On the Contrary

I was watching John McCain (McMean) last night out at some drilling site promoting his drill, drill, drill  message.  It was a great political theater and all the media outlets covered it, John with his yellow hardhat lecturing, “Barack Obama is against drilling, but the American people know better.”  Great political theater, but a totally bogus message.  But did the media present any of the data showing that drilling would have no impact?  Did they investigate what are the risks to the environment that the Republicans say are non-existent?  No, like mission accomplished, they are no longer about information and truth, only political theater.  Sadly it works.

What really brought this to my attention was watching MSNBC’s Hardball, hosted by David Shuster.  He and his guest were discussing the totally bogus book, “Obama Nation” by Jerome Corsi.  They all agreed that it was a total fabrication, but then David asked if it mattered.  That is the question of the hour.  How is it in this day and age that a book that is lie and fabrication gets so much media coverage and because of that, makes an impact on the voters who hear it enough and start to believe it?

So there are two questions here and I will start with the first.  The 24/7 news monster needs to be fed, so even lies make good filler.  Then if the lie is sensational, it makes even a better story so it gets a lead.  When the lies get better ratings than the truth, focus on the lie.  Corsi, in the media’s view, is interesting because he is saying outrageous things about Barack.   So they keep emphasizing his message even though they add little footnotes about the outrageousness of the claims.  If you don’t believe me log into Media Matters each day and look at the press’s unchallenged claims by both sides.  The Republican’s have learned this lesson well and they don’t care about the truth anymore, because lies play well if not better than truth.  The question you have to ask is why a media would cover these stories.  The answer is its entertainment value and ratings.  Money dumbs us all down.

The second question is why do lies that are obvious and have been debunked live on?  If you didn’t read my blog, “Stupid is as Stupid Does”, I suggest you go back and read it now.  At least 50% of my fellow Americans are stupid.  They chose what they want to believe and they don’t listen to anything else.  That’s why repeating an untruth enough times make it believable to this sad 50%.  But now I have the more important question for you.  If it doesn’t matter if your claims are true because the media plays into your game, and a goodly portion of the population are easily manipulated by these lies, does running an “above board” campaign make sense?

McCain has been out making untrue statements about Barack Obama, questioning his patriotism, and mischaracterizing his stand on Iraq, and the media is lapping it up because it plays well and is entertaining.  And what they are doing is reinforcing his message and lending it credibility.  So can Barack stay above this kind of name calling and character assassination?   The answer in the real world is no.  He has to go on the attack.  But he doesn’t need fiction to fuel his attack.  He wanted to have an adult conversation about the issues.  The problem is the majority of Americans are not adults and the media is still in kindergarten, unable to tell the difference between entertaining distraction and important issues.  So he is going to have to get confrontational.  (As a side note, isn’t it sad that the media doesn’t attack these misinformation campaigns and shame them?  It would end them, but they think it is just part of the game and it is funny.)

That does not mean he has to become John McMean.  But it does mean that he has to get passionate about John McMean’s prevarications and get the media to focus on his counterattacks, albeit, counterattacks backed up by fact.  Even better he needs to go on the offensive and attack John McMean’s false image identified in yesterday’s  blog.  If Barack wants this thing, he has to show the world who John McMean really is.  He has to show them that he is passionate about the truth and willing to fight for it.  It might not hurt to also start counter attacking the media and their coverage of these missrepresentations. Instead of tolerating their inane questions, go after them for distracting the American public.