Nothing like not holding press conferences, because you are entirely contemptuous of the media, in order to give that rare press conference you do hold extra special importance, so you can then use that extra special rare and important press conference to promote your unpopular policies and give those policies an air of importance, because the people don’t support your policies. They don’t. No. Really. They. Do. Not.
There was even a ham handed attempt to link the Social Security issue by word play to the abortion issue by stating, from FoxNews: “Most Are ‘Pro-Choice’ On Social Security”. What they lack in subtlety they more than make up for in audacity.
Such tactics are called propaganda.
Desparation breeds idiocy.
Seems I’ve seen this movie before…
Otter: We gotta take these bastards. Now we could do it with conventional weapons that could take years and cost millions of lives. No, I think we have to go all out. I think that this situation absolutely requires a really futile and stupid gesture be done on somebody’s part.
Remember that asshole from high school who everyone said would be famous contrary to the fact that he was a talentless hack? He’s found his niche. In two months, he’s going to have “Your Ad Here” on his forehead.
Public relations is the art of pursuading the masses to think in a way that is contrary to popular belief. To alter consensus thought towards a specific idea in order to promote an agenda or product or both. And, it goes without saying, that such persuasion is not always a matter of telling the truth.
The father of modern PR was Edward Bernays, who was Sigmund Freud’s nephew, and used his uncles ideas in the pursuit of promotion. His greatest success… turning “bacon and eggs” into the “All American Breakfast”. Bet you didn’t know it was a PR stunt.
NPR has some rather interesting audio files available. Go listen.
It is one of the great riddles of our times: How can the religious right, who clamor endlessly for the “good old days” and rant endlessly on about how American society is drowning in a lack of moral values (why do they hate America?) support a man like George W. Bush who has, for the life of his career as President of these United States of America, avoided taking any and all responsibility for the foibles and mistakes of those he is sworn to lead and take charge of?
Simple. He lacks personal responsibility. Ironically, it is this exact same issue which the right used to attack Clinton.
The religious right also lacks that all important ethical back hone- responsibility. In an ethical and moral universe, men and women are responsible for their words, actions and thoughts in a manner which requires us to be honest, not only to ourselves, but to those around us. It requires a commitment not only to ones G-d or set of beliefs, but also to oneself, and most importantly, to the greater community and greater good. Therein lay the abyss.
If one is swimming in an ideological ocean, and the greater good is the shoreline, the ideology becomes more important than the goals it professes to dictate which are so far away on land. This is why a person who says they are pro-life has no ethical problem with killing an abortionist. The ideology trumps the greater ethical and moral good. Quite simply, it’s an ethical and moral jump in logic that seems to so many to make sense because they can not see the shore, they only see the water around them.
Thus, many on the right are not responsible to their own beliefs nor their own actions. Their ideology trumps all else in their narrow world view. If their ideology is steeped in evil and incorrectness, they would stand by it to their death, for it would require an evaluation of their ideology.
It’s an ancient perspective that has dogged civilized man from the very beginning.
Leadership is of a much higher caliber of moral and ethical work and desire than someone like George W. Bush is even capable of comprehending.
The buck stops somewhere else…
And, that is a very sad reality for many of us to watch unfold.
Media perception often works en masse. It’s a construct not only of how people get information- from other media- but also a social construct – people talk to each other.
Truth has a way of bubbling to the surface, especially when people reflect, given the distance of time and wisdom, upon past events. And, right now, we are experiencing a period of reflection upon domestic terrorism. Specifically, how right-wing groups and their causes are often the root of domestic terror on these shores, and the Oklahoma City bombing is only one example of this.
The cause of much of this reflection is the realization that right-wing groups in the US often share the same goals as the Islamic terrorists the US in fighting: the destruction of the US government. It is a truth that lay hidden for many reasons, but the most apparent is that internal discord such as domestic terror is given special handling by government agencies and politicians. Self described “patriots” running around killing innocent American’s in the name of their “beliefs”, be they political, religious or otherwise, is an orphan terror, because such terrorists take full advantage of the freedoms they actually violate in their pursuit of ideology.
For example, a number of right-wing groups are outright vocal in their agreement with groups such as Al Qaida. Yet, short of violationg the liberties of these so-called “patriots”, there is not much a civil society can do until after the tragedy occurs.
It certainly doesn’t help matters that the US is now deep in the throes of being controlled by right-wing ideologues, in government and in the media, who are much more inclined to look the other way or be apologists for their own ideological brethren who spill common blood. “One man’s survivalist is another man’s terrorist.”
