As you may know from earlier posts, I've long kept an eye on the tabloids, which are all owned by a single company, and which traditionally have ties to both the Republican establishment and -- no, I'm not being paranoid -- the intelligence community. So my recent trip to the grocery store checkout counter was rather enlightening: One tabloid cover featured a hit piece on John McCain, while another focused on the alleged sexual shennanigans of Sarah Palin.
Two questions:
1. How many hit pieces on Obama or Biden have you seen featured on tabloid covers? (Interior stories have less propaganda value; the screaming headlines have a psychological effect even on non-purchasers.) I haven't seen any.
2. Can you recall any previous election in which the tabs went after the Republican ticket more than they went after the Democrats?
I see here one more indication that we have entered an "everything is backwards" election season.
13 comments:
There have beens several anti-Obama ones. One went like: Obama's pastor says 'kill whites'. Another had a story about 3 gay men from TUCC who had been killed right before the primary season, which raised questions about Obama's connection. Several on the battles between Oprah and Michelle. Just read the titles, not the articles.
I believe the republicans behind the scenes, the money people ARE acking Obama. They have contributed hugely to him from very early on, even before he declared. It's win/win for them. If elected he won't rock their world. If voters decide he is a failure, fine with them. If the economy does turn around, they will be in a position to rip it off again.
I agree with your commentator foxx. I think Wall Street backed Obama heavily. I'm not sure if this is the natural tendency for money to follow the likely winner (hey just take a look at the mess the last republican administration made) or cos they realise that the Street needs government protection and Obama is more likely to provide it.
I also think its clearly true that Obama has been given an incredibly easy ride by the media. Weirdly easy. Why hasn't Murdoch really gone for him? I don't get it but I can speculate. You don't back Herbert Hoover in the the pre-amble to the new great depression.
However I note that my journalist friends in New York are all Obots. All. The same is true of London. Maybe its just liberal media bias. Its scary to neg a black candidate when as soon as you do you get a mob of fellow hacks screaming "racist".
Harry
from the start the republicans didn't seem to want the white house this time, I guess that was the reason the dnc wanted obama. As for the media my guess they were told their jobs on the line if you don't turn into mouth peices for him. but if he loses by the grace of god this will turn the media obslete and they will not allow that at any cost, also that will give GRASS ROOTS a new meaning and that definitly is a no no
Obama's popped up in the tabloids a lot—there have been attacks on the Obama marriage, a story about a "love child," and a recent bit about the long-lost Obama (half?) brother who is supposedly living in a "shack" in Africa (I don't actually read tabloids, so I don't know the details).
Haven't seen any hit pieces on Biden.
Republicans should be scared sh*tless right now.
Obama represents a group of Democrats who got sick of watching Republicans win elections by cheating and have decided to give them a taste of their own medicine.
I had long feared the Democrats would go over to the Dark Side. It's only human nature--especially after watching Republicans ensconce one blithering incompetent after another and ream the country into the ground.
Now the Obama people are beating the Republicans bigtime at their own game--even to the point of flipping the media over to their side.
With the polarity of the mainstream media reversed as it is, the Republicans have no chance. They should be very afraid. :(
Obama will get in and rig the electoral system. There won't be another Republican President for 50 or more years. Also sprach Perry.
WAY wrong, Perry.
We're heading for Depression. It has not hit yet. It will.
Neither candidate has the inclination or the muscle to do the FDR type stuff necessary to pull the country out. Ergo, the guy sitting in the oval office will soon be the most despised man on earth.
Doesn't matter which party he belongs to. Doesn't matter if he is inflexible or flexible in his economic approach. Doesn't matter if he is intelligent and well-meaning or foolish and deceptive. He'll be hated. He'll be at the receiving end of a propaganda barrage blaming him instead of W for this mess.
Which means that the OPPOSITION party will recapture Congress in 2010 and all three branches in 2012. If it's a Republican in '08, we could have an FDR in '12. If it's a Democrat in '08, then --
well.
Time to learn how to spell Sieg Heil. Remember: When I and E go walking, the second does the talking.
back on topic, maybe the Tabs turned when they started to get poisoned with WMDs? (And were there not stories swirling around about what pictures the photo editor had at the time if his anthraxing?)
The tabloids have had a LOT of anti-Obama articles, including ones hinting about Oprah having a crush on him, Larry Sinclair's charges, and so forth.
We DID have somebody in this campaign who talked about class issues, the issues that REALLY matter, and that was John Edwards, but he was blackmailed out of contention and probably out of public life.
I don't see anybody else on the horizon who addresses issues that matter.
I believe the Democrats are deliberately throwing the election this year because the economy is so bad. The polls may show a "tie" now, but I don't think the electoral math is there for a Democratic win this year.
Yes, Joe, I think you have it nailed. Nasty recession/possible depression = poisoned chalice. They wont remember chimp man did it. They will just hate the moron who caught the hospital pass.
I hope his ego enjoys it.
harry
Of course they want a democrat in there. To pick up the pieces of the worst administration in History (I'm even thinking global history)
Think about how much this administration squandered.
But, I think they want to run Mitt Romney in 2012 and that is why they don't want McLame.
The National Enquirer was on the John Edwards affair for the better part of the year......
They just got the photos recently.
I have thought about this long and hard- as I have a completely republican family. I have to view their world often and to them-the media has always seemed the way you now view it. It is a great deal to do with personal perspective.
I usually content myself with browsing the cover stories while standing in line at Publix. However I do buy the magazines with the political hit pieces.
Yes, there have been some sex scandal stories about BHO, one alleging that Michelle had confronted him with love letters, etc. (the supposed evidence she had found was listed on the cover). I think there were supposed to be naked pictures involved as well.
But those features of the story appeared only on the cover! They weren't mentioned in the article at all. So, a little bait and switch from the headline or cover to what the article actually said.
The article actually said that Michelle had figured out she didn't know enough, and therefore the country couldn't possibly know, BHO's past, back when he may have been a playah. That she demanded to know details, found his denials and demurrals inadequate, and 'blew up the campaign' by threatening to cancel touring for him.
I find I'm often unable to see past the double and triple mirror actions of psyops guys. Was the cover hyped up to fool people who didn't read the story (and thus, to unfairly smear him)? Or, was it a kind of innoculation from such charges, especially focusing on his HETERO-sexual alleged misdeeds, in an elaborate misdirection to point away from the Larry story?
Don't know, and when you are trying to figure out people who you know are deliberately misleading you, it makes your head hurt.
XIslander
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