DON’T GET MAD! GET EVEN: DEFEAT WINGNUTS EVERYWHERE (Pt. 1)

From zizi2, reprinted with permission:


DON’T GET MAD! GET EVEN: DEFEAT WINGNUTS EVERYWHERE (Pt. 1)

*ACTION DIARY*

Listen folks! If Halperin’s juvenile antics this past week confirmed anything at all, it is the fact that we should expect even more of this venal behavior from these mediocre silver-spooned DC gate-keepers who will continue to spew right wing ideological gunk cooked up in the dens of America’s corporate powerbrokers, from their gilded beltway media perches. The incorporation of celebrity “journalists” (that label is pointless!!) and their entire media retinue into the plutocratic corps has been the single most damaging blow to our democracy. They render the “public” in Public Square moot. All we have is simulacra.

Beware, Halperin’s job is to distract us, to shift our focus from the Repug economic and Social Safety net destruction agenda. They will do a whole lot more distracting until the election. WE. CANNOT. LOSE. FOCUS!!! We are in an existential war. Our adversaries are a dimwitted but dangerous cabal of right wing media lackeys, corporate boardroom retrogrades, and their puppets in political office. They don’t want the Republic itself to survive with us the 98% who are not super-wealthy thriving in it. When you are dealing with a faction that has told us who make up America, loud and clear that they will detonate Weapons of Mass Destruction unless we surrender everything including our lives to them, you better believe them. They are not bluffing. They mean it. This is no hyperbole.


And when you have a corporate media that tells us to “cave” to our destruction (as Jessica Yellin did on CNN), this is no longer an eye-roll moment. It is an asymmetrical war. We have to work harder, smarter, stealthier, and twice as long to BUILD the tiniest of advances, while they can flunk and grift their way to political power just do DESTROY. Yeah the fact that a sizeable portion of this country gives a platform to the Palins, Bachmans, McCains, Rick Scotts, Scott Walkers, Snyders et. al. should tell us all we need to know about how steep our climb ALWAYS is.

Read more »

Keith Olbermann Leaves MSNBC and Progressives Lose a Voice

I am not entirely shocked by Olbermann's departure from MSNBC this week. The timing is perplexing, but not so much the thought that Olbermann would be leaving. The writing, so to speak, was on the wall.

Another reason that it was not a shock is because it backs up my belief that establishing Progressive voices and a Progressive media infrastructure in this Country seems almost impossible. This has been the case for the past few decades. It is difficult for Progressive media to really take root.

I suspect that part of the reason for Olbermann's difficulty...and the problem with MSNBC as a whole has to do with the fact that it is hard to embark on a truth-telling enterprise using a purely corporate for-profit model. There are too many divergent and conflicting viewpoints & interests among stakeholders, which guarantees the butting of heads.

The Olbermann fiasco also exposes what most who have been paying attention already knew.... but exposes it for more to see - that there is a clear double standard in news/political media in this Country. Progressives and even Centrists (like most at CNN) are held to one standard, while Fox News, and Conservative talk radio (collectively the Republican media) is held to a completely different standard. In an organization like MSNBC/NBC (and now Comcast)... There is no loyalty to truth... all loyalty is reserved for shareholders. At NBC, there are so many different people to answer to. The ideology of board members, the company President, VP's, Department managers, executive producers etc, may not match up with the world view of the host. In fact, I would venture to guess that many of those higher ups are Republicans. So it is hard to create the conditions for good synergy. The experiment was doomed from the start. This is the fundamental cause of the double standard. This is why everything that a Keith Olbermann, a Rick Sanchez , a Rachel Maddow or Ed Schultz...or any other Progressive host says is examined down to the atom level. Company execs are overly sensitive about everything and are in a constant state of paranoia, because they don't want to get in trouble with shareholders or with the bullies of the media - the Right wing Republican media- which dominates the airwaves.

Progressives like Keith Olbermann are sent packing (often fired immediately) for minor - even trivial - issues, while Fox and Conservative talk radio hosts are allowed to make the most outlandish, ugly, racist & offensive comments as a matter of routine...and are allowed to stick around. Why? Because at Fox and with AM radio, the synergy is impressive. Everyone from Rupert Murdoch to Roger Ailes, and the executive producers down to the hosts are, more often than not, generally on the same page ideologically. Everyone has bought into the belief system of the organization. All of the stakeholders support the mission.

