews on Hardball was interviewing Coleen Rowley, the former FBI agent and 9/11 whistle blower who is now running for Congress as a Democrat and some guy (can't remember his name) who -- shocker! -- has his own right-wing AM radio show -- and is a representative of moveamericaforward.com.
That man was the most vile -- the rudest, most aggressive man you have seen in ages. By the way he was acting, he put Rush's schtick to shame. He went on the attack against Coleen Rowley -- he called her names -- he loathed sharing the same screen as her. "Stop flapping your jowls!" "What would you do different, you traitor!" "You are are a disgrace to this country!"
And all the while Nora O'Donnell sat there looking pretty with her new haircut and asked Rowley why she would "align herself with the left wing extremists" down in Crawford. (Crowley has recently defended and supported Cindy Sheehan openly.)
Crowley held her own, correcting her about the term "extremists." But, obviously O'Donnell knows which side of her bread is buttered. After all, I'm sure there are many parties she wants to get invited to.
When William Safire retired, he wrote in the NYTs that it was a *good sign* for both sides to come after you after you've written a column or filed a report. O'Donnell obviously took that advice to heart. Safire must have left out words like "truth" "quality" and "fair." But she's got the *stern Barbie look* down. All of right-wing America must be truly impressed.
After Hardball, Keith Olberman was on and I have to say I'm still astonished by the Sheehan story that was shown -- the absolute spectacle that was reported.
Olberman was interviewing Gary Qualls, a father who has lost a son in Iraq and is now down in Crawford protesting against Cindy Sheehan. And of course, protesting above all -- to "support the troops." According to Digby, Qualls had met with Sheehan recently and they hugged and he told her that he loved her.
But someone must've gotten to him. Because he ended the interview with the words: (and I'm paraphrasing)
"I am ashamed of all this protesting down here against our troops. My son died in this war. I am a single dad. I raised my son better than this. I never raised him to mingle or be around people like this."
Keith Olberman didn't say a word back to him.
That did it for me.
I believe things are getting out of control and Americans are going to start going after each other the way they did -- the way I couldn't believe they did -- so many years ago.
The right will stop at nothing. They will use anyone they can to make their point and split this country in two.
And the liberal media is right in the middle of it.
Yes, the *liberal media.*
I don't like any of them anymore. I was not raised to put up with people like that.
Yeah, the old liberal media canard.
The reason a right wing jerk like Rush has his fans is because he makes these people feel better about their hatefulness and stupidity. He validates all of it. And of course it's much easier to think in black and white, attack rather than discuss, etc.
The reason "centrists" like they have on MSNBC and the like have their viewers is because - well, exactly the same reason, even if the illusion of discourse is added.
Gary Qualls I can forgive - he bought the lie, he's paying for it as Cindy Sheehan is, and he doesn't want to think his son died for nothing.
The rest of these bastards should be called on their moronic shit, their programs and sponsors boycotted, and our backs turned on them once and for all. Let's drop the illusion/delusion of discourse that lets them maintain the upper hand. We don't need them at all.
Posted by: Kevin Wolf | August 23, 2005 at 08:31 AM
Your choice of the Joni Mitchell lyric was not lost on me.
I've said it here before, but I think it is important to say it over and over. They were scared to death of a Dean candidacy, even if they fixed the election and he had no chance, they didn't want him saying things like this:
http://www.crocuta.net/Dean/Transcript_of_Restoring_the_American_Community_7Dec_2003.htm
Doesn't matter if he was "too liberal" for the DLC or "not liberal enough" for the progressive democrats. We needed him to blast the truth in speeches all over the country, with media coverage, and the death of his candidacy was a serious setback.
"It's life's illusions I recall / I really don't know life - at all."
Posted by: Viscount LaCarte | August 23, 2005 at 09:05 AM