:: Oh, Olbermann!

The traditional media has been slow to come to grips with the American public's distrust and dislike of President Bush -- sentiments clearly reflected in opinion polls dating back well over a year.

This is the Washington Post's Dan Froomkin, commenting on a puzzling (to me, anyway) phenomenon. I used to think that tv news programmers were biased towards the conventional wisdom of their target audience. In other words, if the target audience went cuckoo for cocoa puffs, you'd get, um, a puff piece on cocoa puffs. If a politician had high favorables, the coverage would be favorable. And if his numbers dropped, so would the tone (or quantity) of his coverage. I guess this is a long-winded way of saying that I believed tv news content was in large part inspired by the market.

But the coverage of Bush throws that idea out on its ass. The media fawned over the Decider right after 9/11; only natural, since his favorables were at one hundred million gazillion percent. But the bloom has been off that stinking rose for quite a while. So why does the mainstream media remain enthralled, repeating the WH spin, diminishing criticism, and downplaying bad news (i.e. the Four Faces of Newsweek)?

I have no idea. Despite describing Olbermann as "shrill" (an odd pot-calling-kettle-black sort of thing), Froomkin writes appreciatively of the man who has become a lone voice of sanity among the barking and drooling hyenas he has the misfortune to call his peers. Froomkin is right to question why there aren't more like him in the mainstream media - though I suspect Olbermann's greatest contribution is towards saving cable news from itself.
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:: Bottoming Out

What a face.

And speaking of a profoundly repulsive creature, here's an item about Fox's Bill O'Reilly (as noted by National Journal's Paul Mercurio).

Naturally, Bill and friends have been doing their bit to blame the Foley (R-FL) situation on Democrats:

During Tuesday night's show, the chyron below the former congressman's name repeatedly flashed the words: "Mark Foley, D-FL." Three different times. In two separate segments.

The entire column by Mercurio is a terrific overview of the venality gushing forth from Republican mouthpieces this week.

Luckily for sane people, the numbers coming back from the field indicate a sizable chunk of Republican voters see this issue as a matter of accountability, which makes the "blame Clinton / blame Soros / blame Canada" message exactly the wrong one. This is how Lawrence Nuccio, a 78 year-old habitual Republican and resident of Glen Cove (Long Island) puts it when he explains why he will vote Democratic this year for the first time ever:

I'm a registered Republican, but when I turn around and see them trying to cover up — and that's what they're doing — and try to pass the buck to the Democrats, that's not right. You have elected officials who are running the country and you assume are doing the right thing, but they're not.

In case you are wondering, Mr. Nuccio's Congressman is Peter King (R-NY). I don't like him (that is, Peter King; not Mr. Nuccio who I'm sure is a lovely fellow as well as a paisan), but as far as I've seen, he's had nothing whatsoever to do with the Foley business.

Even Republican attempts to confuse sexual predation and homosexuality - thereby appealing to their bigot base and ostensibly turning the issue against Democrats because of the party's support of gay civil rights - will fall flat since the Republican leadership clearly had countenanced the homo evil in their midst.

I imagine quite of few of the so-called "values voters" who were told they were the linchpin of Republican victories in 2004 are considering the adage "you dance with him what brought you" and asking "so why were you dancing with him?"

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:: "Why should such a man be?"

Why should such a man be?

The question is a crucial turning point in the great novel "The Brothers Karamazov." The four brothers each consider it in reference to their father, a man so vile, so bereft of redeeming qualities, and so prolific in malevolant and destructive activity that it drives even the devout to question God's wisdom in making such a creature.

It sprung to mind today when I read Media Matters Daily (aka the Misery Missive). Today's edition noted a press release by the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights, a hate group that has yet to be disowned by Catholic institutions. Yes, the bishops will threaten to excommunicate your sorry heathen ass if you vote pro-choice, but those who spread hatred far and wide have naught to fear.

The press release concerns the Foley Follies; it notes Foley's lawyer's claim that the ex-Congressman/current pervert was molested as a 15 year-old by a priest. This is the Catholic League's contribution to the fray:

“As for the alleged abuse, it’s time to ask some tough questions. First, there is a huge difference between being groped and being raped, so which was it Mr. Foley? Second, why didn’t you just smack the clergyman in the face? After all, most 15-year-old teenage boys wouldn’t allow themselves to be molested. So why did you?”

This is such utterly disgusting trash that there's hardly any reason to look behind it, other than to take note of another man who combines intense anger and a baseless perception that he is being persecuted with a rigid religious sensibility. But maybe its worthwhile to make this point:

Donohue suggests that a teenage male who is molested has allowed this to happen, insinuating that not physically fighting back can be taken as a "come-on" (in other words, he was asking for it.) This is a sensibility shared by many sex predators, who sometimes inhabit "fantasy worlds" in which the children (or teens) they target, through subtle "signals" perceptible only to the predator himself, invite sexual activity. The creation of the fantasy world shields the predator from appreciating the true nature of his acts.

Funny how bleak, twisted minds can think alike. Read more!

:: Bless His Heart

The Archbishop of Canterbury released a report this week addressing the misuse and misinterpretation of Christian theology with regard to domestic violence.

Britain's The Times explains:

It warns clergy that the bride’s traditional marriage vow to “obey” her husband could be used to justify domestic violence as could referring to God as “He” and “Lord”.

Bad theology, such as using the Virgin Mary “to reinforce norms of female passivity and obedience”, has even been used to convince victims to forgive their abusers and not take action against them.

The report criticises the Church of England for failing to challenge abusers and for intensifying the suffering of survivors, whether intentionally or unintentionally.

“Over the centuries questionable assumptions about the relation between men and women, which were supposed to reflect the will of God, have influenced the Church’s interpretation of the Bible, its moral teaching and pastoral practice,” the report says.