This double standard puts Progressive media at a distinct disadvantage. This is why there should be an effort to build Progressive media from the ground up. Progressives need their own media infrastructure that does not leave those like Keith Olbermann (and his supporters) beholden to the interests of a corporation.

Countdown was one of the few political news programs that I really enjoyed watching on a regular basis. Although I would prefer to see something more along the lines of a 60 minutes... (call me old school). We need more serious, trusted, investigative reporting. But I enjoyed Keith Olbermann's contribution.

I have a funny feeling that he won't be the only host leaving. When you get rid of the Captain of the ship.... the man who had the top political program in the line-up... well that to me is an indication that the execs at NBC may be looking at other changes. Part of it may be a reaction to the results of the November elections. MSNBC is one of those networks that reshapes itself based on the changing winds. Again... it goes back to the corporate business model... there is nothing that drives any ideological belief system..no mission based on values like honor, truth, etc... the only belief system driving these cable networks is the belief system of making money.

Here are his final remarks on Countdown. According to whispers on the twittersphere.... he may be interested in going back into sports broadcasting..... wow. Interesting. But I can't say I would blame him if he did decide to go back into sports. The American voting public is a source of disappointment & hopelessness for me... not to mention the politicians who are supposed to serve in the public interests. I can definitely see why people would want to get out of politics.

The Idiocy of American News Media

I find myself agreeing with this point (almost reluctantly) about the fiasco surrounding the BP Chairman's comments & how American media too often diverts attention to the wrong issues, wasting precious time that could be spent educating/informing the public on much more important facts and events. Just to be clear though, I basically hate BP & companies like it and am not a fan of the practices of greedy corporations. (anyone who has read this blog for more than 6 months should know how I view corporations). So i'm not defending them one bit.

But this comes at a time when the mainstream news media (more & more a venue for info-tainment) already spends too much time on nonsensical non-news stories on the level of cats stuck in trees. (this is national news i'm referring to..even in times of crisis/turmoil). I have contacted news agencies on a few occasions over the years to get them to cover real news... only to be told that they weren't interested. This is one reason why I lost respect for mainstream news (or for what imitates news & journalism these days) and decided to start blogging.

This is why Americans are clueless about oil spills in Nigeria, war & genocide in Sudan and Congo (several orders of magnitude worse than in Kosovo...for which Bill Clinton was willing to start WWIII), the ongoing Cold War in Central Asia and the Caucusus, life for troops in Iraq & Afghanistan, modern day slavery, the American health care system and American Democracy as compared to other nations, the time leading up to the financial crisis and how Bernie Madoff Made-off w/ so much money, Americas upcoming day of reckoning regarding its ballooning debt (what could be coming will make 2008-09 appear minor), the shady oil & mining industries, the lack of labor protections/labor regulations to protect workers, etc, etc.

As far as the news business is concerned, I wish we could go back to the days of Ed Bradley, Walter Cronkite & Bernard Shaw. Unfortunately, a lot of the really good journalists who are still left have had to go online and/or independent, and can't reach a wide audience. It just seems that with the Fox News Faux News model leading the way, we are stuck in a race to the bottom in terms of news coverage... and we have a less informed/educated populace as a consequence.

Kucinich Drops Out of the Race, But....

Kucinich has announced that he is dropping out of the Race for the Democratic nomination for President. Although he was never a serious candidate, actually winning the White House was probably not his true goal. His goal was to try to keep the other candidates honest...or at least to the extent that he could. And in that mission, he did well. Once he saw how the media and certain candidates used the courts to block his participation, he may have felt that his mission was probably done.... at least in terms of being a candidate. Hopefully he will continue to highlight the lies of candidates in both Parties.

How would Kucinich have done in that Nevada debate? What would he have said? Since Kucinich was blocked from the debate, Amy Goodman from Democracy Now gave him an opportunity to take part in the debate anyway, and allowed him to say what he might have said if he had the chance.

Listen Here

Dennis Kucinich Speaks About His Exclusion from the Nevada Debate

Hear a brief interview with Dennis Kucinich, where he talks about his lawsuit against MSNBC.

He made some great points, despite silly questions from the host.

He pointed out the fact that media organizations should not be in the business of deciding who the President is going to be.

