Luckily for me, I almost never watch TV otherwise the political commercials that Black castigates would drive me insane, especially since Ohio is a so-called ‘swing state’ and we get much more than our fair share of this nonsense. Yes, we are all swingers here. To think that TV viewers have to put up with this for another three months makes me worry whether come November, people will be wandering around with glazed eyes.
(This clip appeared on July 24, 2012. To get suggestions on how to view clips of The Daily Show and The Colbert Report outside the US, please see this earlier post.)
It has always been fair game to point out others’ lies, exaggerations and half-truths.
In the recent decades, it was unaceptable but common to use questionable sources to exaggerate or “disprove” others’ statements in political campaigns (e.g. Willie Horton).
But how far have things sunk that campaigns have resorted to outright lying and think it’s okay? If the Rmoney campaign is willing to tell such a lie to the public now, is anyone naive enough to believe they won’t lie when in office?
OK, y’know what? Screw the mainstream FtB capitalist accomodationism.
Even if Obama had said what Rmoney’s people have edited him into saying, he would have been right.
The whole “self-made
manperson” (because we have to pretend that capitalism hasn’t always been phallocratic) myth is just another myth. My favorite quote on the subject (not as an appeal to authority but as a brilliantly-worded and understatedly poetic encapsulation) is Carl Sagan — “If you wish to make an apple pie from scratch, you must first invent the universe.” Nobody, with a few narcissistic exceptions, will claim to have invented the planet, let alone the universe — yet somehow, the entire U.S. political system is obsessed with this mythological entity of the “self-made entrepreneur” who is somehow simultaneously completely separate from human society and yet somehow has built a way of siphoning money from that society.And (sorry, capitalist-apologists!), it’s all bullshit. Everyone who has done anything worthwhile (and can we at least agree that we, as a species and set of societies, have done some seriously worthwhile things?) has done so in a social and economic context which was provided effectively free of charge. Everything that any of us have done, even on a modest scale, has been enabled by our societies and our places therein. The best we can hope for is to be a vital and positive voice in a conversation which is immensely greater than any of us individually — which is a damn fine goal, now that I mention it. How, exactly, is it necessary or beneficial to pretend that the people who control the money have a unique and irreplaceable role in response to which we must give them power over the lives of the rest of us?
When you think that Sheldon Adelson himself has pledged $100 million to beat Obama, it seems that the deluge we’re seeing now may just be the first volley, and only a hint of what lies ahead. I live in a state categorized as “lean Obama” yet the robo calls arrive every day, pollsters call, ads are flooding the air, web, and billboards. I wish there were some way to opt out of all political ads, a’la the do not call list. If not for caller ID, I may already have cancelled my landline phone.
Thanks for posting this. Horatio Alger is a dangerous messiah, and not enough time is spent repudiating his gospels.
I’ve been arguing for years that Nutella is just as nutritious as peanut butter, and should be counted as a legitimate meal and not dessert. Sounds like Black is on my wife’s side . . .