Double Fantasy 08′
- 02.21.2008 - 11:45 AMWhile Barack Obama earns a standing ovation for blowing his nose, John McCain gets the full smear job for having been in the company of a female lobbyist. This is fitting, as the adulation surrounding Obama’s every twitch is as manufactured as the finger-wagging over McCain’s non-alleged scandal. Troubling that in the most serious of times, the media refuses to take this election seriously.
The New York Times piece in question is the journalistic equivalent of push-polling or the “it was all a dream” narrative explanation. They float a juicy two-pronged premise (adultery and political compromise) before the electorate with no greater justification than that some anonymous observers had mistakenly assumed it to be true. In the article, the Times practically does a cut-and-paste of the most incriminating bits, detailing the non-allegations at the beginning and end, so that all the relevant refutations are framed in slime.
John McCain came up against this kind of unscrupulous warfare in South Carolina during the 2000 primaries. George Bush’s camp invented a scenario to play on voters’ prejudice under the guise of a poll. Voters were asked if they would vote for McCain if they knew he had fathered an illegitimate black child. Back then, the attack was orchestrated by his opponent. That today such methods are employed by a supposedly impartial press goes to show how far the tenor of political coverage has sunk. But in either case it is a testament to John McCain’s character and record that the most potentially damaging blows to his candidacy need to be fashioned out of thin air. Just as it’s an indication of Barack Obama’s actual flimsiness that the abilities for which he’s adored are also fabrications. Elections have dealt in sleaze before, but this inclination towards legitimizing fiction is a new and alarming turn.
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February 21st, 2008 at 12:00 PM
A conspiracy theorist might say that this story was planted with the Times to fire up the Republican base.
February 21st, 2008 at 12:19 PM
We’ve been hearing that John McCain needs a knock down drag out with the NYT in order to fire up the conservative base so that they’ll shake off their alleged McCain apathy and get to the November polls (personally, I think the prospect of a Clinton or Obama White House is plenty to get the conservative base fired up). If this is indeed the case, it looks like the NYT has done McCain a favor. He doesn’t even have to pick a fight - the Paper of Record has done it for him. We’ll see if the battle can continue for 8-9 more months.
February 21st, 2008 at 12:37 PM
Troubling that in the most serious of times, the media refuses to take this election seriously
They take it very seriously, they know that Barry Hussein is lockstep with their agenda and nothing will stop them from trying.
February 21st, 2008 at 2:28 PM
Appropriate respone to a very inappropriate, poorly written piece. We must remember that more discerning factual news is being read on the web than found in the Times and not get too drummed up about this. We give the Times too much credit by even responding to this tripe. RIP NYT.
February 21st, 2008 at 2:32 PM
My conspiracy-minded self took it even further when I heard about the story: McCain operatives planted the NYT tale themselves.
Okay, that seems too far-fetched, even for tinfoil-hat moi. But McCain’s media-darlingness does seem to be a major irritant with the conservative base, perhaps more influential than any specific issue. Even the famous immigration hoohah seems to have little bite in actual GOP primaries.
Unless McCain blows up in public over this story - which he seems to be very carefully resisting - or unless there’s some substance here - which seems very unlikely - it’s hard not to see the fuss as a plus.
February 21st, 2008 at 2:45 PM
By the way, some diehard anti-McCainiacs aren’t falling for it. Over at the NRO Corner Andy McCarthy is shouting that even if McCain got slimed by the NYT, he somehow deserved it because McCain slimed waterboarding advocates. Seriously, that’s exactly what McCarthy is arguing. I’m starting to worry about how this guy got to be a U.S. attorney. Did he ever win a case?
And yes, I know I’m usually hard on the NRO Corner, especially Mr. Derbyshire. Maybe I’m channeling JPod, whose bouts with Derb are the stuff of NRO legend. But Derbyshire just put up an astonishingly clear-headed analysis of how an Obama presidency could harm race relations in the U.S.
Okay, aspersions are easy to cast on the motivations of the self-identified racist. But Derbyshire argues persuasively that a replay of the Carter administration by Obama is a very possible outcome. And that could wreck the full integration of blacks into the American political system.