You know, this is a defining moment in our nation's history. And I too wonder with anticipation: are we at the point where the voting public is finally smart enough to recognize a steaming pile of shit when it's served to them--even when the hosts are calling it plum pudding?
Today, the day after ABC's chillingly biased Pennsylvania Primary Debate, our electronic powers-that-be spin away at the countless objections from the Obama campaign, weaving them into whining far-left cries of "you're too mean!" Yet the point of contention was not the hard line of questioning. It was the fact that only one candidate was subjected to them. A curiosity made downright scandalous by the fact that the debate was moderated by the other candidate's husband's press secretary.
Under the guise of a getting-at-the-tough-issues forum, this sham more closely resembled the Joseph McCarthy Senate hearings more than any exchange of ideas. A one-sided, accusation-rich witch hunt so partisan, Obama wouldn't have felt less comfortable in an interrogation room with a single lit light bulb swaying over his head.
I'm not part of the far left wing--I voted for Ronnie and W so I think that qualifies me as banned for life--so I take offense at the media's automatic categorization of anyone who didn't feel the debate was fair and accurate as such. Even now, long after the stage lights have faded in Philly, you still get the sense the media feels Obama is "getting off easy".
One one side, you have a woman who has hypnotically convinced the media to turn her lies--sorry, inaccurate recollections--about her trip to Bosnia qualifying her to be our Commander-In-Chief, into an old topic we need to get past. On the other, you have a man who in a week's time will enter his third month of scrutiny regarding a sermon given by his former minister. Not his spouse, nor his running mate, nor a family member. His former reverend. Getting off easy? The guy is getting it from all sides: from his own party, from the opposing party, and from left- and right-wing media alike.
You see, Hillary Clinton was supposed to win the nomination. But clearly, some of you Democrats weren't paying attention like you should have been. Shame on you! It's amusing the degree of ferocity displayed by those in "the establishment" with a clear stake in the primaries, particularly those in the left-wing media (read: Fox News). On the Hannity & Combs entertainment program, John Kasich, the former Republican Senator from Ohio, literally yelled out an accusation that the Democratic Party "has it in" for the Clintons. I love it when people play the victim card for perhaps the single most vindictive couple in modern American politics. Not only was the comment without merit; it also came the night after Hasslemania, the ABC-TV Pennsylvania Debate, where Hillary was able to read responses directly from 3x5 cards, as if on cue.
And Sean Hannity, the Peter Griffin of political news, has used his "Hannity's America" show as a platform to engage in topics of hearsay bordering on gossip, the likes of which one would only expect to find in an Olympia Dukakis movie. If you were real quiet, you could hear hair stylists all over town yelling "shut your yaps" at their TVs.
I'm not even sure that ABC's debate-turned-debacle has satisfied the mainstream media. These are the same folks who collectively turned tail and ran hours after the New York Times story broke concerning John McCain's questionable relationship with an oil corporation lobbyist. They cited insufficient evidence of a sex scandal, ignoring, in their hasty exit, the fact that an absence of proof of physical sex doesn't make his unethically close relationship with a female lobbyist--one whose client happened to be on the business end of legislation to which McCain's involvement would be critical--any less newsworthy.
This is the same media who has allowed Senator Hillary Clinton and her former-President husband dictate the course of this entire Democratic Primary. It's as if they wait for her campaign releases and run with them like the gospel. Last night Ms. Clinton got away with dropping yet another F-bomb (F as in Farakhan) in another attempt to strike fear and trepidation into Pennsylvania's mostly white voting public by tapping into their deepest prejudicial insecurities. Standing on a stump and proclaiming "This is not a campaign about race" is win-win for her; it makes her look fair while planting the seeds of doubt in the minds of undecideds.
Could it really, really be that this man--this man who's taken all their punches, who time and again refuses to take the bait and sink to mud-slinging, even when handed the topic of Hillary's fabrication of her Bosnia "experience"--strikes fear in the eyes of the establishment? And by establishment I mean everyone from the Clintons to the McCains, from Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity to George "Step-On-All-Of-Us" and Charles Gibson?
I'm sure we'll learn more after Pennsylvania, when Hillary wins the popular vote by roughly 10% (as polls suggested months ago and even Obama's campaign has acknowledged) while nearly breaking even in the electorals.