I was never a fan of Michael Moore’s Fahrenheit 9/11. Agitprop serves a certain purpose, but when it comes down to it, if the information presented is already out there and understood and the main thesis of the film is not adding anything new to the equation, what is the point? Moore doesn’t make any real attempt to investigate the reality behind 9/11, nor the political ramifications. He simply says “What if?” a great deal. Which, as I said, has a role in a lower level of discussion. But, ultimately, the facts within such a film premise are woefully open to attack (as we saw) simply because the level of factual reporting was so poor.
You won’t, for example, see the right-wing going after the Frontline producers of The Man Who Knew, which is infinitely more condemning of the Clinton and Bush Administrations, and the entire American system, than Moore’s effort. Why? Because the Frontline show is about the facts and about historical accuracy. It’s also about cause and affect. It’s about why things work the way they do.
Of course, Fahrenheit 9/11, like all of Moore’s films, was constructed as a baseline confrontation of a disconected man in power, in this case George W. Bush. And, unfortunately, in discussions about Fahrenheit 9/11 that element became the point, rather than the (admittedly) limited facts brought forth within the film. That is to say, the film became the point, rather than what the film was discussing. That alone speaks volumes. And, when Michael Moore became the point, that speaks volumes about the many right-wing pundits who spent so much time and energy attacking him, rather than the facts, or lack of them, in the film. Because there is much to discuss regarding the causes behind 9/11 and also, what happened after…
To this point, a documentary by the Media Education Foundation, Hijacking Catastrophe endeavors to explore how the tragedy of September 11, 2001 has been used and abused by those in power to solidify power for the long term.
If you haven’t seen Sex and Lucia yet, do. If sex in film puts you off, don’t. Cause, well, it’s in the title, so it’s in the movie. But, it works. Well made, thoughtful and sexy. It’s now on DVD.
Media Matters does a fine job of expaining how the right-wing, particularly the conservative blogsphere, lied in order to blame Democrats for the Schiavo memo, which it turns out, was written by an aide to the Republican Senator from Florida, Mel Martinez. Of course, these lies were later taken as some type of printable fact by mainstream media shills such as Howard Kurtz. Imagine that.
It is one thing to have a conservative worldview. It goes without saying hat’s an honorable activity to engage in. The world is big enough for a multitude of perspectives. And, a healthy civilization requires the diversity of many world views, as does a functioning demmocracy.
But, so many on the right are just plain lying, and it has gotten truly pathetic.
They get nothing right. Their fact-checking skills are atrocious. They neither report nor call experts, it’s just whatever they invented twenty seconds ago. Watching them work is like attending a high school debate match in the impromptu event. Arguments are created on the fly, accuracy is unimportant so long as the product accuses the “MSM” or Democrats of some cardinal sin that’ll leave Powerline’s sycophantic readers moaning with the exquisite pleasure that comes only from having one’s biases expertly stroked. The plausibility of their claims ranges from pathetic to laughable (has Big Trunk debated PZ Myers on the biological uncertainty of evolution yet?) and their traffic and credibility is entirely predicated on the work someone else did, success they’ve been totally unable to replicate. They have failed.
Those who have obtained power by the process of propaganda and disinformation have nothing else to offer. Those who follow the liars have even less. So, they lie. Their problem solving skills do not exist. Their plans are not not geared toward creating any solutions, they are simply attacking what they do not like. They are dismantlers. Destructionists.
With such an outlook and scenario, it is inevitable that the right will destroy it’s own grasp on power. Because it is power built upon lies and fabrications. It’s power built upon propaganda and disinformation. It is simply meant to continue the illusion of power and correctness.
The Abstract Factory offers similar thoughts on the always idiotic and deceptive Jonah Goldberg:
The fact is, Goldberg doesn’t care in the least whether what he says is true and well-reasoned, and neither do his backers and readers. Goldberg’s function is not to say things that are true, nor is his function to present a reasoned argument. Goldberg’s function is to spew forth some roughly grammatical stream of words that appear to reinforce conservatarian ideology, so that his readers can listen, nod, and feel vindicated in their beliefs.
And — this is what’s really maddening, all the outrages I’ve brought up wouldn’t matter in the least except for this point — virtually all right-leaning commentators, running the gamut from David Brooks to Rush Limbaugh to Glenn Reynolds, whether consciously or not, perform roughly the same function, and they’re wildly effective. The entire right-wing movement is like a hovercraft floating on the perpetually roaring whirlwind of sub-rational, self-reinforcing nonsense that gusts through the minds of its adherents. It goes on and on and on, and nobody stops the people who feed it; most of the time, nobody with a prominent voice even stands up to them and calls them on their nonsense.
