dubyaD40.com - Guest Blog

dubyaD40.com's Guest Blog

A Vote For Reality
Thursday, October 30, 2008

It would be a massive understatement to say this election season has been "interesting". The Republicans have done an extraordinary job of turning a Presidential election into top notch theater. Well, maybe not top notch - more like "Gilligan's Island" with a hint of "Survivor". We've got everyone here - Mr. Howell (McCain), Mrs. Howell (Cindy McCain), the Skipper (Karl Rove), Gilligan (Tucker Bounds), Ginger (Palin), and MaryAnn (Nancy Pfotenhauer). Now comes the part where we get to vote everyone off, right?

It's fun to play Central Casting, but in all seriousness I'm afraid we've lost sight of what we're really doing here. Because this isn't Central Casting at all; it's nothing less than the future of a once-great nation. We really are at a pivotal point in our history and the decision we make next week will determine our direction for not just the next four years, but for years to come. No second takes. No alternate endings. It's the real thing. We're not casting for the role of President and Vice President, we're selecting an actual leader who will have an enormous impact on lives around the world, not just here at home.

I know image has always played a big role in politics, but it never should have been allowed to eclipse the actual issues. We're not voting for leaders, we're voting for mavericks and plucky frontier mamas because we think they're fun to watch on TV every day. Yes, it applies to Obama too. Jamie Foxx recently told Newsweek, "We need a cool President." Well yeah, that'd be nice - but I'd also like a competent President. If he makes a major mess of things (see: Bush Presidency), it's not like I can just change the channel and make it go away.

As much as I'd like to see every eligible voter out there speaking up for themselves, I do worry about people's motivations for their vote. Bush got elected by people who voted for him because he seemed like the kind of guy they could have a beer with (never mind that he was a recovering alcoholic and probably hadn't seen the inside of a local watering hole in... ever). Don't vote for someone because his campaign marketing was more exciting and you think he'd look good behind the podium - vote for him because you believe he'd be a good leader.

So when you make your final decision, turn off the TV and turn to the issues. Make a responsible decision, not only for you and your family, but for the nation as a whole. You get one vote - make it a vote for reality, not ratings.

(For the record: yes, I support Obama. But if you truly believe McCain's positions on the issues - see: Bush Presidency - are better for the entire nation, then that's how you should vote. You're disturbingly wrong, but you're free to make that mistake. And I was always partial to The Professor on Gilligan's Island - he's more like Obama. :-)

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Jenna's Journal
Monday, October 13, 2008

The Palin Problem

Sarah Palin is a problem for many people. She's a problem for the American people from the standpoint that if she ever makes it to the White House, we're in deep... despair. Her each and every presence at official events will be a new and fresh opportunity to embarrass us at the international level. Her policies are terrifying for the vast majority - both male and female alike. She's even become a problem for her own campaign and if she weren't actually on the ticket, she'd probably be banned from any and all McCain events.

But she's become a particular problem for women. We can't win with her, we only lose. If we support her, we bear the wrath of her twisted ideology with regard to rape and reproductive issues. If we don't support her, we're suddenly anti-feminist and going "against the cause". If we don't vote for a woman, then we must not be very serious about equality, right?

That's possibly why McCain chose her. Throw half the population into chaos over who to vote for and maybe they'll just stay home. He certainly didn't choose her to garner favor with women because just the opposite has happened. More men than women have gone to the McCain side because of Palin. I imagine these are not men who think with their brains.

No matter how the election comes out, she's been bad for women. If McCain loses, politicians may forever be skittish of adding a woman to their ticket. It didn't work with Ferraro and it didn't work with Palin, so they're just not gonna do that again - it's a campaign death sentence. If McCain wins, she'll not only be a great embarrassment for four years, she'll throw women's rights back about 50 years.

Geez - one person really can make a difference. Too bad it's not a positive difference.

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Obama Waffles
Monday, September 15, 2008

Joan Lowy of The Huffington Post recently wrote of the Values Voters Summit, a right wing political shindig sponsored by such organizations as the Family Research Council, American Values and Focus on the Family Action. Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich were two of the featured speakers.

During the course of said summit, boxes of Obama Waffles waffle mix flew off the shelves at $10 a pop. Obama Waffles - I get it. The party who brings us the candidate with more flip flops than a college sorority is trying to tell us Barack Obama is a flipper himself. Frankly, it's a clever pun and an inspired move, even if it's not true. It's even enough to elicit a few chuckles and make a Democratic campaign manager wish he thought of it first.

But the concept is where it stops being funny. It gets offensive when it includes a caricature of Obama with stereotypical bug eyes and big lips. And that's just the front of the box. The top flap shows him in Arab headgear, pushing the false notion that he's really a Muslim instead of a Christian (implying that Obama isn't what he says he is AND that it's bad to be Muslim, so... double score!). On the back he wears a Mexican sombrero alongside a recipe for Open Border Fiesta Waffles, which serves "4 or more illegal aliens."

