If you’re as obsessive about politics as I am, you probably watched the “CNN Democratic Debates” this week, brought to you by CNN, hosted by CNN, and did I mention CNN was somehow involved? What the hell ever happened to the League of Women Voters, anyway? This notion of presidential debates being treated like commercial media properties is beyond ridiculous. Debates should not be some pre-packaged product served up by powerful corporations who benefit from the free-for-all media environment our bought politicians have built for them over the years. As if that wasn’t bad enough, the three purported journalists moderating the event were hell-bent on getting the various candidates to mix it up, posing questions that were, at worst, the equivalent of “Are you just going to stand there and let her say that about you?” and, at best, cheap rehashes of Republican party talking points. (Jake Tapper is such a freaking waste of space.)
Night one had the two progressive candidates plus what seemed like a legion of also-rans and never-heard-of-ems. Bernie and Warren both did fine, given the full-on frontal attack both were subjected to from the Frackenlooper chorus and the “moderators” (they kind of gave that term a new meaning, come to think of it). I thought Warren was, once again, particularly sharp, agile. Delaney appeared to be the main foil, and he got roasted once or twice, despite Tapper and company’s best efforts to cue him up as the reasonable alternative to what they consider to be radicalism, but which is no more radical in the main than the types of policies Eisenhower was comfortable supporting. Night two was cast as a re-match, in essence, between Harris and Biden – I saw CNN’s run-up to the main event, and it was a cross between reality show and prize fight promo. Ridiculous.
The whole spectacle told us more about our prevailing media culture than it did about the candidates’ positions. One small example – in a brief discussion of the Green New Deal and related legislation, one question centered on the idea that the bill would entail guaranteed government jobs with benefits. As the candidates responded, the super showed the question as something like: “Should the Green New Deal include guaranteed government jobs with paid vacations?” These people are so steeped in the neoliberal myth of our current “prosperity” (based on millions of crappy jobs) that the very concept of stable work with benefits seems bat-shit crazy to them.
Speaking of bat-shit crazy, the CNN shills were outdone by their counterparts on Morning Joe on Thursday morning. Joe, Mika, and the whole crew were appalled by the previous night’s performance, saying the candidates were attacking Obama all night. Not sure they saw the same debate as I did, but this is the type of input Democrats should expect from never-Trump Republicans like Scarborough: We should rewind back to 2008 and stay right there, folks. Take that from someone who endlessly criticized Obama from one end of his presidency to the other. Oh … and here comes uber-moderate Claire McCaskle (sp) to tell us how to win in swing states like Missouri, which she lost only last year.
What an enormous pile of shit.
luv u,
jp