Anti-Media Backlash Fuels Gingrich Win in South Carolina.....

Just 36 hours before the South Carolina Primary ABC “News” aired an interview with an ex-Mrs. Gingrich (there are two) that added nothing new from an early 2010 Esquire Magazine interview.

In doing so, they appeared to be looking to derail Gingrich’s surge in South Carolina (the headline of the piece was, “Exclusive: Gingrich Lacks Moral Character to Be President, Ex-Wife Says,”), a surge that had been reported earlier that same week, but what they seemed to have accomplished was twofold, (1) making a martyr of Newt Gingrich and (2) further alienating the American people from what nearly 75% seem to see as a hopelessly biased news media.

On the first score (making a sympathetic figure out of the prickly and irascible Gingrich) they performed a minor miracle, on the second, they merely amplified what the vast majority of Americans have already believed – that the news media in America is both out of step with the American people and blatantly ideologically biased.

I’ve long fought for a “disparate impact” ruling against the mainstream media. Polls show that 83% of those who do divulge their political affiliations in the media are liberal Democrats, and even the 9% who divulge a Republican affiliation, note that they are “Moderate” and “socially liberal Republicans.” That, in a country that is more than 2 to 1 Conservative! That’s akin to having a Police Department being 90% white in a city that is 2/3rds black!

The SAME standard should be applied to the news media in terms of ideological bigotry – if not enough Conservatives are applying for those positions, “It’s probably because they don’t feel welcome,” so, as is done with many city police departments, the media must be charged with the tasks of both recruiting that dispossessed group and balancing the ideological disparity UNTIL the media “adequately reflects the community it serves.”

Without question, that ideological imbalance and the implied ideological bigotry is what’s behind the fact that nearly 3/4s of the country doesn’t trust its news media (SEE: http://www.gallup.com/poll/148250/Americans-Regain-Confidence-Newspapers-News.aspx)

The backlash against America’s liberal media wasn’t merely stated in the fact that Gingrich won, but by how much he won. Gingrich surged even stronger after the ABC interview aired, from the low 30s to a resounding 41% of the vote! That’s 50% more than Romney tallied (27%)!

There’s no other way to describe this unlikely Gingrich route, except as an anti-media backlash.

Numerous people spoke to the convoluted and vile defense much of the media initially made over “Weiner-gate,” and the veritable media blackout on the Edwards scandal, even though the National Inquirer broke that story during Edwards’ run for President.

The problem for the media is that this is NOT isolated to South Carolina or the “Deep South,” instead it’s a national referendum. When over 3/4s of the American people don’t trust their own news media, that’s an issue!

Worse yet, is that since 2010, 2/3s of Independents have broken more Conservative than “Republican.” It’s unfortunate that so many in the media seem to believe they CAN (let alone should) influence public opinion. Remember the laments that “the likes of Rush Limbaugh have made America more Conservative?” The fact is that what Limbaugh proved is that the media, even commentating titans CANNOT influence public opinion, if they’re smart, they can do what Limbaugh himself claims he does – “resonate WITH the views and opinions of the general public.”

Maybe now would be a good time to begin that media recruitment effort?

Politics SHOULD NOT be a Team Sport

One of the casualties of our celebrity driven culture is that too many of us have come to put brand over beliefs.

Politics SHOULD NOT be a team sport, but that’s pretty much what it’s become.

As voters too many of us are either “red” or “blue.”

Conservatives abound in BOTH major Parties. Recent polls show that appx. 43% of Democrats consider themselves ideologically Conservative.

Likewise, Progressivism was created by the Rockefeller-wing of the GOP!

Teddy Roosevelt initiated the Progressive party (“the Bull Moose” Party) as the nation’s first Progressive Party. Progressivism was and remains the vehicle which Corporatists have used to advance a decidedly anti-free market agenda. That agenda was packaged as offering “greater job security” for workers, while also offering greater Corporate and wealth-protection security for both established Corporations and the very rich.

The very first Progressive President of the United States was Herbert Hoover, the “Jimmy Carter of his day,” who began the “Alphabet Soup” that FDR later expanded.

For decades the Democratic Party had been the home of working class Conservative Americans. Tammany Hall Democrats fought vehemently AGAINST the Progressive Republican social reformers from Fiorello LaGuardia to John V. Lindsay.

The “Southern Strategy” developed by “Rockefeller Moderates” in the GOP like Richard Nixon cynically sought to stifle America’s Conservative majority by luring large number of “Southern Conservatives” and “Northern white ethnics” (especially ethnic Catholics) to the GOP whose agenda was controlled by its moneyed and very Progressive Rockefeller-wing.

That strategy has worked very effectively to date and it continues to work because the Progressives (both Rockefeller Republicans and Progressive Democrats) have been so successful at dividing Americans along racial and gender lines in order to blunt their ideological ties.

So long as politics remains a team sport for so any Americans, the Progressive moneyed elites will continue to dupe and dominate the increasingly poorer working class.

Michelle Obama’s First Lady Problem...

A new book (“The Obamas” by Jodi Kantor) and some old rumblings about Rahm Emmanuel and Richard Daley Jr. not being able to get along with her, has put Michelle Obama on the defensive.

Unfortunately, even on the defensive, Ms. Obama, like many politically correct progressives, reflexively plays the race card. Headlines abound on Michelle Obama “Rejecting the ‘Angry Black Woman’ Label.”

Unfortunately retreating to identity politics makes her appear more venal, not less.

And that’s unfortunate, because all-in-all, she hasn’t been a bad First lady at all.

Her anti-obesity campaign is as vital as any that any previous First lady has endorsed.

Aside from some “inside the beltway” grumblings Michelle Obama has kept a pretty low profile and has handled her role quite well.

The unfortunate thing here is that a defensive response from the First Lady dredges up the initial resentments created by her ill-timed and ill-conceived February, 2008 remark in Milwaukee, “For the first time in my adult lifetime, I’m really proud of my country...”

There’s no reason to do that.

Her anti-obesity campaign has drawn rave reviews and she’s conducted herself so well that for 3+ years not even her harshest critics have had much to harp on at all.

Certainly this flap will further highlight the wide disparity in perspective between blacks and whites with more Conservative whites seeing this as just more evidence of Michelle Obama’s petulance, while many black women in particular being able to relate to the “angry black woman” charge as a an example of a not so subtle bigotry at work.

There’s little chance of any of this being instructive, or helping bridge that perspective divide.

Ultimately, no good comes from this flap and Ms Obama’s response to it.