The Reality
Monday, March 03, 2008
Predictions for Tuesday
Even though Bill Clinton said unequivocally that his wife needs to win both Texas and Ohio to stay alive - after she loses Texas, she won't suspend her campaign. She'll win in Ohio. Perhaps there might even be voting machine shenanigans. But she won't stop.
She's going to drag it on till she wins Pennsylvania and then she'll claim that she's viable. Then she'll spend her time campaigning in private for super delegates, party elders, and the Clinton machine's DC allies in the establishment in order to secure for herself the Clinton birthright.
She's stalling. I don't think she can be the nominee. I don't think she will be. Is this what she wants to leave as the last major episode of the Clinton machine's electoral legacy- that they subverted the will of millions of new voters in order to get their old offices back, get their old friends their old jobs again? Selfishness like that would not be easily erased from the CW of the Clinton machine's lore. People would blame Hillary and not Bill. She has to know that. Which is why I think Obama will eventually be the nominee.
Immediately thereafter, the honeymoon with the media will end. Obama will be Dukakised. I'm afraid that he'll lose to McCain.
What does it mean to be Dukakised? Well, political reporters must not like politics because they don't write about it. They write about theatre and/or sports. Instead of writing about the effect of deregulating markets and telling America who is in favor of it, we get horse-racism with all it's binary sports analogies or we get assessments as to whether particular debate zingers landed with the audience or fell flat. We get sports or theatre criticism.
Mostly, stories about elections are stories about tactics. What this emphasis on the 'inside story' neglects is the degree to which voters' perceptions (and ultimate choices) are structured by conditions external to (and even prior to) the campaign.
For 20 years we have been told in spite of the evidence that McCain was a maverick. When Obama tells the truth about McCain, the media will call it a partisan attack rather than the truth.
McCain is for all intents and purposes running for George W. Bush's third term, he'll deny it to most people, confirm it with others, and the press will let him slide. Why? Because they always have let McCain slide. They love him.
In 1988 George Bush the Elder had to distance himself from the final big scandal of the Reagan White House (the Islamic Terrorist Appeasement scandal, a.k.a. Iran-Contra).
Desperate to get away from the other criminal Republicans, Bush said he "out of the loop." A stupid excuse that Ted Kennedy beat into our heads with his convention speech refrain "Where was George." So, Bush was out of the loop, while at the same time his secondary narrative was that he was running for Ronald Reagan's third term. How could he have it both ways? IOKIYAR.
Lee Atwater (Bush Sr's Rove) spread rumors that Dukakis' wife burned an American flag protesting the Vietnam War. The Republicans aired blatantly racist TV ads. Republicns attacked Dukakis for being a liberal from Massachusetts while at the same time attacked him for polluting the precious precious Boston Harbor and all it's fish (double-standard? IOKIYAR!). One day, Dukakis wore a helmet too big for him and the media took that image, put it on the air - - and never took it down until November. Not once, not even for commercials. Game.
A young Al Gore ran for President that year too, he said that Jesse Jackson was inexperienced and that Dukakis was naive. For what it's worth, Dukakis had this line in his stump speech: "After seven years of charisma, maybe it's time for some competence in the White House." Naive, indeed.
Dukakis wanted the election to be about competence. Bush wanted it to be about character... and about how Dukakis was a goddamnedratbastard The media made the election about the latter. Why?
I think it's because political reporting had changed forever and Dukakis was way behind the times.
By 1988 it was an open secret that the Reagan White House was a mess. The man had Alzheimer's, the enormous deficit and high unemployment were shocking, there were high level indictments in St. Ronnie's Administration: the Nixonian 'crooks' were back.
The media tried to cover the criminal behavior; the illegal wars in Central America, the negotiated partnership with Noriega, the bribes to the ayatollah, the corruption in the GOP Senate, the S&L collapse, the Housing market recession, and more.
In order to protect the feeble, sick President, very tight message control and media manipulation techniques were employed and perfected. These efforts were elevated in importance over the actual running of the country. The Madison Avenue stagecraft of the executive branch began innocently enough, out of protection for and ailing speech reader.
But the press felt duped by this president who retained his high popularity by engaging in very carefully controlled direct communication with voters (through weekly radio broadcasts, canned TV speeches, constant political ads, and propagandized right-wing talk radio). Atwater kept Reagan's rhetoric and message consistent, and avoided confrontations with the press when there was no benefit attached.
By 1988 it had become conventional wisdom among the political media that President Reagan's political fortunes had been a function of smoke and mirrors.
Instead of reporting on the man behind the curtain, our media settled for reporting on whether or not the hologram, flames, and smoke are convincing the rubes.
The feeling of manipulation continued through the 1988 presidential victory of George Bush, which was widely attributed to, as Newsweek's Howard Fineman put it, "the Republicans' well-honed marketing skills, hardball tactics and skillful manipulation of 'hot-button' issues." Post hoc, proctor hoc. Such analyses are little more than the self-fulfilling prophecies of lazy reporters who care more about process than substance.
Having focused mostly on Bush's and Dukakis's campaign tactics, journalists assumed that those tactics decided the race. What this emphasis on the 'inside story' neglects is the degree to which voters' perceptions (and ultimate choices) are structured by conditions external to (and even prior to) the campaign.
McCain and the maverick story line were built to dupe the media into thinking McCain is not what he is. It's been cultivated for decades. It was built to deceive. And it will.
