It seems like in most of journalism everything has to come in two flavors. I suspect it comes from the good and evil duality that many religions espouse. If there is a God, then there must be a devil. It must be nice to have everything reduced to black and white like that.
What happens in real life, though, is that journalists in their quest for duality in the world, create many false equivalents. For example, if some people believe in the science of evolution then there must be an alternative - one that comes from a book thousands of years old written by ignorant nomads who didn't know of the existence of the solar system or ever heard of (less saw) a dinosaur. Yes, journalists would have you believe that these two conflicting opinions should form the basis of political discourse to determine what to teach our youth. Ignorant nomads vs. hundreds of years of scientific research. That this may make sense to those with atrophied brains is bad enough, but why must the media, who collectively know better, go along?
The answer, of course, is ratings or circulation, in other words, money. Didn't someone once say that love of money is the root of all evil? But I digress.
The story today is Bernie Sanders, the Donald Trump of the left. Oh my, now I'm doing it too! How in the world has the press degenerated so much as to compare the Donald, the Elmer Gantry of our time, the ultimate flim flam man, to a serious public servant like Bernie Sanders?
Trump's experience with politics has been with buying politicians to serve his purposes. We don't have to guess about that. He's proud of it. He even paid Hillary Clinton to come to his wedding. How pathetic is that? For Trump, politics is a game, like everything else he does. Doesn't how he manages his real estate empire sound like Monopoly to you?
Now Bernie, on the other hand, (I'm doing it again!) has been fighting for the middle class for years and years, without making nary a profit on it. I need to pause here for a second and let folks know that Bernie, in spite of himself, is not a Socialist. I know Socialists, some of my friends are Socialists, and he ain't one. Unfortunately for Bernie, we don't have Social Democrats in America. We just have Democrats and Republicans. (there's that duality again!) In Europe, Social Democrats occupy a space on the left that is just to the left of our Democrats, but not as left as Socialists. So Bernie is without a real party since he is in reality a Social Democrat.
Trump, on the other hand, really needs no party. He is his own party. Kind of like Juan Peron, the ex-dictator of Argentina. He is a Trumpista. In English, he might be a Trumpeteer, but that sounds too crass, even for Trump, so he has contented himself to try and hijack the Republican Party. Whether he is successful or not is dependent on the strength of the Party leadership which at last look is close to nonexistent.
Most pundits believe that the Sanders campaign is doomed since Hillary does look like she finally has the upper hand this time around. But make no mistake, Bernie is a real candidate, with a real record of accomplishments in the political arena.Trump has no record to run on, just platitudes designed to channel some people's frustrations with the system. One can say that Bernie is also channeling people's frustrations but here is where the comparison ends. Bernie brings with him a lifetime of concern and solutions for average Americans whereas Trump is simply an opportunist with no meaningful experience with public policy and no solutions except empty slogans.
Members of the media, please pay attention.
What happens in real life, though, is that journalists in their quest for duality in the world, create many false equivalents. For example, if some people believe in the science of evolution then there must be an alternative - one that comes from a book thousands of years old written by ignorant nomads who didn't know of the existence of the solar system or ever heard of (less saw) a dinosaur. Yes, journalists would have you believe that these two conflicting opinions should form the basis of political discourse to determine what to teach our youth. Ignorant nomads vs. hundreds of years of scientific research. That this may make sense to those with atrophied brains is bad enough, but why must the media, who collectively know better, go along?
The answer, of course, is ratings or circulation, in other words, money. Didn't someone once say that love of money is the root of all evil? But I digress.
The story today is Bernie Sanders, the Donald Trump of the left. Oh my, now I'm doing it too! How in the world has the press degenerated so much as to compare the Donald, the Elmer Gantry of our time, the ultimate flim flam man, to a serious public servant like Bernie Sanders?
 |
| Bernie Sanders |
The press like these duality narratives because it entertains the public. If the right has an extremist wacko, then it stands to reason that the left must have one too. It's a kind of rule of journalism, apparently. Truth be damned, facts ignored, the story is king, and nothing should get in the way of a good story.
Except we are talking about people's lives, and the future of our country.
We all know that Trump is having a huge good time at our expense, but Bernie actually cares about regular Americans. Trump, like the con artist that was Gantry, is only pretending to care.
Trump's experience with politics has been with buying politicians to serve his purposes. We don't have to guess about that. He's proud of it. He even paid Hillary Clinton to come to his wedding. How pathetic is that? For Trump, politics is a game, like everything else he does. Doesn't how he manages his real estate empire sound like Monopoly to you?
Now Bernie, on the other hand, (I'm doing it again!) has been fighting for the middle class for years and years, without making nary a profit on it. I need to pause here for a second and let folks know that Bernie, in spite of himself, is not a Socialist. I know Socialists, some of my friends are Socialists, and he ain't one. Unfortunately for Bernie, we don't have Social Democrats in America. We just have Democrats and Republicans. (there's that duality again!) In Europe, Social Democrats occupy a space on the left that is just to the left of our Democrats, but not as left as Socialists. So Bernie is without a real party since he is in reality a Social Democrat.
Trump, on the other hand, really needs no party. He is his own party. Kind of like Juan Peron, the ex-dictator of Argentina. He is a Trumpista. In English, he might be a Trumpeteer, but that sounds too crass, even for Trump, so he has contented himself to try and hijack the Republican Party. Whether he is successful or not is dependent on the strength of the Party leadership which at last look is close to nonexistent.
Most pundits believe that the Sanders campaign is doomed since Hillary does look like she finally has the upper hand this time around. But make no mistake, Bernie is a real candidate, with a real record of accomplishments in the political arena.Trump has no record to run on, just platitudes designed to channel some people's frustrations with the system. One can say that Bernie is also channeling people's frustrations but here is where the comparison ends. Bernie brings with him a lifetime of concern and solutions for average Americans whereas Trump is simply an opportunist with no meaningful experience with public policy and no solutions except empty slogans.
Members of the media, please pay attention.
No comments:
Post a Comment