In the last post on the Republican nonsense about the deficit, this comment:
Why should the people call them on it since the media refuses to call them on it.
The people, you and I, need to call the republicans out precisely because the media won’t. We need to stop pretending that it is the job of the media to inform their viewers. This may have been the case in the past, and there may still be a few hold-outs here and there. But for the most part, it simply isn’t, anymore, and most of the media players have been quite upfront about it. We’ve just refused to believe them, but they aren’t being shy about things. They know their job isn’t to inform us, but to draw viewers, and they’ve been telling us directly for a while. Have you watched tv lately:
“Up next, the Obama administration says the sky is blue and the grass is green, while Republican congressmen claim this is just another lie from the most liberal socialist and possibly Muslim administration ever designed to cover their power grabs over the environment and that claiming the sky is blue hurts job creation. Who is right? Send us your thoughts via email, and don’t forget to take part in Rick Klein’s poll- “Who is most responsible for all this nasty partisanship?” Also, we’ll be checking Sarah Palin’s twitter feed live, hoping to see if she has weighed in on blueksygate, and we think we have more pole-dancing footage of the missing showgirl.”
Here’s an actual story at the Politico:
Former Alaska GOP Gov. Sarah Palin – whose lips have been sealed about the recent repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” – is now hinting that she supports the move.
Palin has not spoken publicly about the end of the ban on gays serving openly in the military, but she appeared to show support for the change via a retweet on Monday night of a gay conservative radio host.
In short, quit looking to the media to inform people. Ben Smith and John Roberts and Steve Doocy don’t give two hoots in hell what you do and don’t know. It’s all about the eyeballs and the benjamins and getting established in the Beltway/NY party circuit.
cervantes
I actually think SP misunderstood that thing she retweeted. It said something about homos under the bed so she liked it.
DonBoy
Follow the link chain down to the picture of the bear! It’s adorable!
david mizner
Everyone should read this interview with William Greider. It’s ostensibly about the media’s coverage of Social Security but it’s really about everything.
“Reporters and editors are disturbed to learn that growing sectors of the public do not trust their reporting. But this is the natural result of one-sided reporting. It reflects the unconscious class bias of the media—looking up to selected expertise that’s in power and looking down on the everyday citizens. In the old days, when I started as a reporter, newspapers were far more diverse and representative in speaking to and for the variety of popular perspectives. Each newspaper might have its bias, left or right or something else, but there were countering opinions and perspectives that tended to keep the other side more honest. That variety is pretty much gone now, so lots of citizens are finding their own ways to inform themselves, putting their faith in the bloggers or other renegade sources. Who can blame them?”
http://www.cjr.org/campaign_desk/social_security_in_perspective_part_iii.php?page=all
Dave
As the writer of that comment, I would like to clarify that I meant it more as a moment of exasperation with the American public more than anything else. Because I agree with you, John, and I wager most other people here do as well.
The problem is that a large subset of Americans don’t. They have either tuned out because the media treats both parties as equal in seriousness, which means the GOPs crapiness rubs off on the Dems, or they tune into Fox and clearly don’t give a shit about reality.
The only news show that even comes close to calling things like they are is “The Daily Show”. And when a comedy show is your best news show…you have problems.
fourlegsgood
Good god. That politico story makes me want to bang my head against a wall. WHO GIVES A FUCK WHAT CARIBOU BARBIE has to say on ANY subject?
(sorry to shout)
General Stuck
All of this confusion will begin to make sense when the new House majority republicans read the entire US Constitution aloud on the floor of The Peoples House. So don’t you folks out there worry your pointy little heads none. Brother Boehner and company are here to help, so just keep plenty of your cash on hand in case it is needed to keep the patriotic ball a bouncing, and do stop worrying and learn to love the lie. We promise a Cheeseburger Tuesday, for every red blooded American.
Dave
@General Stuck: I can’t wait till they read the part about how representatives were originally apportioned, or how the Electors meet to vote. Can’t you just feel the electricity?
Carnacki
As a blogger, I read a lot of the West Virginia media and I have tons of respect for the work of Ken Ward Jr. and some of the others. There’s probably no better reporter in the country when it comes to covering the coal industry than Ward. He covers it like old-school journalism, digging through reports and debunking spin, He is a dogged seeker of the truth. That’s probably why he would never be hired by the media giants in the Beltway.
Poopyman
@fourlegsgood: Sadly, if the answer was “no one”, they’d soon quit the breathless reportage. Too many people DO care, sadly.
@david mizner: That’s pretty much what I was thinking of saying in response to Dave’s comment below that Cole quoted. Said much better, of course. If everybody complained to a newspaper would we even know about it? Not unless the paper reported it.
Well, the internet is the new media, and the traditional news media is demonstrably doing pretty bad in it. But there’s still a problem of collecting and distilling information for online publication. Still too few places that can pay journalists, so until a workable business model evolves I’m afraid we’re still at the mercy of trad med for original reporting.
mk3872
A politican whose political platform can be delivered and accepted as news via RE-TWEET ?? Now that’s a sweet job, if you can get it …
El Tiburon
It is not going to change anytime soon. As an old marketing/journalism major from back in the day, it goes like this: The media does not tell you WHAT to think, but WHAT to think about.
So when the framing, from Obama and even the Democrats in Congress, falls into the right-wing framing – compounded by the media’s gross negligence into correcting this framing – there is not much that can be done.
To expect the average news-consumer to go out and get at the truth is a ridiculous expectation. Most of them are too busy watching DWTS and American Idol.
As much as a fire-breathing liberal as I am who is completely connected, I can’t talk my wife out of thinking Glenn Beck is an okay dude.
I was naive to believe that the Republican party was dead for a generation.
A sucker is born every minute.
Chris
God, what a gutless cowardly POS.
So what happens now – does the base jump down her throat because she’s not one of them after all, or do they change their mind or keep silent because if she said it, it must be right?
cleek
in this song, counterpoint will be provided by Glenn Reynolds:
El Cid
Former prized establishment reporter Judy Miller stands by the difference between her flat-out lies and Julian Assange’s leak-based description as a ‘journalist’.