“It is a tragic fact that bad theology, in this case a faulty understanding of God and human beings in relationship, can have the effect — whether intended or not — of betraying victims of domestic abuse and encouraging the actions of perpetrators.”

The Archbishop's report makes me question my inclination to view all religious institutions as sinister at best (but just a little). If he can release something so... civilized, it makes you wonder why our homegrown Christian institutions are so... not. And this doesn't mean the nice individual clergypersons with their nice small liberal congregations and no power within the greater church hierarchy. I mean the leadership, the keepers of tradition, the heads of the old (and new) clerical behemoths.

This is the sort of analysis that our Leaders Religious would produce if they were serious about promoting tolerance of the beliefs of others (forget about women's rights; they would sooner swallow iron shavings). We get no end of commentary about backwards social ideas contained in the Koran and promoted by Islamic clergy; a little perspective on how many chestnuts of lunacy are contained in the Bible and some of the ass-backwards ideas promoted by Christian clergy (I'm thinking of you, Southern Baptists) might help our people develop a sense of context. But no. Even if our church leaders were so inclined, none would risk the inevitable public disapprobation that would follow a thoughtful, specific critique of the misuse of Christian theology. I predict we'll see something critical in our media of passages in the Bible and statements made by wackjob Christian leaders round about... never. Read more!

:: "Ain't I a Woman?"

A photo from my favorite organization's trip to Ethiopia. "The weaker sex" doing manual labor while the men supervise... what would the sociobiologists and the cultural conservatives - who believe biology reifies gender stereotypes - say to this?

Probably nothing. But we know what Sojourner Truth would say:

“That man over there says that women need to be helped into carriages, and lifted over ditches, and to have the best place everywhere. Nobody ever helps me into carriages, or over mud-puddles, or gives me any best place! And ain't I a woman? Look at me! Look at my arm! I have ploughed and planted, and gathered into barns, and no man could head me! And ain't I a woman? I could work as much and eat as much as a man - when I could get it - and bear the lash as well! And ain't I a woman? I have borne thirteen children, and seen most all sold off to slavery, and when I cried out with my mother's grief, none but Jesus heard me! And ain't I a woman?”

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:: The New Conservative Message on Iraq

The Sunday New York Times offers a tantalizing glimpse of what may be a new White House message strategy that attempts to reconcile the First Truth - the White House is always right - with the reality-based assertion that the Iraq basket is on a fast track to hell. Columnist David Brooks, always game to try the latest conservative Jedi Mind Trick on the NYTimes readership, put it thusly: "Iraq is the most xenophobic, sexist and reactionary society on earth." ["Closing of a Nation," New York Times, September 24, 2006.]

Brooks cites World Values Survey research on Iraq to back up his claim. The World Values Survey is indeed a treasure, so much so that I suspect every staff member is worth their own weight in gold. They are the go-to place for transparent comparative data about social attitudes around the world, and they put much of that data up on the web for researchers, the curious and the habitual procrastinor to peruse for free. There is no doubt in my mind that the figures from the World Values Survey that Brooks cites are accurate: for example, that 90% of Iraqi Arabs say they would be uncomfortable having a foreigner as a neighbor.

The real matter of interest is to what end Brooks presents this information. After all, the man who recently defended traditional gender stereotypes as hardwired in the brain (ergo natural, ergo good), concerned about Iraqi sexism? The man who thinks America is Number One in any and all circumstances, concerned about Iraqi xenophobia?

The answer is revealed in this statement: "... over the past 15 years, things have become much worse. It's impossible to tell how much of the trauma has been caused since the American invasion. We do know, however, that American policy makers were surprised to learn how religious Iraqi society has become during the 1990's. (Iraqi exiles had not prepared them for this.)"

Set aside, for the moment, the notion that we can't compare conditions before and after the invasion. Set aside, also, that Brooks uses religiosity as a euphemism for the aforementioned xenophobia, sexism and reactionary-ism (oops, I think the correct term is knee-jerk conservatism.) And set aside, lastly, that Brooks uses figures for Iraqi Arabs (rather that all Iraqis) to get more dramatic numbers.

The real message is that democracy in Iraq is failing because the Iraqis themselves are the most xenophobic, sexist and reactionary people on the planet. In other words, things are going wrong not because of anything we did, but because (1) the Iraqis are the most screwed up people in the world, and (2) the Iraqis didn't tell us how screwed up they are ahead of time. And they were like this long before we got there.

Its a morally and intellectually bankrupt argument which, among other things, breezes over the distinction between describing a condition and examining its causes, but no doubt some people - people who have the need to believe our leaders are always right, even in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary - will buy it. At least one person already has. Read more!

:: Is That So Wrong?

I posted a reader's review of the new Sofia Coppola movie "Marie Antoinette" at the NYTimes website today (okay, so I was bored):

"Coppola's true achievement is in updating the cinematic aesthetics of privilege. Here and in Lost in Translation the primary subject is the "terrible irony" of being young, beautiful, rich and yet lonely. To her credit, Coppola may be sticking to a dynamic with which she is intimately familiar (we are always told to "write what we know"). To her discredit, you can find this trope in a thousand different fashion layouts, in the celebrity mythology of Paris Hilton, and in the anachronistic blend of 1930s gangster fashion, Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous opulence and 'mo' money, mo' problems' sensibility of a typical big budget rap video. If you are happy to spend ten bucks on pretty costumes, pretty actors, cool music and content that won't make you break a synaptic sweat, then by all means have at it. As for me, I look forward to seeing what Coppola creates when she grows up."

So what if I haven't seen the movie. Is that so wrong? I did see the trailer - twice! Read more!