DISQUS

Bose · 1 year ago

Not-so-soft bigotry of low expectations, anyone?

shrrrr · 1 year ago

If the media does not wake up soon and report the truth, their kids will inherit a third world country.

cowboyneok · 1 year ago

Republican deregulation and consolidation of media. NOW do some understand why the 2000 elections were so important? Just one reason why that election helped take us down this Corporate Fascist path. We've got to get the pendulum swinging the other way or we will have lost our nation our Founding Fathers envisioned to a bunch of neo-con Republican elitist entitled garbage!

Besides, I can see why some in the media would be attracted to a Third World way of living. The countries I've visited have the HAVES walled off from the HAVE NOTS. It is what I see our country moving to. Next step is to have walled off communities where only the few and "beautiful people" get to live. Visit any third world country and you will experience what I'm describing. Those Republicans in power love that model of living.

shrrrr · 1 year ago

I've lived in Central America since 2002. You're spot on.

cowboyneok · 1 year ago

I lived on and off in the Dominican Republican for about three years when I was a young child. I lived in Puerto Rica, and have helped build homes for the poor in Nicaragua. Its so obvious to me those who exploit the "little people" are trying to do this in our country now.

Upland_Oddball · 1 year ago

If Obama does win this farcical election, he can be conciliatory to the GOP in any number of ways but ONE....He has to go after the FCC and clean house. Once the media realizes that a new FCC will not play patsy to their rapacious demand for more consolidation, but actuallly acts to break up media monopolies, the Networks, CNN, MSNBC, FOX and others will change accordingly. Keith will be back. They can't help it, the media managers, they will bend to any wnd, even from the left. Spineless creatures as they are.

kidkostar · 1 year ago

Agreed. It's also odd (and demeaning) the way they refer to her as being locked-up and in complete control of the McCain campaign, as though she is incapable of acting on her own. And she is supposed to be a governor (someone the American people should believe is qualified to assume the presidency) yet she cannot speak for herself, she cannot schedule news conferences herself, she can't even give an simple interview?

Furthermore, during the Republican convention, Andrea Mitchell reported that Cindy McCain and Laura Bush were briefing Palin on how to handle the media. Say what? Is Palin running for first lady or vice president? Did Obama send Biden to talk with Hillary and Tipper Gore to prep him for his position? More to the point, would anyone who had the drive and determination necessary to be a successful leader on the world stage, take to being cast as a weak person who doesn't need briefings from their running mate but from their running mate's spouse? No way. No how. No McCain/Palin.

sukabi1 · 1 year ago

shrrrr, and what would the incentive be for the "media" to wake up and "report the truth"? What exactly do you think would suddenly make them have a "change of heart"? All the gasbags "reporting" the "news" are filthy rich and know that they and their families will be taken care of -- as long as they "go along"...

So how do you propose to make them change?

cowboyneok · 1 year ago

The only way we little people can make them change is for us to do something they can not help but report. We have to start doing things the old fashioned way, like marches and rallies in DC and big cities. Protests, etc. They are doing a good job suppressing information about that, and the journalists they jailed at RNC but if its big enough they have to cover it.

sukabi1 · 1 year ago

yes, but then you're in the "if a tree falls in the forest, and no one hears it -- does it make a sound?" land... which is what has been going on for the last 8 years.... millions of folks HAVE marched in this country -- and have been ignored --- which is why they have been able to keep the perception alive for so long that Bush was popular, that the elections have been "fair" yada, yada, yada....

So, the question remains how do you break through, or go around the media blackout?

shrrrr · 1 year ago

Is it possible Obama has actually done it, to a degree.? That campaign has raised its money over the tubes and in small increments. "the media, had nothing to do with it. Maybe that's a crack in the wall?

sukabi1 · 1 year ago

He and his campaign have raised a huge amount of money from many small donors, and continue to do so...

BUT, the media is still managing the "perception" that McCain is running a close campaign and that his support among the people is about equal to Obama's... they manage the "perception", and that is the key. What people "perceive" to be true and what is factually true are different things.

shrrrr · 1 year ago

That perception is backed by current national polls, and all that. Pure hype, for sure.