Miller’s and the NYT’s “verification” procedures included asking various other government source propagandists to say the same things out of different mouths.
Assange may be anything but a journalist (the role of leaks being published a different question), and Miller can used whatever operative definition she prefers about the definitions of “journalism” and “verification,” but at least he’s not famous for eagerly helping warmongers lie a nation into a murderous war and considering it “journalism”.
Chris
That’s very well-put, though I do think the media also tells you WHAT to think in quite a few cases. Plenty of people watch Limbaugh and Beck simply to be told what to think on certain issues.
Tom65
Prediction: Snooki’s base goes crazy, Snooki claims it’s all a misunderstanding and that the LSM is out to get her again, base agrees and organizes boycott of…something
Yawn.
The Grand Panjandrum
We need more McClatchy’s and fewer cable news morans.
@Dave:
This.
Cris
Dear Lord, we thank you who in His divine mercy delivered batshit insane Tea Party candidates who allowed the Democrats to retain control of the Senate.
MikeJ
@Chris:
Check out the fun in freeperland.
Mumphrey (formerly Renfrew Squeevil (formerly Mumphrey Oddison Yamm (formerly Mumphrey O. Yamm (formerly Mumphrey))))
This is dead on. I get the Washington Post at home here. I don’t read the news in it much, though there are days, like today, when they do some real reporting about something–today it was about rapacious mining companies in West Virginia weaseling around oversight laws.
But most days I read the op-ed page for Eugene Robinson, who I like, ad Krauthammer, who I read to astound myself at his depravity, I read the baseball pages when they’re playing baseball, and I read the funnies. That’s about it. There isn’t much else in there that’s worth bothering with.
Bulworth
And how do we do that?
Maybe we could disguise ourselves as a Constitution-revering, debt-hating, “tea party”. We’d be “opposed to both parties” of course, but in actuality, only one party. We could hold rallies and carry all kinds of weird signs.
Sincerely, I don’t know. I know the media doesn’t care.
Bulworth
I’m afraid I’d rather not.
jayjaybear
@Chris:
Truthfully, I’m not entirely sure what Bible Spice had in mind when she retweeted that. I actually follow her on Twitter (it’s good for a chuckle at least a couple times a day) and I saw that last night, and I was sore confused, frankly. She may have retweeted it because SHE didn’t understand what the originator was saying. I think my confusion was caused by the context of it being on her Twitter feed, because it sounded positive to me, and a little bit snarky against the Repubs.
Or it could be that she gave her Twitter-mule his 2 weeks notice and he slipped it in there to shiv her in the neck. /shrug/
El Cid
@Dave: Or the part of the 14th Amendment barring any state or federal officeholder who had sworn allegiance to the Constitution and who “engaged in insurrection or rebellion” (i.e., Confederate treason) from serving in federal office, or the part of the same clarifying that the federal government was in no way liable for the debts of traitors, including for the loss of slaves.
(And perhaps bearing in mind how the Reconstruction Act prevented readmittance to the Union until each state seeking readmittance approved the 14th, and later 14th and 15th Amendments.)
cleek
@MikeJ:
eew. it’s like walking into a run-down mental hospital.
i do admire, in a way, how they’ve refused to update the look of that site. it’s probably the only site left on the web that looks essentially the same in FireFox as it does in Lynx 1.0.
reminds me of how my grandfather refused to buy a TV with a remote control. he was satisfied changing TV channels from his chair using a broomstick with a notch cut into the end that was just the right shape as the “fin” on the TV’s channel changer knob. dumb, ugly and clumsy, but unpretentious.
Elizabelle
@david mizner:
Terrific link to CJR interview with Wm Greider. Thank you.
Dave
@El Cid: Actually, you bring up an interesting moment here. Considering how the GOP is all anti-brown people now…how will they read the 14th Amendment? Will they read it as written or try to substitute something else for the “All persons born or naturalized in the United States… ” beginning.
MattF
@Mumphrey
Me too on the WaPo. It’s not like the DC area is lacking people who could write knowledgeably about, oh, I don’t know,… foreign affairs, finance, science, law, politics, military affairs… even books, art, and music, even. But not in the Post.
Svensker
@El Cid:
Yes, but he looks funny. Which is much worse.
rickstersherpa
Mr. Cole has hit the nail on the head. Further, both the conservative media and the Village are rooting for a Government shutdown/debt limit stand off since they believe the fireworks will increase their ratings, and hence their income.
Mike Kay (Team America)
This should also be the job of congressional Democrats.
Blogs love to bash obama on the bully pulpit, which is fine. But they give a free pass to congressional Dems, whether it’s Pelosi or Hillary or Barney Frank or Feingold or even Kuchinich. For example, when bush was breaking the budget, they were all silent.
Ideally, they should demand equal time and blanket the infotainment channels and gasbag shows armed to the teeth with cutting talking points. For far too long Dems have failed to grasp that the corporate media is against them. Start working the refs, and stop appealing for fair play, because you’re not going to get it.
I mean, the republicans were completely out of power, yet congressional wingers they went out and fought for every second of air time.
The message war was lost and obama deserves blame, but so too do lazy ass congressional dems who think they’re too good to lower themselves by mud fighting on a sunday talk show.
They should also vote against everything and make boehner find the votes, as well as insert poison pills, and shine a spot light on all of their earmark.
freelancer (itouch)
One of the things I have enjoyed about seeing DADT repealed is that most of the wingnuts fought it kicking and screaming, and once it passed, they bent like a pretzel saying “thank God WE got rid of this terrible Clinton policy!”
lovable liberal
Americans don’t want information. They prefer infotainment.
Sadly, we need to do a better job of mocking the GOP’s infotainment.
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
@Dave:
Agreed.
On the other hand it seems to me that not paying attention is a luxury, one that as members of a wealthy and secure nation many Americans feel they have collectively earned and intend to indulge themselves in as much as possible even if doing so is hazardous to their long term health (sort of like eating too much ice cream), and something which they will keep on doing until somebody forces them to stop. Compared to the 1930s thru the end of the Cold War the US currently doesn’t face any accute threats to its existence or wealth and status, or least none which aren’t self inflicted. Under those circumstances of course people are not paying any attention. That’s just how homo sapiens rolls.