To quote Daffy Duck: "Ha, ha. Very funny. It is to laugh."

The creators of this gimmick (who won't be mentioned here because they don't deserve the publicity) shrug off any suggestion of impropriety by comparing it to Paul Newman using a picture of himself wearing a mustache to sell Italian dressing. It seems to have escaped them that their chosen model was not a willing participant and the pictures have nothing to do with the product. (I'm also reasonably certain they can be sued for using his image without his permission, but Obama's the lawyer so I'll let him worry about that one.)

What bugs me most is that these organizations do what they do under the guise of "family values". This was a "Values Voters Summit," after all. How is it a family value to disparage people who have different ideas and opinions? What exactly are these people teaching their children once they get home? Do they give explicit, rigorous lessons on how to offend and marginalize people or is it more subtle? Is there perhaps a cartoon video series for the younger kids?

Thirty years ago, having values included being polite, having a certain level of tolerance, and being kind to those less fortunate. At least that's what I was taught. I don't think that's really changed. The only thing that's changed is that the word "values" has been hijacked for political gain. It's being used by slick hucksters to sell a political brand that bears no real resemblance to its advertising. What kind of value is it to separate immigrant families, deporting the parents and leaving the children to languish in US custody (often in prisons)? What kind of value is it to tell a rape victim she can't have an abortion because it violates the sanctity of life, but attack a sovereign nation, killing thousands of mothers and children?

These people are guilty of false advertising on all fronts. Not just when they try to spread false claims about Obama, but when they try to paint a picture of themselves as benevolent and values-driven. You can call something "sugar free," but if there's high fructose corn syrup in there, it'll still make you fat. You can say someone has "values," but if they continually destroy people for their own gain, they still suck.

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Special Comment by Bob Kincaid of the H.O.R.N
Friday, May 9, 2008

Because of what I do (talk radio or, as we like to call it at The H.O.R.N., America's Liberal Voice, "Conversation Radio"), I spend a good deal of time (probably more than is healthy, really) thinking about the media in our country.

We liberals/progressives/decent human beings have been mostly disgusted with the media's behavior for almost my entire adult life (N.B.: I'm 45). It's worsened to a degree almost unimaginable in the last eight years and, since March of 2007 has managed to inflame both the partisans of Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, as well as the rest of us liberals/progressives/decent human beings.

With the rise of the internets and particularly blogging, a new phrase entered the lexicon: "Mainstream Media." It has hung on like white on rice, like a dog on a bone-wagon, like a duck on a junebug, like stink on, well, never mind. You get the point.Some folks have periodically noted that the media are anything BUT "mainstream." The media in this country are largely owned by a consortium or perhaps sextumvirate of some six major corporations. That gave rise to the term "corporate media," which is accurate as far as it goes.What it doesn't do, however, is go all the way to the vile, bilious, throbbing heart of the problem.

Now, I think I've found the moniker many of us have been looking for. It dawned on me last night during "The H.O.R.N. Section," when Peter Godbold, Jon Fox and I get together for an hour on the air and sort of free-form ideas, stories and even occasional outright silliness. You can hear the archives of the H.O.R.N. Section and every other H.O.R.N. program at www.whiterosesociety.org . The live streams are always available at http://www.headonradionetwork.com , among other places.

This idea, however, struck me as anything but silly. It came from my thoughts about Dennis Kucinich's entirely accurate description of our healthcare crisis stemming from what he called "For-profit healthcare."

And there it was: jiggling like an overburdened toxic waste dump glistening under a blistering sun: "The For-profit Media."

It really encapsulates everything that's wrong with the Timmehs and Tweetys and Becks and O'Reillys and Humes and Scarboroughs and Phlegmballs and SavageWeiners and "BUYGOLDNOW and spend it on our herbal erection concocktion! Use it while sleeping on a Swedish mattress developed by NASA and clean up the mess with a vacuum cleaner that picks up bowling balls" ads that litter the Fourth Estate. At the end of the day, in the final analysis, it's the profit motive that drives everything we loathe about American media behavior. It's behind Fox's incessant, obsessive use of titillating imagery. It's what drove CBS to hire Katie Couric for FIFTEEN MILLION DOLLARS a year (anybody know what Murrow made at the height of his career?). It's what jams BritneyLindsayParis Shark Attacks on Missing White Girls onto our screens nightafternightafternightafternightafternight. It's what keeps America dumbed-down and hyped-up.

So there you have it. Make free use of it. Beat 'em over the head with it.

The For-Profit Media.

With any luck, we can make Timmeh and Tweety start hallucinating it in their AlphaBits every morning.

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