Great post Maha, I don’t think people realize the media blitz that has occurred in order to keep right wing policies, that only help the few while devastating the many, palatable to the masses. I’ve said before that if we didn’t have the right wing media lies, we would have landslide elections for Progressive (not even Democratic) candidates every time around. I’m with you on the health care issue; I’ve personally known two people who have gone bankrupt while on ‘good’ insurance. Both had 80/20 co-pays and ended up needing major surgeries and follow-ups. The right-wing lies can’t get people out of bankrupcy.
Great post that documents one of the main reasons we’re bogged down with our ridiculous excuse for a healthcare system. Americans have been so propagandized that most haven’t known what their own best interests really are. But it looks as if they’re starting to wake up and ignore the VRWC spin machine on this. Want to jump start the economy? Unclog our economic arteries with health insurance reform. In addition to its obvious inequities, our inefficient and dysfunctional system of health insurance has become the plaque clogging America’s increasingly arteriosclerotic economy. Energetic young people with ideas can’t afford to pursue their dreams by leaving the jobs that provide their health insurance for themselves and their families. Boomers who would love to retire from jobs that have grown tiresome — perhaps to start part-time businesses of their own — grimly hold on to ride out the years until Medicare kicks in, because of the sky-high cost of individual health insurance premiums a their age. It’s a progressive hardening of the arteries of an economy that was long regarded as the most dynamic in the world.
Great post, maha. I’m posting as “Joe_too” over there because I think there was already a poster going by the (unlikely) handle of “Joe”. May be time to get a new handle . . .
Amazing that there would be two Joes reading the same blog. 🙂
You just have a really broad appeal!
This is truly the beast that needs to be killed. Even if we elect the most wonderful people in the world, it won’t do much good if this vile machine is still spewing poison.
It’s this machine that moved the center of political gravity so far to the right, that a stupid rich kid like W got into the highest office in the land, and proceeded to wreck so many hard-won gains, domestically and abroad. It’s this machine that sold the Iraq war, and so many other disasters at home and broad.
High on the Democrats’ priorities should be reforming the media ownership rules. This is by no means a silver bullet, but it’s a necessary and important start.
The good news is that this machine isn’t yet invincible, as evidence by the November rout. The bad news is that this machine has instituted numerous projects at home and abroad to degrade what functioning democracy is still left in this country. If unchecked, this multi-fronted cancer will destroy our country, which will be accomplished mostly by the willing hands of the brainwashed.
The measure of any opposition candidate should be not only where they stand on the big issue of the day: Iraq, but on how well they publicly fight and beat back this machine. This should be a major domestic focus, both while campaigning and once in office. Kerry lost the 2004 election in many people’s eyes because he wasn’t up to this battle. Despite his advantage of being a decorated war hero, and despite W’s disadvantage of being absent without leave, they managed to slime Kerry, and more importantly he let them get away with it.
In essence we have let a small cabal of the rich bully us around with their selfish interests, with media that serves them and them alone. Any candidate who doesn’t effectively come to grips with this is at best a triangulating weenie who is only putting a bandaid over the root problem and doesn’t have the know-how or the guts to do the radical surgery that’s necessary to take our country back from those who stole it.
I’m sure you guys have noticed that at least MSNBC has changed it’s stripes. Olbermann rocks, Tweedy is doing O.K., and even Joe Scarboro is leaning more to the center.Hey, Tucker even ditched the bow tie and at least resembles a true Libertarian instead of a neo-con.
I live for the day the Neo-Cons are just plain “Cons”.
I’m thinking when the new guys get busy on “the hill” some VERY interesting things will come out of those probes. I hope to see some cuttin’ and guttin’. Time for a little “neo con pollo”…
This is a great post; but, it still doesn’t explain the betrayal of the American public and journalistic integrity by The Washington Post and The New York Times.
What is strange is to see the Frederick Kagans come out of the wood work to become THE advisor to Bush and today I heard Richard Perle, yes that one, come back out of the shadows. Perle works for AEI and doesn’t Kagan? The right wing is one long Jason movie rising from the discredited dead to push their ridiculous policies over and over again. How I wonder do they have the nerve of a tooth after 4 years of disaster to rise up and push more of the same lousy judgement and false assumptions?
Because they are well funded and the media corporations keep pushing them in our faces while never telling who they really are and what interests they really represent. You see it constantly in media where a person is on the screen and there is a name maybe even the bland name of some ‘nonprofit’ (like american policy council’ or some such innocous name that does not tell the public what it really is because it is all about concealment- push a well oiled message that does not reveal its inside corruption and corrosion) . The person is touting the corporate interest line while couching the message in reasonable ideas like personal responsibility or democracy. But the real message is to make you the consumer sold on policy that will screw you and your country to the wall while a few make out like bandits.