I suspect this is a structural reason why empires tend not to last very long.
Redshift
The most maddening part to me (which, in keeping with the theme of this post, I try to call out whenever I can) is how areas of absolute Republican intransigence are treated as “not news” since they aren’t changing. So, for example, in stories about the deficit, everyone knows Republicans will oppose any tax increases, so that’s just treated as part of the background, rather than an insane position that makes it completely impossible to reduce the deficit.
Grrr…
licensed to kill time
@MikeJ:
It’s amusing to watch them picking through Sarah!’s tweeterscat for nuggets of meaning while anticipating that the Great Clarification is nigh.
TR
When the House Republicans read the part about how blacks only count as three-fifths of a person, do you think any of them will applaud?
Aside from Steve King, of course.
jayjaybear
@TR:
I think they should get Allen West to read that clause, personally.
Davis X. Machina
What kind of Vanguard of the Revolution are these losers trying to run? Doesn’t anybody still read What Is to Be Done? Have we forgotten the immortal words ‘Freedom of discussion; unity of action’? Where’s the love for democratic centralism? Did Vladimir Ilyich die in vain?
rikyrah
TR,
a whole group of them will applaud the 3/5ths compromise.
Mike Kay (Team America)
but the sarah palin thing is great blowback.
the infotainment channels love a freak show, and there’s no bigger WAMPA than palin.
the gop media created a monster to attack the dems, now that monster has gone rogue and wants to be president, which they know will end in a smashing down-ticket defeat.
Violet
@Dave:
Speaking of Jon Stewart, did you see that the 9/11 Responders made a point of thanking him for his doggedness in talking about the bill to get them coverage? Link to video.
Quote from 9/11 responder:
Chris
@TR:
Nah. Having lost that battle, their current line is to remind everyone how Democrats were the party of segregation, and Republicans the party of civil rights.
Which completely ignores the fact that the GOP basically left civil rights dead in the water for seventy years straight after the end of Reconstruction; that it took a Democratic President, Truman, to get the ball rolling again; that it was through the efforts of liberal Democrats that the big civil rights legislation was passed in the 1960s; that the Republicans who went along with them tended to be Northern, moderate, Rockefeller Republicans of the kind that also supported the New Deal and all that faggy socialist stuff; that the Goldwater wing of the GOP strenuously opposed the Civil Rights and Voting Rights Acts; and that the voters who used to be Democrats because of segregation ran away to the GOP in the 1960s and have been there ever since.
Conservatives are amazingly good at taking credit for the things they fought tooth and nail after they’re passed. In the year 2100, look to the conservatives for claiming that they were always for gay marriage and that in fact, all those people advocating gay rights in the twenty-first century would really be conservatives if they were alive today.
Dave
@Violet:
That sums up the problem in a nutshell. Rather than a “serious” journalist or news anchor, it took a comedian on a comedic news show to help push a serious piece of legislation into the public consciousness and into law.
The fucked-updedness of that is off the god-damned charts.
Mike Kay (Team America)
DADT will be a great wedge issue against the GOP.
Ask all of of the presidential candidates if as president they would ask congress to reinstate DADT, and if they say no, their taliban base will freak out and become demoralized, and if they say yes, they paint themselves as intolerant extremists.
DJShay
Oh yeah, we can demand, but the same people that refuse to inform us, are the gatekeepers of the what the average american gets to see. So we’re basically screwed. It’s a brick wall and calling John Roberts, Wolf Blitzer, Chuck Todd etc out on it does no good. Writing blog posts does no good because only we and our like minded friends will see it. So, if it’s “our responsibility”, what are we supposed to do to get these glaring inconsistencies and hypocrosies noticed if the gatekeepers of what America sees aren’t interested? The most watched cable news program lies to their viewers on an hourly basis and said viewers are so brainwashed, they’ll believe anything that comes out of those evil bastards’ mouths. I’m really serious about what you think is a solution. Not vague ideas like “organization” etc, but solid ideas. We’ve tried protesting on DC, but the “media” doesn’t cover it. So what are we supposed to do??? The people that read this blog already know what a crock the media is, so what is the plan to get the message out to my coworker with 3 kids, one who is 3 years old who works a full time job. Or the guy that sits next to her that works 2 jobs. These are the people that need to see and hear the GOPs shamelessness, but at this point, I don’t think there is a solution.
DJShay
@Violet: And you know what, they probably did look at themselves for about 2 minutes. Just like they did with Shirley Sherrod. And NOTHING HAS CHANGED.
Chris
@Dave:
In the olden days, I’ve read, when playwrights and the like wanted to get an unpopular or impolitic message through, they put it in the mouth of a court jester or someone of similarly unserious status. I suppose in some ways times haven’t changed all that much.
Parallel 5ths (Jewish Steel)
Sure.
When there’s only blog-level money in actual reporting…
MikeJ
@Chris:
the play ‘s the thing, wherein I’ll catch the conscience of the king.
Suck It Up!
I’m all for calling Republicans out but I still think the larger public needs to hear what’s going on. How do we get to the people watching Good Morning America? or Oprah? how do we get to the mainstream public? all we’re doing right now is preaching to the choir.
Nellcote
Everyone agrees that the Villagers=junk news.
But as Canacki mentioned upthread for example, there are responsible reporters that work for local papers that are still doing the work. I’d like to offer Bob Egelko from the SF Chronicle. He does mostly legal stories but is an exceptional explainer of complicated subjects.
Does anyone else have reporters they’d like to recommend who deserve credit for upholding journalistic standards?
trollhattan
@El Cid:
Speaking of the 14th Amendment, here’s the latest thinking on the pesky ol’ thing from Ronaldus Magnus’ gift that keeps on keepin’ on–Antonin Scalia:
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/44/2011/01/scalia-constitution-does-not-p.html?referrer=emaillink
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
I’m trying to figure out how to spread the word about how the Republicans fucked up the Texas budget. I might start putting paper under people’s windshield wipers here in Dallas.