Corporate Elite Fear Candidate Edwards

By Kevin Drawbaugh / Reuters

WASHINGTON - Ask corporate lobbyists which presidential contender is most feared by their clients and the answer is almost always the same -- Democrat John Edwards.

The former North Carolina senator's chosen profession alone raises the hackles of business people. Before entering politics, he made a fortune as a trial lawyer.

In litigious America, trial lawyers bring lawsuits against companies on behalf of aggrieved individuals and sometimes win multimillion-dollar settlements. Edwards won several.

But beyond his profession, Edwards' tone and language on the campaign trail have increased business antipathy toward him. His stump speeches are peppered with attacks on "corporate greed" and warnings of "the destruction of the middle class."

He accuses lobbyists of "corrupting the government" and says Americans lack universal health care because of "drug companies, insurance companies and their lobbyists."

Despite not winning the two state nominating contests completed so far, with 48 to go, Edwards insists he is in the race to stay. An Edwards campaign spokesman said on Thursday that inside-the-Beltway operatives who fight to defend the powerful and the privileged should be afraid.

"The lobbyists and special interests who abuse the system in Washington have good reason to fear John Edwards.

"Once he is president, the interests of middle class families will never again take a back seat to corporate greed in Washington," said campaign spokesman Eric Schultz.

Open attacks on the business elite are seldom heard from mainstream White House candidates in America, despite skyrocketing CEO pay, rising income inequality, and a torrent of scandals in corporate boardrooms and on Wall Street.

But this year Edwards is not alone. Republican candidate Mike Huckabee, former governor of Arkansas, sometimes also rails against corporate power and influence, tapping a populist current that lies just below the surface of U.S. politics.

One business lobbyist, who asked not to be named, said Edwards "has gone to this angry populist, anti-business rhetoric that borders on class warfare ... He focuses dislike of special interests, which is out there, on business."

Another lobbyist said an Edwards presidency would be "a disaster" for his well-heeled industrialist clients.

After this week's New Hampshire primaries, where he placed a distant third behind New York Sen. Hillary Clinton and Illinois Sen. Barack Obama, Edwards might not seem so scary. He ran second in the Iowa Democratic caucuses last week, trailing Obama and just ahead of Clinton.

Edwards suffered a blow on Thursday when Massachusetts Democratic Sen. John Kerry snubbed him and endorsed Obama. Edwards was Kerry's vice-presidential running mate in Kerry's failed Democratic bid for the White House in 2004.

BUSINESS'S FAVORITE UNCLEAR

Asked which candidate their clients most support, corporate lobbyists were unsure. Clinton has cautious backing within the corporate jet set, as do Arizona Republican Sen. John McCain and former Republican Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, they said.

These candidates represent stability to executives who have much to lose if November's election brings about the sweeping change some candidates are promising.

Obama and Huckabee register largely as unknown quantities among business owners, both large and small, say lobbyists.

"My sense is that Obama would govern as a reasonably pragmatic Democrat ... I think Hillary is approachable. She knows where a lot of her funding has come from, to be blunt," said Greg Valliere, chief political strategist at Stanford Group Co., a market and policy analysis group.

But Edwards, Valliere said, is seen as "an anti-business populist" and "a trade protectionist who is quite unabashed about raising taxes."

"I think his regulatory policies, as well as his tax policies, would be viewed as a threat to business," he said.

"The next scariest for business would be Huckabee because of his rhetoric and because he's an unknown."

From Reuters

(Reporting by Kevin Drawbaugh; editing by John Wallace)

_______________________

This just supports my earlier comments regarding the media's motive for blocking out John Edwards from the political race....and from the American political conscience entirely. I have mentioned before that Corporate America along with the Republican establishment were scared to death of John Edwards and his message.

The U.S. media is owned and controlled by some of the biggest Corporations in the World, and they would have a problem with many of Edwards's proposed policies.

_________________________

Related Posts

Media Blackout Continues for John Edwards

A Look at the Media's Coverage of the Primaries- John Edwards Blackout confirmed

The Impact of Corporate Media

The media that sold the War in Iraq, is the same media that determines who will be President of the United States.

Amy Goodman - Excerpts from Media In Time Of War Speech


Amy Goodman - Independent Media in a Time of War Documentary


The Garbage that is Big Media


The Importance of Independent Media