The other thing that makes me scared that Obama will lose is his political tactics. I criticized Kerry for bringing a knife to a gun fight. I don't want Obama to bring a daisy to a gun fight. Appeals to post-partisanship strike me as flowery. ¶ 2:48 AM 0 comments
She's going to drag it on till she wins Pennsylvania and then she'll claim that she's viable. Then she'll spend her time campaigning in private for super delegates, party elders, and the Clinton machine's DC allies in the establishment in order to secure for herself the Clinton birthright.
She's stalling. I don't think she can be the nominee. I don't think she will be. Is this what she wants to leave as the last major episode of the Clinton machine's electoral legacy- that they subverted the will of millions of new voters in order to get their old offices back, get their old friends their old jobs again? Selfishness like that would not be easily erased from the CW of the Clinton machine's lore. People would blame Hillary and not Bill. She has to know that. Which is why I think Obama will eventually be the nominee.
Immediately thereafter, the honeymoon with the media will end. Obama will be Dukakised. I'm afraid that he'll lose to McCain.
What does it mean to be Dukakised? Well, political reporters must not like politics because they don't write about it. They write about theatre and/or sports. Instead of writing about the effect of deregulating markets and telling America who is in favor of it, we get horse-racism with all it's binary sports analogies or we get assessments as to whether particular debate zingers landed with the audience or fell flat. We get sports or theatre criticism.
Mostly, stories about elections are stories about tactics. What this emphasis on the 'inside story' neglects is the degree to which voters' perceptions (and ultimate choices) are structured by conditions external to (and even prior to) the campaign.
For 20 years we have been told in spite of the evidence that McCain was a maverick. When Obama tells the truth about McCain, the media will call it a partisan attack rather than the truth.
McCain is for all intents and purposes running for George W. Bush's third term, he'll deny it to most people, confirm it with others, and the press will let him slide. Why? Because they always have let McCain slide. They love him.
In 1988 George Bush the Elder had to distance himself from the final big scandal of the Reagan White House (the Islamic Terrorist Appeasement scandal, a.k.a. Iran-Contra).
Desperate to get away from the other criminal Republicans, Bush said he "out of the loop." A stupid excuse that Ted Kennedy beat into our heads with his convention speech refrain "Where was George." So, Bush was out of the loop, while at the same time his secondary narrative was that he was running for Ronald Reagan's third term. How could he have it both ways? IOKIYAR.
Lee Atwater (Bush Sr's Rove) spread rumors that Dukakis' wife burned an American flag protesting the Vietnam War. The Republicans aired blatantly racist TV ads. Republicns attacked Dukakis for being a liberal from Massachusetts while at the same time attacked him for polluting the precious precious Boston Harbor and all it's fish (double-standard? IOKIYAR!). One day, Dukakis wore a helmet too big for him and the media took that image, put it on the air - - and never took it down until November. Not once, not even for commercials. Game.
A young Al Gore ran for President that year too, he said that Jesse Jackson was inexperienced and that Dukakis was naive. For what it's worth, Dukakis had this line in his stump speech: "After seven years of charisma, maybe it's time for some competence in the White House." Naive, indeed.
Dukakis wanted the election to be about competence. Bush wanted it to be about character... and about how Dukakis was a goddamnedratbastard The media made the election about the latter. Why?
I think it's because political reporting had changed forever and Dukakis was way behind the times.
By 1988 it was an open secret that the Reagan White House was a mess. The man had Alzheimer's, the enormous deficit and high unemployment were shocking, there were high level indictments in St. Ronnie's Administration: the Nixonian 'crooks' were back.
The media tried to cover the criminal behavior; the illegal wars in Central America, the negotiated partnership with Noriega, the bribes to the ayatollah, the corruption in the GOP Senate, the S&L collapse, the Housing market recession, and more.
In order to protect the feeble, sick President, very tight message control and media manipulation techniques were employed and perfected. These efforts were elevated in importance over the actual running of the country. The Madison Avenue stagecraft of the executive branch began innocently enough, out of protection for and ailing speech reader.
But the press felt duped by this president who retained his high popularity by engaging in very carefully controlled direct communication with voters (through weekly radio broadcasts, canned TV speeches, constant political ads, and propagandized right-wing talk radio). Atwater kept Reagan's rhetoric and message consistent, and avoided confrontations with the press when there was no benefit attached.
By 1988 it had become conventional wisdom among the political media that President Reagan's political fortunes had been a function of smoke and mirrors.
Instead of reporting on the man behind the curtain, our media settled for reporting on whether or not the hologram, flames, and smoke are convincing the rubes.
The feeling of manipulation continued through the 1988 presidential victory of George Bush, which was widely attributed to, as Newsweek's Howard Fineman put it, "the Republicans' well-honed marketing skills, hardball tactics and skillful manipulation of 'hot-button' issues." Post hoc, proctor hoc. Such analyses are little more than the self-fulfilling prophecies of lazy reporters who care more about process than substance.
Having focused mostly on Bush's and Dukakis's campaign tactics, journalists assumed that those tactics decided the race. What this emphasis on the 'inside story' neglects is the degree to which voters' perceptions (and ultimate choices) are structured by conditions external to (and even prior to) the campaign.
McCain and the maverick story line were built to dupe the media into thinking McCain is not what he is. It's been cultivated for decades. It was built to deceive. And it will.
The other thing that makes me scared that Obama will lose is his political tactics. I criticized Kerry for bringing a knife to a gun fight. I don't want Obama to bring a daisy to a gun fight. Appeals to post-partisanship strike me as flowery. ¶ 2:48 AM 0 comments