Nellcote
@trollhattan:
from the link:
So why are the goopers reading the constitution into the congressional record again?
El Cid
@Dave: “All Southern white Christian males with long-form printed burf certifats…”
And they can add notes from Fat Tony Scalia:
Right. Just pass a law that prohibits discrimination against women. But that can be repealed. Better to propose a Constitutional Amendment prohibiting such, and though one failed, try it again. If nothing passes, well, fuck you, womenfolk, and get out of the god-damned work force where you don’t belong anyway, or at least stay secretaries like you were supposed to.
El Cid
@trollhattan: Great minds and all.
Dave
Hey, it’s the full text of the House GOP’s “Baby Wants His Bottle” health-care repeal. All two pages of it.
numbskull
@Dave: Simple. They will schedule the reading in parts. The 14th Amendment will be read at 3 am Saturday morning by a Republican from a relatively blue district. Alternatively, it will be read by a “guest” Blue Dog showing that the whole thing is bipartisan in nature. I lean towards the latter as it can then be used as a twofer.
El Cid
@Chris: It also conveniently fails to mention that the Democrats who opposed segregation literally changed to being Republicans.
Jesse Helms and Strom Thurmond didn’t start as Republicans. They started as Southern segregationist Democrats.
The response should be “The Democrats you blame as being segregationist are now you.”
numbskull
@Mike Kay (Team America):
I thought you were the one who didn’t believe in magic ponies.
JohnR
Exactly! I’m glad you’ve finally come around to my way of thinking! Now, I use my lunch-hour to chase people down near the bus station, and harangue them in my most spittle-flying way in order to inform them and call the Republicans out, but I’m sure you prefer your own techniques. Perhaps this blog could become a clearing house for the best methods that we can use in order to start an underground news-dissemination uprising against our Corporate overlords. I’m betting BoB has some good ones. Wolverines!
Chat Noir
@El Cid: I remember an episode of “The West Wing” where Ainsley Hayes said that there was no need for an Equal Rights Amendment because the 14th Amendment covered her just the same. Apparently not, per Nino Scalia.
El Cid
@Chat Noir: Well, this is why women shouldn’t get involved in politics. Or rather, why they shouldn’t be allowed.
me
@Dave: AKA the “You’ve got a preexisting condition? Fuck You! Act of 2011”.
stuckinred
House Republicans have appointed Rep. Virginia Foxx as chair of the subcommittee on higher education.
Observer
John, finally something you wrote that I can wholeheartedly agree with. Not that you cared.
Where I would tweak is this:
No, it’s never been the case in the past. Dems simply have never really embraced “taking it to the streets”. Veal pen and all that. This has been Somerby’s main point over the years on Social Security, education and other things. bascially, sure the press sucks, but Dem operatives suck more.
You don’t rely on the press, you do stuff and let the press react. Dems never got this. Still haven’t. It’s why the “liberal elites” tag has so much traction. The peeps hardly ever actually hear from liberals down in the trenches making a liberal argument; it’s always sanctimony and name calling.
One more convert is good. Welcome to the club.
tPirate
She’s going to wait and see what the reaction is and then tweet on her own. If she gains by saying she forwarded it because she agreed, then that’s what we’ll hear. If she thinks she gains most by saying she tweeted it in order to begin criticizing it, that’s what she’ll tweet.
IOW, “under” whose “bed”?
El Cid
More GOP lies I don’t think you’ll see on the front pages, because Darrell Issa is a lovable, reasonable moderate willing to do what he can to foster bipartisan work for the nation’s betterification.
Well, some critics say…
Still, we should probably go ahead and cut $125 billion from Medicare, because we all need to tighten our belts and return to our dignified Real American roots in home remedies.
MattR
@Dave: I assume the Republicans have the votes to pass that in the House so the real question is how many Senate Democrats will state that they oppose repealing HCR but that it deserves an up or down vote so they will not vote to sustain a filibuster? (EDIT: Yikes. For some reason my brain gave Republicans control of the Senate. Nevermind. I don’t see how this 2 page bill ever comes up for a vote in the Senate)
El Cid
@stuckinred: For whatever reason, I gave myself a few split seconds to hope that was a joke. Of course, no such luck.
Once we get rid of all the teachers’ unions and stop spending all this money on education and get a diversity of views on human evolution and stop being so anti-Confederate and put Ronald Reagan in as one of the Founding Fathers, America will return to the forefront of the world in not having all these book-learned elites wandering around and being snotty.
MikeJ
@El Cid: Improper payment can also be something as simple as entering the wrong code number for a procedure.
And if you tighten up regs to catch everything like that, then Issa and his ilk will be complaining about inefficiency and all the red tape required, etc. Ah, who am I kidding, they complain about it now. Self contradiction is never a problem for republicans.
Dave
@MattR: Hopefully all of them. I’d much rather the House’s idiotic bill be debated, in full, on prime-time, in the Senate, so the entire United States can hear about how Republicans want to reinstate losing your insurance for a pre-existing condition. I welcome that.
stuckinred
@El Cid: She was a university administrator, that explains a great deal.
Tim
I have a full time job, the proceeds of which I use to support myself, my dogs and my kids.
My free time I use to entertain myself and others, to cook or garden or whatnot, to exercise, to partake in the arts, or to relax as I see fit.
These pursuits take up and make up my life. It is not MY responsibility to do the jobs for which political types were elected (including raising holy hell with media types for not covering “their” side of the story), nor to cajole corporate media types whom I don’t follow to perform their tasks in ways contrary to their status as corporate whores, nor to waste my limited time in other frustrating, pointless pursuits.
Many of you here ENJOY your political/media involvement, much as I enjoy my amateur acting pursuits or playing tennis, but please don’t pretend we are all obligated somehow to do what you do for entertainment.
It took me a long time to see the futility of engagement in the American political system; I’ve wasted enough time there in the past. No more.
Mike Kay (Team America)
@El Cid: this should be turned into a tee vee commercial.
“gop wants to pull the plug on grandma and cut Medicare $125 billion dollars”.