Great post Maha, I don’t think people realize the media blitz that has occurred in order to keep right wing policies, that only help the few while devastating the many, palatable to the masses. I’ve said before that if we didn’t have the right wing media lies, we would have landslide elections for Progressive (not even Democratic) candidates every time around. I’m with you on the health care issue; I’ve personally known two people who have gone bankrupt while on ‘good’ insurance. Both had 80/20 co-pays and ended up needing major surgeries and follow-ups. The right-wing lies can’t get people out of bankrupcy.
Great post that documents one of the main reasons we’re bogged down with our ridiculous excuse for a healthcare system. Americans have been so propagandized that most haven’t known what their own best interests really are. But it looks as if they’re starting to wake up and ignore the VRWC spin machine on this.
Want to jump start the economy? Unclog our economic arteries with health insurance reform. In addition to its obvious inequities, our inefficient and dysfunctional system of health insurance has become the plaque clogging America’s increasingly arteriosclerotic economy. Energetic young people with ideas can’t afford to pursue their dreams by leaving the jobs that provide their health insurance for themselves and their families. Boomers who would love to retire from jobs that have grown tiresome — perhaps to start part-time businesses of their own — grimly hold on to ride out the years until Medicare kicks in, because of the sky-high cost of individual health insurance premiums a their age. It’s a progressive hardening of the arteries of an economy that was long regarded as the most dynamic in the world.
Great post, maha. I’m posting as “Joe_too” over there because I think there was already a poster going by the (unlikely) handle of “Joe”. May be time to get a new handle . . .
Amazing that there would be two Joes reading the same blog. 🙂
You just have a really broad appeal!
This is truly the beast that needs to be killed. Even if we elect the most wonderful people in the world, it won’t do much good if this vile machine is still spewing poison.
It’s this machine that moved the center of political gravity so far to the right, that a stupid rich kid like W got into the highest office in the land, and proceeded to wreck so many hard-won gains, domestically and abroad. It’s this machine that sold the Iraq war, and so many other disasters at home and broad.
High on the Democrats’ priorities should be reforming the media ownership rules. This is by no means a silver bullet, but it’s a necessary and important start.
The good news is that this machine isn’t yet invincible, as evidence by the November rout. The bad news is that this machine has instituted numerous projects at home and abroad to degrade what functioning democracy is still left in this country. If unchecked, this multi-fronted cancer will destroy our country, which will be accomplished mostly by the willing hands of the brainwashed.
The measure of any opposition candidate should be not only where they stand on the big issue of the day: Iraq, but on how well they publicly fight and beat back this machine. This should be a major domestic focus, both while campaigning and once in office. Kerry lost the 2004 election in many people’s eyes because he wasn’t up to this battle. Despite his advantage of being a decorated war hero, and despite W’s disadvantage of being absent without leave, they managed to slime Kerry, and more importantly he let them get away with it.
In essence we have let a small cabal of the rich bully us around with their selfish interests, with media that serves them and them alone. Any candidate who doesn’t effectively come to grips with this is at best a triangulating weenie who is only putting a bandaid over the root problem and doesn’t have the know-how or the guts to do the radical surgery that’s necessary to take our country back from those who stole it.
I’m sure you guys have noticed that at least MSNBC has changed it’s stripes. Olbermann rocks, Tweedy is doing O.K., and even Joe Scarboro is leaning more to the center.Hey, Tucker even ditched the bow tie and at least resembles a true Libertarian instead of a neo-con.
I live for the day the Neo-Cons are just plain “Cons”.
I’m thinking when the new guys get busy on “the hill” some VERY interesting things will come out of those probes. I hope to see some cuttin’ and guttin’. Time for a little “neo con pollo”…
This is a great post; but, it still doesn’t explain the betrayal of the American public and journalistic integrity by The Washington Post and The New York Times.
http://www.tbrnews.org/Archives/a2603.htm
use a B.S. filter on this one
What is strange is to see the Frederick Kagans come out of the wood work to become THE advisor to Bush and today I heard Richard Perle, yes that one, come back out of the shadows. Perle works for AEI and doesn’t Kagan? The right wing is one long Jason movie rising from the discredited dead to push their ridiculous policies over and over again. How I wonder do they have the nerve of a tooth after 4 years of disaster to rise up and push more of the same lousy judgement and false assumptions?
Because they are well funded and the media corporations keep pushing them in our faces while never telling who they really are and what interests they really represent. You see it constantly in media where a person is on the screen and there is a name maybe even the bland name of some ‘nonprofit’ (like american policy council’ or some such innocous name that does not tell the public what it really is because it is all about concealment- push a well oiled message that does not reveal its inside corruption and corrosion) . The person is touting the corporate interest line while couching the message in reasonable ideas like personal responsibility or democracy. But the real message is to make you the consumer sold on policy that will screw you and your country to the wall while a few make out like bandits.