I turned on the television a few mornings ago for five minutes and Romney was (seemingly) live on ABC, NBC, and CBS at the same time in talking head interviews. Switched to MSNBC and they were talking about Romney but not actually to him. Click - t.v. turned off.
Turn on the computer and surf to DKos and what do you know? Mitten's ugly mug staring at me - day after day.
On The All Republican All The Time Front Page… it's not a good thing and I for one am tired of it.
First off, I really don't care who the Republicans choose. (To the extent the people choose at all, it seems like a foregone conclusion - a decision made above the people's paygrade.) It has seemed like Romney for two years at this point, so there are few surprises. I don't care to hear any of their speeches or lies.
Second, this kind of "cover the horse race" reporting disgusts me. And I can get that kind of coverage anywhere. It is literally all the vile Chuck Todd does 24/7. Most of this "horse race" is actually semi-scripted bullshit like bad reality television…the rise of Herman Cain, (an actual reality t.v. guy) the Donald's interventions, etc. Hate to see the FP descend to that.
Clinton v. Obama was an actual race, a close race, and this is a Democratic site, so the coverage of that race made absolute sense. it was also interesting and most people here had a personal stake in it, to some extent. So different story there.
Talking about the Repub horse race all the time does a couple of things - it gives them free publicity, bolsters their name recognition, and "normalizes" them. By normalize, I mean it makes the odd Repubs seem kind of normal just by seeing them all the time. Kind of like hearing a terrible song on the radio, but after the nth time you start to tap your foot and kind of like it or at least get used to it - because it has been shoved down your throat so much. It may not work on most people here, but it works on people at large, believe me. Regardless of the message, humans are social beings and keep an ear to the ground of what everyone is talking about - the traditional media wants that discussion to be Romney - to LEGITIMIZE him. Let's not help in that process.
It is sort of like when Palin came out on the scene. There was a strong desire to talk about her 24/7 on the Blogosphere, to broadcast every nutty thing she said and did. She should have been ignored and, thus, marginalized. And I think we finally reached that point with Palin, thank goodness. When the traditional media does not want to publicize something, they just barely cover it all (OWS, for example). You think you are attacking them, but, especially weak attacks, can have the opposite effect. It is almost true that there is no such thing as negative publicity but only publicity.
Republicans dominate virtually all traditional media political coverage, do we want to aid and further that?
The extensive coverage of their primary also serves as a distraction from actual news and actual coverage of politics as it is going on right now i.e. what the Obama administration is doing. Surely, you don't want to serve up distraction. You can't be doing this on purpose to take the spotlight and criticism off Obama, can you? Say it so Joe…or, in this case, Kos, et al.
My advice: save up the Republican coverage for a once a week group post and make sure any attack is extremely strong. A weak attack is worse than none.
Do you want to win or be a standard issue boring political blog? If you want to win, cut out this all Republican all the time Front Page.
Do you want to be a force for good in the world or part of the traditional media propaganda/distortion/distraction Wurlitzer? You want to be a force for good, cut out this all Republican all the time Front Page.