I'm hoping, and its kinda weak, that just enough folks do get it, as evidenced thru our new media, the new ways to raise funds, and new way to spread info quickly...and so on. A round-a-bout-way around the media. Seems to be working, somewhat.

sukabi1 · 1 year ago

Yeah and they are the same polling companies who have been caught repeatedly skewing their polls... and yet the media happily keeps using those companies to REINFORCE the PERCEPTION.

So Obama constantly draws huge crowds, raises massive amounts of money -- all from small donors, has an actual message and policy positions and he's running neck and neck -- according to the media and polls -- with McCain who up until last week couldn't draw a crowd larger than 3000 folks, hasn't been able to raise money -- except from a few large corporate donors, doesn't have a clear position on ANYTHING other than he's a "maverick" and a POW --- Really? Does that make sense to anyone? Oh, but we're supposed to swallow it because that's what the "media" says.

A non-functioning press wouldn't be as much of a problem as it is currently IF the voting process hadn't been so thoroughly corrupted and privatized. As it is, the media sells the "horse-race" election, the voters go push their buttons, the media calls the election, and the private vote companies "tally" the vote.... but you can't see or verify the results -- you have to take their word for it.

shrrrr · 1 year ago

sukabi, I know, I know. Been reading Brad for years.

See? We are both plugged in. There are millions, and millons plugged in too. Thats all I'm saying. Yes, the media spins....and continues to think it owns the message, but it does not own it. Not completely. Our ranks are growing.

Hope that's enough to win.

sukabi1 · 1 year ago

Someone said "Hope is not a strategy"... and after 8 years of circling the drain, it's past time to break the media's "perception machine"... just trying to figure out how... I do know though, that continuing to treat them like they are ANYTHING BUT A PROPAGANDA ORGAN is a self-defeating strategy.

shrrrr · 1 year ago

Agreed.

shrrrr · 1 year ago

Fair question but I dunno. If old fashion human decency has not worked yet, I don't what will. I do think some of these jokers could some day be thought of as traitors to their country.....you know, when their kids (and the rest of the world) studys what happened here. Seriously.

cowboyneok · 1 year ago

Yep, whats good for the boys ought to be good enough for the girls... Not asking her questions REEKS of sexism. They are saying because she is a woman, she needs a nicer media. She can't handle it like the big boys!

sukabi1 · 1 year ago

cowboyneok, is there a schedule for McCain to haul Ms. Palin out of the closet ... as in do we know where they are going to be making "campaign photo op stops"? Since they are worried about the boys beating up on the little woman, it would be nice to get a bunch of "little women" to show up at their "events" and question the hell out of her... can't get too upset if she's just answering women's questions... THAT wouldn't be sexist in any way, shape or form.

cowboyneok · 1 year ago

Well, if the post from that family in NM who had the temerity to ask questions is any indication, Sarah either won't answer or she will hopefully BLOW IT. McCain, of course, does not answer questions to any "little people." He doesn't answer anything that might prove he isn't right for our country. Damned good Washington insider, that John Bush!

I do agree some women journalists ought to go after her!

sukabi1 · 1 year ago

I guess what I'm suggesting is trying to track down their photo op schedule and organize a bunch of "little women" to ask her questions...

cowboyneok · 1 year ago

Bill Maher just produced a commercial called "Mommy and me: Home Pregnancy Tests!" LOL!

unrepentant_expat · 1 year ago

I do agree some women journalists ought to go after her!
cowboyneok

A Helen Thomas, Rachel Maddow tag team?

Upland_Oddball · 1 year ago

Yes, having Thomas and Maddow dismember her credibility would be fitting revenge for all the she-wolves she has machine-gunned from helicopters. What a sport!

unrepentant_expat · 1 year ago

What might be sexist is the way the McCain campaign is treating Palin

Yah, really think its McCain calling the shots? I mean it must have come to him as quite a shock to find out he'd chosen Barracutie as a VP.

Upland_Oddball · 1 year ago

The Obama/Biden campaign needs to be heard on this. They should be getting on the MSM's case about giving Palin such kid glove treatment. She is in the big leagues now, so she has to face it all on a daily basis. It is 100% sexism to let McCain get away with this. But the MSM has its gonads in jars, so it has to be shamed by an equally powerful force that could end up controlling the FCC. That's you, Obama/Biden. Get off your asses and fight for equal treatment by the media!

