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Last Updated: Nov 14, 2008 - 12:49:26 PM |
The older I get, the more things appear bewildering. I find myself in the place of one of Steve Martin’s classic comedic characters. In this bit he plays the doofus peering off into the distance asking himself, “What is that thing?” over and over, punctuated once in a while with a, “Oh, I know what that is,” followed by another round of “What is that thing?” I drive down the street and see things that constantly make me ask the best wife in the world, “What is that thing?” For instance, what’s a “Parrot Head” and what do they have to do with Virginia?
Now that the endless election is over and the next one hasn’t broken the surface of America’s attention, I’m amused by the many supporters of our President-elect who’re on the airwaves telling us the man they promoted can’t possibly do the things he said and they reported he was going to do and that he’ll really “govern from the center.” If you’ve watched the talking heads since the election, they’re blathering about how the most liberal Senator ever to sit in the Senate is going to pull the Reid – Pelosi axis to the right. In fact, if you Google “Obama will govern from the center,” the internet pulls up 1,870,000 hits in .45 seconds. Can anyone say whistling in the wind? Should we just join the mainstream media (MSM) with a heartfelt, “I hope so.”
During the campaign, the MSM who’re supposed to be the fourth branch of government, went beyond partisanship, becoming the lapdogs for the Obama campaign. As every survey shows, the denizens of the MSM are overwhelmingly liberal, or should I say progressive. However, I believe in this election cycle, they left the realm of journalism entering the world of propaganda.
Further, I believe the image presented by the MSM of Barack Obama is a straw man made out of whole cloth. Showing no curiosity, they ignored whole periods of his life. So much so even the MSM itself is beginning to acknowledge what they did.
Deborah Howell, the ombudsman of the Washington Post, in a recent column admitted coverage of the campaign by the Post was biased. “The Post provided a lot of good campaign coverage, but readers have been consistently critical of the lack of probing issues coverage and what they saw as a tilt toward Democrat Barack Obama,” adding, “My surveys, which ended on Election Day, show that they are right on both counts.”
Looking at the number of articles that concentrated on superficial horse-race topics as opposed to substantive issues, she concluded, “The count was lopsided, with 1,295 horse-race stories and 594 issues stories. The Post was deficient in stories that reported more than the two candidates trading jabs; readers needed articles, going back to the primaries, comparing their positions with outside experts’ views. There were no broad stories on energy or science policy, and there were few on religion issues.”
That wasn’t all she said. “Obama deserved tougher scrutiny than he got, especially of his undergraduate years, his start in Chicago. and his relationship with Antoin “Tony” Rezko, who was convicted this year of influence-peddling in Chicago. The Post did nothing on Obama’s acknowledged drug use as a teenager.”
Does anyone find it interesting the MSM was able to find resources to send dozens of reporters to Alaska, but couldn’t find anyone to walk around Chicago and ask questions about Mr. Obama’s meteoric rise in Chicago politics? As a Chicago boy myself, I wonder how anyone manages to ascend from the crew to the Family in the notoriously corrupt political machine without the support of the Boss, Richard the Second?
Throughout the campaign, the MSM endlessly looped every McCain mistake, while ignoring Obama’s. How often did you hear his statement that Iran is a tiny country that poses no threat to us, or that there’re 57 American states? All we got was his patronizing “come on” when a journalist had the nerve to challenge him. While we were told endlessly, “He’s a gifted orator,” anyone who was interested could go numerous Internet sites to witness video of the stammering and stuttering Mr. Obama needs to spit out a sentence when speaking without his teleprompter.
I hope President Obama succeeds. I hope he becomes the greatest president in American history. For the sake of our children and grandchildren, I not only hope so, I pray every day for God to touch, guide, and guard him.
My biggest problem is that after two years of hearing about him every day, I still don’t have any idea who he is. So as I stare bewildered at one more thing in life that makes no sense, I turn to the best wife in the world and mumble, “What is that thing?”
dr.owens@comcast.net | 751-0421
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