(August 28, 2010 at 3:59 pm)Entropist Wrote:(August 28, 2010 at 11:49 am)lrh9 Wrote: Bet you'll wish you had pushed for a secular amendment to the Constitution.
Well, there already is one-- the first amendment-- however, it seems at least 1/3 of the country doesn't give a damn about it.
Once upon a time, in the early 1990s I remember-- you had to turn on AM radio at 2 in the morning to hear idiots like Glenn Beck. FOX "News" has done more to sink journalistic standards in the US in the past decade -- which has negatively impacted the standards of other news networks in the US (also, Beck was with CNN a few years ago, which I found baffling).
After 9/11, I remember ALL the media were pushing-- PUSHING for the invasion of Afghanistan, and not long after that, Iraq. There were no dissenting views, there were no reports scrutinizing anything (except for Phil Donohue, who was then quickly fired-- I guess Olberman and Maddow are supposed to make up for that, though I find them disappointing as journalists per se).
It had gotten to the point where I had to look overseas for news (usually the BBC and the Guardian) because at least they tended not to treat politicians and pundits with kid gloves like they do here in the US. Journalists here in the US do NOT follow up questions to politicians and now we've got this bizarre practice of giving "other views" even if that "other view" is batshit insane.
In the meantime, you have idiots who still cry out about the "liberal media"! What liberal media? There is no such thing in this country-- certainly not in the corporate media in the US. Traveling overseas, I realize all the more how insular the US is culturally and politically, and how journalism operates in other countries. Really, US Americans should get out more often.
To think these idiots think Obama is a socialist/fascist/communist/muslim/atheist (how can he possibly be all these things. Again, they are idiots). They think he is "liberal"? I find him and most of the Democratic party far too conservative, but that's just me. But I find it amusing they make such idiotic statements when in some other countries there are "conservatives" who are to the left of Obama.
The teabaggers are just tools. That problem (and the underlying racism, fearmongering, xenophobia, religious idiocy) is not merely political, but cultural. But they are being used and it is affecting the US politically. Ironically, Glenn Beck "wrote" a "book" called The Overton Window, but if anyone is pushing the Overton window, it is the right in this country. It has gone so far over to the right that the "left" in the US is hardly "left" at all. Its a joke.
Well obama is pushed for the health care thing which is socialist in design but socialism is not a horrible monster
since i don't know how to post a youtube video here, here is the link
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M4DsNKIJ6...r_embedded