Wesinoregon · 1 year ago

I watched, painfully, the special on Fox about Palin. It sure was spinning at it's best. Those people are lost in a kitchen. And the hamburger they made for one of the little girls was gross. Black (burned) meat on dry bread, with just a thin slice of lettice.

DCinDC · 1 year ago

The McCain camp wants to get their lies straight. Like criminals they need to form a cover story that sounds real and say it all together. If they let Palin speak now you might hear something McCain/Rove do not want you to hear. I sincerely believe Palin is a Rove plant to be in the McCain administration to continue Bush/Cheney policies.

jobaby · 1 year ago

There's a hilarious thread over on one of Ebay's discussion boards ...
"Photoshopping Sarah Palin" ...it goes on for like 4 or 5 pages...

http://forums.ebay.com/db1/thread.jspa?threadID...

Bostonian_Queer_in_Dallas · 1 year ago

I think we are all much too concerned about the MSM. They are irrelevant now. They are not reporting on the numbers of people at Obama rallies nor on the surge in Dem voter registration. The MSM appeals to seniors. Most people under forty are now using the internet for their information. These "close numbers" reports may actually be a total joke on the GOP. Unintentional but a joke nevertheless. We have to be hopeful. If the turnout for Obama is big, they cannot rig this one.

MNUSA · 1 year ago

McCain's pick of his "Babe in the Woods" is a cynical one. They have two months until the general election. They've solidified their base, the right wing fanatics, now, if they stall long enough, they can make it to the election before anyone really finds out anything about her. She also takes the scrutiny off him. Now they'll begin her re-education and only release her the process is completed. Of course she's not ready to face the serious issues that will have to be dealt with in the next four years. But that isn't the issue. In the Rovian style, winning matters, performance doesn't.

kirkaracha · 1 year ago

She's a self-described pit bull with lipstick, and she called Hillary Clinton a whiner when Clinton complained about sexism.

ydthin · 1 year ago

There is a reason she's "self-described" as a pit bull, because her tactics are more quid pro quo behind the scenes dealing than about being strong and powerful. She's a shrewd manipulator, and people like that aren't ever really 'hard-core' types, they are just soul-less prostitutes.

CPL · 1 year ago

She is to be treated with "Due Deference" but not "Due Diligence".

McCain is NOT BUSH/CHENEY and shouldn't have the same sort of power over what is considered to be the mainstream media. Ugh.

ydthin · 1 year ago

yeah, well, there's that, and the comment below is an example of the kind of sexism no one is talking about but it's the most blatant. Where are the indignant men who rail about Hardees and PC (personal computer in this case) commercials being cloying and sexist and stereotypical in their portrayal of men as oafs with one-track minds...what they are saying to men with this candidate is 'we know you will like her because she's sexy/hot/a babe'...are American men really that stupid? I understand those qualifications are important when choosing calendar girls, porn actresses, pop stars and sadly, these days, tv journalists, but are we willing to risk bra size over substance even when it comes to the highest office in the nation? It's such a stupid move, I can't believe more men aren't ticked off, because it really is incredibly insulting.

sukabi1 · 1 year ago

Some douche, I think it was Deutche said the other day (and this IS how they are selling her as VP) something like, "She's a feminist. She's a babe, you want your VP to be someone you could come home to.... I'd like to lay down with her at night"

So, now instead of your president being someone that you'd like to have a beer with, your VP is supposed to be someone you'd like to fuck...

Wesinoregon · 1 year ago

What about her constant use of the phrase "Good ol' Boys"? I think that is rather sexist. What if Obama said "Good ol' Ladies"....in that demeaning style she uses?

Sandy2 · 1 year ago

Sarah Palin is a disgrace. I am a mother of a special needs adult child. I know the care I have put into raising her as a single mom. I don't think Sarah realizes the attention a special needs child requires. I'm not saying she shouldn't work. Of course she should but let her stay in Alaska. I do believe that work/family balance is possible but not for someone helping to run the country with a BRAND NEW baby who just happens to be handicapped and a pregnant, teenage daughter.

Also, I think it's ridiculous that Hillary Clinton was bitterly attacked by the media but, for some reason, this woman, so far, has been sheltered from it even after attacking the press in her convention speech. When is the media going to fight back? Come on....