Scare the fuck outta the low-info seniors.
that’s the way they would play it.
Mike Kay (Team America)
the dems should pull every delay tactic in the book and force the wingers to hold the vote in the middle of the night.
that’s what they did to use, and then they turned into a commercial: “dems pass bogey-man legislation in the dark of night”.
but not our congressional dems. the playbook is right there, but they to undisciplined to use it.
stuckinred
@Tim: Sounds like you are wasting your time here too dawg.
Mumphrey (formerly Renfrew Squeevil (formerly Mumphrey Oddison Yamm (formerly Mumphrey O. Yamm (formerly Mumphrey))))
@Chris:
There’s almost nothing a Republican can say to piss me off as much as that line. Shit. I get so sick of the “Democrats were against the Civil Rights Acts, Republicans were for it! And you’re all really still racists today, though you won’t admit it!”
Fucking Jesse Helms was a Democrat in the 50s and 60s. So was Strom Thrumond. I think Thurmond was still a Democrat when he filibustered the thing in 1964 or whenever it was. I believe he changed his party about the time Goldwater lost so badly in 1964, or right after, though it could have been sometime earlier in 1964, while the campaign was still going on. Anyway, the point is that he, and Helms, and a thousand other segregationist Democrats became Republicans soon after, and because of, Johnson’s backing the Civil Rights Bills.
Some switched right away; some didn’t switch for 10 or 20 or even 30 years; there are likely still a few segregationist Democrats alive today, guys who never switched parties, though by now my guess is that few if any are elected politicians anywhere. But the segregationist politicians who voted against the big bills in the 60s while they were Democrats are all Republicans today. I don’t get why that’s so hard to understand.
I know some of the blowhards, Limbaugh, the Wall Street Journal op-ed writers and editorial page editors, they do know this and spout it as a way of defending themselves when people rightly point out that the policies Republicans push are bad for minorities. It’s the idiots who listen to these clowns who actually believe this shit; and it’s hard for me to believe that anybody could be dumb enough to believe that shit. It’s like the truly believe Helms became an enlightened backer of civil rights as soon as he switched or something. I don’t know how anybody could be that dumb.
Mumphrey (formerly Renfrew Squeevil (formerly Mumphrey Oddison Yamm (formerly Mumphrey O. Yamm (formerly Mumphrey))))
@stuckinred:
And here I lways thought Republicans had no sense of humor or understanding of irony…
goblue72
@stuckinred: For a community college. She somehow managed to get a doctorate in education at UNC but managed to keep her unreconstructed self intact.
She’s a classic bitter old Southern biddy (a person’s face can tell you a lot & her face says a**hole) – Voted AGAINST aid to the victims of Katrina, voted AGAINST renewing the Voting Rights Acts, called HCR worse than terrorism and voted against the Matthew Shepherd Act calling it a hoax that he was murdered because he was gay.
She is, in her heart of hearts, evil to the core.
hueyplong
Mumphrey, take heart, voting trends fairly clearly indicate that not very many African-Americans fall for the “Democrats are the racists” line. It’s just the racists themselves who perpetuate it, and making them admit the truth won’t change anyone’s vote– theirs or ours.
El Cid
@MikeJ: Well, we all know that “entering the wrong code” is just, well, code-words for Democraps stealing the citizens’ money. Shoot, they actually tell doctors and such to enter the wrong codes so that they can purposefully steal more money from Good Hardworking Americans so as to give to fake people who are really ACORN Black Panther voter fraud thugs.
No, the only way to prevent this is to alert the public about how many ways that Democraps are stealing their money via Medicare and get the political establishment and punditariat to agree that this can’t be allowed to go on, and then remove $125 billion from Medicare.
Mumphrey (formerly Renfrew Squeevil (formerly Mumphrey Oddison Yamm (formerly Mumphrey O. Yamm (formerly Mumphrey))))
@hueyplong:
Oh, yes, I know that. I guess what offends me about it is the sheer idiocy of the argument. I mean, how dumb and ignernt do you have to be to believe that shit? Answer: Perty damned dumb and ignernt.
Mark S.
Shorter Colonel Mustard:
El Cid
@Mark S.: I know, right? No one ever prevented Antebellum Southern legislators from discriminating against white men too.
goblue72
@Tim: In the 5th century BC, Athenian citizens would be herded into the assembly by a red-stained rope – those who dawdled and got a red-stain on their clothes were fined. We all have an obligation to participate in a democracy. Otherwise, we are just acquiescing to our own servitude.
hueyplong
True, Mumphrey, but if your opponents are that stupid, then you should really take heart. Evil and smart is marginally scarier, I guess.
Wile E. Quixote
@Tim:
So what you’re saying is that you’re not a citizen in a democracy, you’re just a consumer. Yeah, this blog is the wrong place for you, why don’t you head over to Red State.
Chris
Yeah, I understand the rage.
The first time I ever heard that line was from a Southern white conservative friend who just couldn’t understand why black people didn’t vote Republican. The same friend will tell you unambiguously that she “doesn’t date nonwhite people” and that Caribbean people have destroyed South Florida.
Somehow, she never makes the connection. And the crazy thing is that people like her aren’t pretending; even though they flaunt their contempt for black people every chance they get, they’re still very sincerely bewildered that the blacks don’t vote for them.
Alex S.
@MikeJ:
But what does Sully think about it????
Lurking Canadian
@Dave:
They’ve convinced themselves that the “subject to the laws of the United States” part of the 14th Amendment means the children of illegal aliens are not citizens, because illegal aliens have diplomatic immunity and would not be tried if suspected of crimes. Or something.
Since Scalia appears to think it doesn’t even apply to WOMEN, he’ll probably go along with this madness, too.
Tim
@stuckinred:
.
Always with the wanting commenters you disagree with to go away. What is up with that?
Why can’t people OBSERVE politics as one observes sports, as an entertainment and for the purpose of learning, without directly participating, without making snotty folks like you get all snotty?
Tim
@Mike Kay (Team America):
Yes, exactly, and yet it doesn’t happen. Why do you think that is? And why would you support a party that doesn’t do this, which is part of their job?
