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The purpose of this blog is to get readers to think about the complex (or perhaps simple) issues I write about.

The primary topics will revolve around politics and society as a whole, but a mixture of sports opinion may be thrown in from time to time.


Wednesday, May 16, 2012

Barack "Leonidas" Obama and his Media Phalanx

My morning reads contained this article from NY Magazine, written by a NYC liberal with a bit of humorous self-deprecation. Two things about his well-written piece leaped through the context. The first, his wife's reaction to the newest CBS/NYTimes poll that by now most have heard about which Mitt Romney is leading Barack Obama by 3 over all, but some of the deeper trends (67% think Obama's Same Sex Marriage turn was "for political reasons" and over two-thirds of the country thinks the economy sucks) when she ponders "People are really willing to vote for Mitt Romney? They hate Obama so much they'd vote for Romney?"

The second (and I will expand on both of these quotes later) was Mr. Cassidy's rightful ribbing of the New York Times for burying this poll on page A17, with Cassidy opining "If Romney's ahead in the next poll, the Times should just put the results in the "Metro Section"-the one that no longer exists."

Yesterday, CNN's Don Lemon linked Mitt Romney's stance on marriage ("Marriage is a relationship between one man and one woman.") to the formerly infamous Alabama segregationist George Wallace by prefacing Romney's quote with Wallace uttering the scary, "Segregation now. Segregation tomorrow. Segregation forever."

You don't have to look far to see what is happening...

It has become utterly apparent to the media establishment that "their guy," Barack Obama is not only going to have a tough re-election fight on his hands, there is the distinct possibility he could lose. What you've seen in the media since the President's "evolution" on same-sex marriage was "complete" is a full-throated push to cast the President in a positive light, and they have actively used this "evolution" to disparage Mitt Romney at every opportunity.

It has gone well beyond the same-sex marriage issue. On Monday, the Obama Campaign released a video of former employees at Kansas City, MO steel company GST discussing how the corporate restructuring of the company by Bain Capital led to massive layoffs. During the video, the Obama team actually calls Mitt Romney a Vampire. Literally. Despite the ad being roundly criticized by all sides MSNBC has talked about the ad, parroting its major talking points for the better part of 72 hours now. Of course none of that time was actually fact checking the video, or putting time considerations (GST went bankrupt-when most lost their jobs in 2001, two years after Mitt Romney left Bain Capital. Or hey! The fact that the purpose of private equity isn't to "save or create jobs")

The Romney team quickly reacted with a video of its own, touting Steel Dynamics, another steel company that was nearly brought to its knees before a big influx investment from Bain Capital allowed it to thrive. MSNBC's reaction? They examined this ad with a fine-toothed comb, of course! A Google search can produce the talking point MSNBC has for the Romney ad, that (only after) government stepped in with (additional) money to help Steel Dynamics get to where it is today-conveniently ignoring the fact that without the initial investment of Bain Capital, Steelworks wouldn't have existed long enough for the government to invest in it with grants.

To respond to Cassidy's rightly-cynical suggestion the NYTimes simply not report any bad polling numbers for Barack Obama in the future, I'd say we should expect them to continue to "bury" the info, but if these numbers exist on August 15th, expect the paper to be in full on, Romney-Attack & Obama-Praise mode.

And how about Mr. Cassidy's wife, and her incredibly insular reaction to the polls findings? Mrs. Cassidy (I don't know the hyphenated version you probably go by), contrary to your better wisdom, there is actually a world outside the bubble that encapsulates the NYC metro area. We don't hate Obama, and we are going to vote for Romney because we've seen where the country goes when we nominate someone with absolutely no resume.

So long as those who's first read every morning is the New York Times, or who's first look at cable news is 10 am on MSNBC, they should all have their willful ignorance protected by the Barack Obama echo chamber.

To those who are disenchanted with Obama, or who were never going to vote for him anyway: It's only May, and the media are reacting to the news that their guy's re-election isn't a sure thing. The Phalanx is being formed by the media establishment now, and the great Leonidas (the President) they hope to bring glory to is as mortal as the incredibly brave King of Sparta was in the end.

The notion of inevitability surrounding the re-election of "The One" is cracking. The Phalanx has been established, but the disenfranchised 2008 Obama voting block grows by the day, and if it grows big enough, the most impressive campaign-President will fall.

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