Last night I asked someone in the United States whether Bush was electable, as having failed on every issue he is now depending on the pseudo-issue of being tough on terrorism. On the one hand, he is in a nice position on it – if there are terrorist attacks in the United States, everyone rallies behind their President in times of trouble. And if there are no attacks, Look! No attacks! Success! On the other hand, though, he must prove sell the impression that he will be more successful in that fight than another candidate.
This morning, I voiced the hope to someone else that if that issue ever fails him, his candidacy will crumble collapse like a house of cards. (It was very early in the morning, and a better metaphor did not occur to me.)
And also this morning, a man named Dick Clarke who has been around forever (but has more realistic hair than the other Dick Clark that came to mind) was all over the news. All over Blogdex, anyway. And the Republican/Bushite attacks on him are all about character, not content, and spurious. And Rumsfeld is, as of this moment, top story on CNN doing his “twin cobra hands of death” thing and saying, even if they had caught Bin Laden before 9/11, it wouldn’t have changed anything, which is first of all backpedaling and second of all has little to do with anything.
So, will this change anything? Or are voters really, really fucking stupid?
Also, about the terrorist attack in Spain allegedly affecting the outcome of the elections there, has it been reported in the American media that support for Spain’s involvement in the Iraq “war” hovered around 10% the whole time, and that the conservative government lied about the Madrid attacks, blaming it on the Basques when they knew otherwise because they feared it would get them voted out of office if it came out, and when it finally did come out prior to the election, the fact that they had lied got them voted out? Because people were already mad at them for lying about a tanker catastrophe earlier? Or was it totally spun as giving in to the terrorists? Who were not Iraqis?
I would hope that as things develop the citizens here in the U.S. would wise up. But in talking to people about Bush, I find that they still support him, with reasons they can’t seem to find. Mostly, I get responses like, “He’s a good talker.” “He talks like regular people do.” “He’s down-to-earth.”
Do they ever realise that Bush uses pathos in his speeches, never Logos? No.
My hopes are that enough people have started paying attention to politics here and have been stirred up enough to get out to the polls.
We’ll have to see how everything pans out between now and November.
As for the attack in Spain, the reports that I have heard and seen have not mentioned governmental lying.
I hate our media.
I am constantly baffled at my own overestimation of the average American’s intelligence, awareness, even sentience. Have you ever watched Weekends with Louis Theroux? Even that show, with its critical investigations of odd American subcultures, makes us look like a nation of thinking, feeling creatures, but then you read about another county voting to bring in Walmart, and you remember that it’s only the magic of television.
Couple that with the weirdness of politics, and I’d have to say that Bush is re-electable. At least in Florida. As long as his brother is governor, there.
Eh, media are skewed all over. It’s just when they’re all skewed the same direction that it’s scary, and that seems to be the case in the States, to a large degree. Elsewhere too, of course.
And gullibility and stupidity, or laziness, are not an American monopoly, although we sometimes seem to be good at it. I suppose dumb+powerful is a bad combination.
And, not only Florida. I’ve heard scary things about the electronic voting machines, and how simply they can be um manipulated, and/or hacked, and who owns them.
You know, excuse me if I’m repeating myself, this is a story I’ve told somewhere before, but my eyes were opened to media bias/manipulation in 1986 in a Moscow hotel bar, when I caught a glimpse of Russian news, showing scene after scene of what was wrong with the West: police brutality here, apartheid there, riots somewhere else. Things I knew existed, but had never seen on the news in that detail or with that spin. And of course any images of the USSR were positive. And that got me thinking, if they do that here, what about back home?
One of the plusses of foreign travel is the opportunity to hear other perspectives on isssues, eeven if you don’t speak the native language and just watch CNN Europe (or, in one case, Asia.)
(BTW Mig, I’ll probably be cchanging planes in Vienna this summer.)
One of the plusses of foreign travel is the opportunity to hear other perspectives on isssues, even if you don’t speak the native language and just watch CNN Europe (or, in one case, Asia.)
(BTW Mig, I’ll probably be changing planes in Vienna this summer.)
not all voters are really really fucking stupid, just the ones who voted for Dubbya.
I just counted five votes to oust him. (mig can you vote in absentia?)
i’m considering registering in several states and renting a 1958 chevrolet apache half-ton and driving from voting booth to voting booth.
also, i don’t really think that all dubya voters were fucking stupid. some were, of course. i know some fairly smart people who voted for him.
My great optimism for ousting Bush is that many people who supported him in the first election, seem to have changed their minds. And, all those people who voted for Nader, thinking that both parties were the same, will now be voting for Kerry.
I read an article on the ease of tampering poll booths as well though, and am very frightened that a win for Bush might happen through tampering (as I personally believe the first election was stolen).
I can’t help but see a vote for Nader, at this point, as a vote for Bush. I respect Ralph- I used to work for his public interest group MassPIRG, but he’s not going to get the votes, and Bush is a serious threat to all I hold dear.
First, let me just say that I am voting Kerry. I find Bush to be a petulent, mean-spririted, jesus-freak little chimp of a man and take serious, serious issue with how he runs this nation.
Second: media spin goes both ways, for certain. I can tell you that, IMO, the Spanish Government “lies” are the result of media spin. You can, if you dig into the chronology of the news reporting, see for a fact that the Spanish “Defense Minister” (can’t remember the exact title) reported the fact taht it could be Al Qaeda or foreign terrorists almost immediately after the evidence was discovered. There was no “cover up” to speak of, but they DID fail to drop ETA out of the equation until it was overwhelminly evident that this bombing was not their crime.
I’m not saying that the conservatives didn’t deserve to get the boot, but I’m definitely not willing to flatly rule-out the idea that the bombing influenced the elections. In fact, that is the majority world-wide perception, and it’s going to happen again and again. This keeps me up nights more than worrying about George Bush.
Like I said, I’m not voting Bush, but I think that there’s a very strange force at work when more people are worried about Bush’s actions than are worried about the actions of Islamic terrorists and the regimes that harbor and sponsor them. To me, it defies logic. But, then again, I’ve survived a terrorist attack (although a domestic terrorst), so my perspective may be a bit skewed.
I’m not making sense. Nevermind
The terrorists no doubt timed the bombing deliberately to influence the elections. But calling it appeasement, as some Bushies did, was putting it too strongly, IMO, and attempting to profit politically from what happened, or at least cut losses, and oversimplifying. You’re right, spin goes both ways, or many ways.