Tim
@Wile E. Quixote:
Once again: why is it important to you to run off commenters you don’t agree with?
Davis X. Machina
@goblue72:
Solon’s earlier constitution provided “whoever, when the polis was in a state of stasis, failed to take up arms with either side should be deprived of civil status and have no part in the polis”. (Pseudo-Aristotle Athenaion Politeia 8.5)
Chris
I like it. The entire Republican establishment minus John McCain gets booted out of American Citizenship forever, and a bunch of illegal immigrants get to have their passports instead.
Sko Hayes
@goblue72:
The thing I remember Foxx for is a committee hearing while the Health Care debate was going on. She was questioning a doctor who was talking about the uninsured and lack of access to health care.
She told him in no uncertain terms that if people needed help, they could go to the emergency room, so even if they were uninsured, they had plenty of access to health care.
What a nasty piece of work.
abscam
@Tim: Because then we wouldn’t have to go to the trouble of skipping your boring self-centered comments.
El Cid
I don’t think it’s anyone’s “job” to work on political activity rather than engaging in it as entertainment, as one does recreation, etc.
Now, it’s simultaneously true that without significant numbers of people doing so, the status of the nation and its inhabitants will seriously degrade.
This is true of nearly any civic action which requires that current political policymaking be something different than what it is. There’s enormous amounts of evidence for this, for example, regarding any of the major societal reforms of the 20th century.
So it is no one’s job. But it appears to be true that without a significant number of people viewing the situation of the nation and themselves and others as a significant responsibility requiring time and effort outside of work, voting, and personal life and recreation, such citizen influences will not occur.
In this case, there is thus the problem of the free rider. Someone ought do these things, and sacrifice activities that they themselves would prefer to do — assuming that all those or even most involved in civic actions are doing so ‘because they like it’ — but it should not be those people who wish to do something else.
And, of course, this is the norm, that only a tiny sliver of the population takes any significant personal actions to affect policymaking. However, in certain cases that tiny amount of involvement can have quite significant effects.
Therefore, though no one who doesn’t actually have a paying job to influence political policymaking has a ‘job’ (duty, in other words) to invest their time and efforts and resources in such work unless they find it entertaining and interesting.
What is required in this case would seem to be either an intellectual dissent that historical evidence to the significance of non-professional civic actions on policymaking, or a moral argument that it is incumbent upon someone to involve themselves in non-personal or recreational activities but not upon oneself, or a different moral case that it would be as satisfactory or rewarding to accept policies made without the involvement of individuals who do not view civic involvement outside voting as entertaining and directly personally fulfilling.
And, of course, in any such discussion or inquiry at some point to define what various forms of truly personally costly politico-civic involvement might be, which would probably only minimally consist of reading and commenting on blogs.
Mike in NC
In other words, millions of unemployed adults with loads of time on their hands can now get busy home-schooling their children, or open up private academies! Another Republican win-win proposition.
Nick
@Poopyman:
I work for a newspaper and in the wake of the blizzard and the story that broke here in New York that Sanitation supervisors purposely slowed down plowing to fuck with Bloomberg and collect more overtime, every other newspaper blamed them and the unions and exonorated Bloomberg.
I got calls from Sanitation workers defending themselves, so of course I did a story presenting their side (even though it’s becoming increasingly clear a FEW Sanitation supervisors did purposely fuck up) and apparently I’m the only person in the City who listened to them.
Nick
@Bulworth:
in large teeming masses
Nick
@Mike Kay (Team America):
But this goes back to what John was saying, what good is staging political theater if no one will allow the audience to see it?
Nick
@Tim:
actually, yeah it is, that’s the whole point of democracy, otherwise we might as well just go for an authoritarian state, it’s cheaper
Nick
@Tim:
they can, it’s called authoritarianism.
Tim
@abscam:
So I’m interested to hear of how you have engaged the political process, not for your own pleasure and because it gives you a sense of belonging or fulfillment (which are rather “self centered” feelings, wouldn’t you say?), but selflessly and for the sake of all mankind. Thanks for sharing.
El Cid
@Tim: There need be no isolation of a sense of belonging or fulfillment and a shouldering of duty or burden which if not in his or her opinion necessary someone might rather not have to do. One doesn’t have to be some exaggerated figure of a saintlike monk or nun (i.e., the myth of Mother Theresa) in order to do efforts involving both.
Mike Kay (Team America)
@Tim:
who do you want me to support, tim? Kang and Kodos aren’t on the ballot.
Tim
@Nick:
Nick, as I’ve written many times here in the past, until 2004 I was an engaged Democrat. I was horrified when Bush stole the election in 2000 and Gore rolled over, but I kept it, and worked on John Kerry’s campaign in Fort Lauderdale. And then I got to sit at a Kerry speech and listen to him tell us all about how important “family values” were for us to adopt, blah blah blah and other Republican talking points, and I got to watch him fuck up his campaign and generally act like a loser and not contest or even highlight massive voting irregularities and hand Bush another bogus victory. and yeah, that’s when I checked out. I take a generally European style view of politics: Most politicians are crooks and liars, and it’s not worth my time to pretend otherwise as long as the status quo prevails. I have a life to attend to. I do not cast further pearls after swine, as would have been the case in working for Obama, who has been as much a sellout if not more, than I anticipated.
However, I have not succeeded in squelching my natural interest in politics, originally sparked during the watergate hearings when I was in high school. So I indulge them be reading about in online and visiting a few blogs. I actually thought for many years that most politicians acted on principal and meant what they said. Those of you who still believe that, after the dem evidence to the contrary in the last ten years, are of course free to hang onto your high school fantasies. But I have left mine behind, thank you.
Obama succeeded during the last two years of creating a lot more Dems who feel just as I do, and who made the rational decision not to vote in the midterms. But that is probably good news to you, as it allows you to feel even more engaged and self righteous than per usual.
You really need to grow up.
