Jon Stewart gave Wolff Blitzer a run for his money when he guested on the Daily Show. Stewart is a master at the art of one-upsmanship.
BTW, mrcool, imitating Bush on the boards will get you noticed.
I guess it was about 1962 that Conservatives began proclaiming the myth of the liberal media as if it were some kind of mantra. Yes, folks, all those teevee stations and those black and white newspapers are leftie-pinko-liberal-liberal-liberal. It wasn't true of course, what was true was that conservatives and what passes for conservative thought was so far out of touch with the rest of America that is was hard to get any positive coverage.
They were against the Civil Rights Movement, they opposed the Space Program, they fought against the poor in the War on Poverty and were for the war in Southeast Asia - can't figure out why they weren't seen as forward thinking leaders. They were, and are, against Medicare and Medi-caid and, when pressed to tell the truth, Social Security, labor safety regulations and anything to do with the environment. (Yes, Nixon signed the law creating the EPA but the photos don't show the knife at his throat.)
What happened after Barry Goldwater got his ass kicked by LBJ (1964) was the right finally figured out what really works-- make people scared of someone else besides them. The right was really scary in 1964 -Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice-- won the election for the Democrats. Luckily for the right the really wacko left emerged just in time for 1968. All those commie-pinko-peacecreeps marching in the streets (although if you look at the photos carefully the marchers still look like Mom and Pop Nation to me.) but a few bombs and fewer campus protests and you got yourself a revolution.
And the right screamed every time anything was written or shown that didn't make the anti-war crowd look like anarchists or anti-christs or something in between. Oh, and the Equal Rights Amendment and Roe vs Wade were a big help too.
So the right yelled "Watch out" and America ducked.
And so did the media.
Every time some butch headed wacko yelled "Liberal" the outlets said "Who us?" and tried to find some balance. That was the beginning of those ridiculous Point-CounterPoints transactions parodied later by Saturday Night Live "Jane, you miserable slut."
So where are we now? We've got a bunch of folks who try to tell us what's going on in the world without upsetting the folks upstairs who receive the checks from the advertisers instead of just telling us what they know, or in the case of Fox, telling us what the folks upstairs say to tell us, while telling us it's what they know, when they know (they do) that it ain't so, it's just what plays to the demographic.
The right yells "Watch out for Saddam, or gays or terrorists or something bad, really really bad." And America ducks.
News anchors dressed in fatigues as if they were going to war instead of covering the process leading up to it.
Pundits grimly swallowing each and every administration proclamation whole and then turning to the camera to say "We'll be back after this." and America gulps and says "Who knows?"
They got somebody for us to be scared of besides them.
Group think is a terrible name for it, it implies that there is some thinking actually involved when there isn't. News comes at us now at such a rate that before we have a chance to digest the first bits of information, there is someone analysing it for us, but even before that is complete there are two more shovels full on our plates, so that at the end we just say "Shucks" and try to get some sleep.
Meanwhile conservatives still complain about that miserable liberal media.
Joe
And it seems to be working pretty damn good! Are we in another red alert again?
Joe Nation
Exactly right.
cicerone imposter wrote:And it seems to be working pretty damn good! Are we in another red alert again?
Better to be an Orange alert.
We must fear all navels.
We should develop a new game.
While watching Fox News, try to name the scary people and shout them out. Liberals! Democrats! Brown People! Liberals!
Women! (er. uh)
Unionized Teachers who are Women! ... People who live in New York City!
Democrats!
You get one point for each shout out.
You can get a half a bonus point if you shout out the adjective used:
French citizen! Sniveling!! Democrats! Weak kneed!
(Is it still Fox News if there is a pundit on? Or is that infotainment? Meet the Press is a news program to my mind, Hannity and Combs is not, but styles itself to look like a news program, but I digress....)
I am going to need some developing this idea and won't we need some kind of electronic score keeper to interest the kiddos?
Joe
Useta be a frat entertainment fer those with too little study on their minds which revolved arounf "The Bob Newhart Show" ... everytime any cast member said the line "Hi, Bob", the watchin' crew downed a shot. Not real sure how you'd score that sorta thing (last one standin'?), but that prolly doesn't really affect gameplay much.
Sure you're not indulging this morning?
Asian's have a saying, "picture worth a thousand words." Thanks, PDid.