Also, too and by the way: for you politically engaged geniuses, the U.S. is not a “democracy” nor has it ever been, but a republic with lots of mechanisms to prevent the unwashed masses from truly having their will enacted.
abscam
@Tim: No, I really don’t think you are interested…but do drone on about yourself some more. I’m sure you will find that far more fascinating. Me, I’ll just have to keep skipping over them. Meh.
Tim
@Mike Kay (Team America):
Um…you don’t HAVE to support anybody…that’s kind of my point.
Mike Kay (Team America)
@Tim: http://sclipo.com/videos/view/kang-and-kodos
fast forward to the 7:22 mark.
Judas Escargot
@Tim:
Many of you here ENJOY your political/media involvement, much as I enjoy my amateur acting pursuits or playing tennis, but please don’t pretend we are all obligated somehow to do what you do for entertainment.
It took me a long time to see the futility of engagement in the American political system; I’ve wasted enough time there in the past. No more.
“A Republic, madam, if you can keep it.”
Won’t bother citing the quote. Wouldn’t want to bore you.
Mike Kay (Team America)
@Tim: then why are you here?
Tim
@abscam: @abscam:
It is interesting how you keep commenting on comments that you skipped over. How does one do that?
Nick
@Tim:
WTF kind of fuckockta version of “engaged” is this supposed to be? Sitting around listening to speeches doesn’t make you “engaged.”
You wanna know why Kerry’s speeches spouted Republican talking points? Because those who believe them were doing more than sitting around waiting for someone to give a speech they agree with.
Mike Kay (Team America)
@Tim:
and yet, you’re constantly posting on a political blog.
LOL, whatevers.
Tim
@Mike Kay (Team America):
please see my post #110.
I find politics interesting, fascinating sometimes. So read about and comment about it. Doesn’t mean I buy into its false premises.
Kang and Kodo are CORRECT, sir.
Tim
@Nick:
Nick, you moron. Please read my posts before responding. I WORKED on Kerry’s campaign. I went door to door canvassing and made phone calls from headquarters. Free tix to this speech were my “reward.” Please.
And your response is so typical of self righteous political geeks.
Tim
@Mike Kay (Team America):
yes, because it is an entertainment and hobby to me. This is not difficult to understand.
abscam
@Tim: Meh.
Nick
@Tim:
well it’s not for us Tim, so go watch a football game or something.
Merkin
@Tim:
Oh gee, so good of you to pop up every fourth year and make a few phone calls, we worship the fucking ground you walk on.
Some of us never stop being engaged, some of us make those calls not for a Presidential candidate every leap year, but for every issue we believe in, to Democrats, Republicans and Independents. We write letters, sign petitions, march across bridges, it’s called advocacy and I see you want none of it.
A candidate isn’t what we fight for. S/he is merely a means to an end. It’s issues we fight for.
Nick
@Tim:
actually, that’s false, just about the same number of Democrats voted in this midterm as in the last.
Tim
@Nick:
Well, actually I often watch sports AND read blogs. I’m amazing that way.
So I’ll stay, but thank you for the invitation to leave.
DFer
I’m amazed none of you can’t obviously tell Tim is merely a troll here to fuck with you all.
No one gets that defensive over someone suggesting you’re wasting your time. He just wants to start fights. Ignore him.
Bill Murray
@Mike Kay (Team America): Kang and Kodos are a little too moderate for the Tea Party as they want to eat all humans, not just liberals. plus they are quantum Presbyterians. or possibly Jewish
amk
One bitter fact is two bit hacks populate the third rate fourth estate who are truly the fifth columnists.
And oh Tim, stop trolling with the same whiny POS. We get it. Obama is teh suck.
Nick
@Tim:
fine, read, just don’t come in here and piss in our coffee, ok? If you’re not interested in being a part of something, then sit there and shut up.
Tim
@Nick:
haha…wow. I wasn’t aware Cole’s blog was officially an arm of the Democratic party.
Oh wait, it’s not.
I’ve been “trolling” here for about five years now, so…uh…fuck you, dipshit. if you need a place to go where everyone thinks like you or you come unglued, you are a sad case.
amk
@Tim: tut, tut, tut. Poutrage worthy of a four year old.
And wipe the crumbs off your keyboard, tim. Your immaturity is showing.
Tim
@Merkin: @Merkin:
wow, i bet your personal, actual life in the sphere in which you could really have some influence, sucks.
Tell me, what is it you are trying to avoid by throwing yourself with such abandon into “issues” advocacy? Loneliness? Despair? Lack of romance? Addiction? Abandonment issues from childhood? Obama can’t help you there, though I’m sure he’d say he could if it could help get him elected.
It always surprises me to be reminded how much of a little fantasy world many of you build in your heads around Balloon Juice. IT’S NOT A REAL PLACE, PEOPLE!
Mnemosyne
Shorter Tim: I was a Democrat until 9/11, and now I’m outraged about Chappaquiddick.
Same old song and dance, slightly refurbished talking points.
Tim
amk
@Tim: Really ?
And yet you have the maximum posts in this thread. And to top it all, all of them are stupid. Talk about being delusional.
Tim
@Mnemosyne:
uh…yeah, that’s it exactly. You’re so concise the way you cut thru my bullshit.
Tim
@amk:
the difference would be that I don’t pretend I’m changing the world by coming here to shoot the shit or read comments or write them.
I’m just shooting the shit and reading comments or writing them, or reading posts.
I’m not fantasizing that I’m “making Obama do it!” like you geeks.
Mnemosyne
@Tim:
Hey, if you don’t want people pointing out that you’re recycling the same tired bullshit we’ve been hearing from the Yoostabees for the past 10 years, then come up with a new schtick.
El Cid
@Tim:
True in many ways, but it’s enough of a democracy to keep the upper class elites continually investing in efforts to control it. And they don’t always win as much as they would prefer, and upper classes don’t like to give up any amount of money and power at all, even if we think it’s reasonable.
Sounds pretty sad, but such differences certainly mean a whole hell of a lot to different people.
Rightly or wrongly, however, I think there is a difference (to whatever degree someone might choose to acknowledge) between someone who has at times devoted efforts to some sort of civic betterment and those who never ever do. Or who might vary the degree. There have been years and years when I was heavily involved with local stuff apart from work etc., and though in many ways rewarding, a lot of it was behind the scenes shit work, but it’s not always as easy with different jobs, etc. This is just reality. It’s not amazing or heroic or monastic of me, but there you go. I don’t encounter people in my work life etc. who have ever done things like that for political reform purposes, but some certainly do invest a lot of time for church or school or youth or sport related stuff.
On the other hand, I’ve known some working class white and black and Latino ‘activists’ who sure as hell could have spent more time with their family and kids than burning themselves out / renewing their inspiration after their one or even two jobs in order to do something else for their community or someone’s needs and fight for some sort of legislation or policy or candidate too. Most of them just would be confused at the notion that such activities were optional — until some of them faced some situation or burned out. But that often was after they had done a hell of a lot of good, which they paid prices for.
I certainly ain’t lecturing anyone on what they should or shouldn’t do, I just take issue with a notion that civic involvement (or whatever name or terms someone prefers so that I don’t have to list 8 billion variations) is mainly another form of entertainment. Though, it might be for a lot of people. Especially since if the tiny slice of the population devoted to various policy and community struggles saw it the same way, we’d have gone even faster to that hell in our handbasket.
If I didn’t have a computer with me at work and/or be able to switch back and forth briefly to blogs, I wouldn’t do this, but I find it entertaining for whatever reason, and I don’t mistake blog commenting as some real sort of policy or community affecting work. Which isn’t to say that some people might not add such value because of their research or actual involvement to make it so, but that isn’t me.
Tim
@Mnemosyne:
Maybe if you’ve been hearing this for ten years, and not just from me, then there might be a little something to it? Just a bit? Maybe?
And why is it ok for you types to keep recycling your fantasies without my alleged fantasies as a counterpoint?
That just wouldn’t be right.
Tim
@El Cid:
Thank you, El Cid, for that very thoughtful and thought-provoking response. I appreciate it.
Nick
@Tim: If you had been more “engaged,” you’d know that that type of dropoff is typical in a midterm election and actually in this case, that 29 million, or a little more than a third, is actually quite good for a midterm election, when the drop offs normally approach half, as they did in 1982 (Reagan), 1986 (Reagan) and 1994 (Clinton).
Merkin
@Tim:
WTF kind of response is this?
Nick
@Tim:
when did I say Cole’s blog is an arm of the Democratic Party? We’re not advocates for Democrats, we’re advocates for issues that a few, some, or all Democrats fight for. When they don’t support them, we call them out, when they do, we praise them (often to the mocking of idiots like you)
Did Democrats kill your puppy or something?
El Cid
@Nick: Yes, this is a fact which simply vanished from discussion. The turnout was pretty much as would have been predicted from typical mid-term turnout, as far as Democratic voters, but if I recall (I’m not looking it up) it was higher among at least a few Republican demographics. I don’t blame people for hoping that somehow, maybe via some organizational work which I don’t think had organizations to do it, miraculous turnouts might have stopped the GOPtard neo-Confederate oldster hordes.
Of course, that would have confused us about the fact that Americans Sent A Clear Message To Obama And The Democrats, That They Were Tired Of Obama And The Democrats Ramming Their Massive Packages Down America’s Throat.
You may be interested in the subgroup breakdown of the recent Gallup Presidential Approval Rating poll which showed Obama at 50% approval (single day) again. (Race, sex, region, income, etc.) average Dec. 27 – Jan. 02 was 48% approval, 44% disapproval.
Out of all the subgroups broken down, the strongest approvals included (there are more):
All identifiers are based on survey responder’s self-identification with Gallup categories.
Blacks, 88%
Liberal Democrats 85% to a ‘low’ of 73% among Conservative Democrats
18 – 29 yo, 65%
Postgraduates, 59%
Not married, 57%
Moderates, 55%
Attend Church Wkly/Monthly, 54%
Region of Country: East, 52%
Same but Seldom/Never, 51%
Female, 50%
Income under $2,000/mo, 50%
On the low end, some interesting ones:
Conservative Republican, 9%
Conservative, 27%
Liberal to Moderate Republican, 27%
White, 39%
Married, 40%
Attend Church Weekly, 42%
‘Pure Independent,’ 43%
Region: South, 45%
Interestingly, the Southern approval rating was at its recent low of 39% in mid-December, and has since gained. The South (any race) had a strong majority approval rating until Stalin Summer of July 2009, then zoomed back up to a near 50% in early May 2010, and dipped below 45% in early June and only now has recovered there.
Mnemosyne
@Tim:
You have no idea what a Yoostabee is, do you?
Try Googling this: “I didn’t leave the Democratic Party, it left me.”
Tim
@Mnemosyne:
No, little Memmie, I know what a yoostabee is. It’s a very cute nickname by the way.
A Humble Lurker
@Tim:
So you’re basically a nihilist, right? I’ve always wanted to ask a nihilist this: if nothing matters, than doesn’t nothing mattering not matter? So your case doesn’t matter. So than why argue your case at all, if it doesn’t matter?
Tim
@A Humble Lurker:
YOU say I’m a “nihilist.” OK. I say the sky is lime green. Now what?
Where did I say that nothing matters? LOTS of things matter, at least to me if not to you.
You pull a label and a false premise out of thin air, then pose a pseudo-philosophical question to me which has nothing to do with me or what I wrote in my comments.
Interesting…but why?
Work on reading comprehension.
matoko_chan
Get. A. Fucking. Clue. Cole.
right here on your blog the vets had a hissy fit meltdown when i TRUTHFULLY pointed out that the Epic Fail of the Grand Misadventure of the Manifest Destiny of Judeo-xian Democracy in the ME (aka COIN and the Bush Doctrine) was REALLY A WAR ON ISLAM, not a Global War on Terror as advertised.
AND this will continue until the WECs and the greys and the teabaggers die off and the demographic timer on non-hispanic caucs and Salam-Douthat stratification on cognitive ability reshape the electorate.
meanwhile back at the Wikileaks ranch cablegate continues……drip drip drip goes the paranoia induction.
Mossad Assassins credit card numbers.