The end of the culture wars? »
Posted by: Radiofreeeuropa 2 months ago142 Comments Report this Story
Hot-button politics has turned out to be cumulatively disastrous for America. Politicians warred over narrow, symbolic issues while real problems that didn't fit the culture war paradigm - lack of access to healthcare, global warming, the US occupation of Iraq grew and festered. Have the electorate finally had enough of the BS?
Read Full Story at guardian.co.uk
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Radiofreeeuropa2 months ago
McCain claims he is not interested in smears like past campaigns, but not even well-meaning nominees will be able stop an outpouring of sludge, especially from the Republican "fever swamp" of secretive, moneyed activists, enabled by a media that exists for nothing more than BS and scandal real or imagined. But there are signs like the failure of Hillary Clinton's gas tax holiday pander that cheap political manipulation itself has fallen out of the public's favor.
After the Bush years, people are sick of obvious fakery and associate it with incompetence and bad policies.
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obiefrommuskogee2 months ago
This is a recent example of a McCain smear: Obama will put in activist judges that will make judgments like taking away the death penalty for rape. So even though Obama disagreed with this finding...
McCain tried to make this court finding a smear against Obama. We laughed when we saw McCain make this statement. If McCain keeps this up, he is going to look like a doddering old fool, even more than he does now.
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aniokly2 months ago
I don't need Sen McCain, or anyone else to tell me Sen Obama will nominate activist Supreme Court Justices. Check his voting record. It is 100% liberal. Check history. Liberals nominate activist S C Justices. Read his books. He is anti-white. So is his lovely wife Brunno. He is anti American. So is his wife. You don't sit in a racist church for 20 years listening to a Black Nationalist preacher curse, and damn America, and everything she believes in, and come to me and ask for my vote. No way. Never.
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rimbaud2 months ago
I like McCain, but he HAS come of as unsure of himself, not a characteristic you want to promote as candidate for President. I think we caught him before he had completed his inner dialogue on how he would stand for President. For a man of principal, this kind of calculation must not have come easy, and we see the evidence.
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gamahuche2 months ago
Exactly the quote that I saved to "make an entrance with", as I was reading through the story.Great minds do think alike I guess..
Now I just got an urgent work call and won't be able to play much today but I did like the end too - and hope that wasn't already pre-empted:
"The elder George Bush and Hillary Clinton â;; each an Ivy League-educated member of the nation's political elite â;; adopted the guise of culture warrior out of convenience, damn the consequences. It was both divisive and silly, what with Bush's affection for pork rinds and Clinton knocking back a whiskey shot in a working-class Indiana bar. If that kind of role-playing no longer wins many votes, American politics is about to become a lot less stupid."
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gamahuche2 months ago
Not sure if I agree with all of the above - I'm definitely not a pork-rinds kind of guy but a whiskey or two, especially a high class single malt never went amiss.[I suppose though it had to be something like Johnnie Walker or Old Grouse]
But the last half-sentence I HOPE and believe is in the course of manifesting..
And especially the end of fakery!!!
Have to repeat that one, though you used it already.
Finally - a relief to read a comprehensible and well-written overview from the outside!
Right or wrong, I hope it inspires a good thread and that I can get back before the last dance..
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Radiofreeeuropa2 months ago
Whether or not this is actually so remains to be seen, but I thought it was an interesting article. We have indeed seen some evidence that fakery and smear are not working as well as they once did in the political arena. That for whatever reasons there is a significant portion of the population that is not influenced so easily by traditional political theater, media shilling, nor bombastic personal attacks. Wanting instead the "change" if you will, of actually trying to solve problems. We shall see.
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Laurel_MicheleComment removed: User banned.
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chuck-the-canuck2 months ago
But if you guys manage to get it together and fly right, what are all us rubberneckers going to do?
Up until now your politicians have put on a better show than the WWF, except wrestlers seem to have better manners and more class.
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Radiofreeeuropa2 months ago
McCain's latest staff shakeup (the 2nd already) has brought in some folks known for unsavory Rove like tactics. Should they employ them, I believe public opinion will backfire on them.
It's also something personally irrelevant to both these candidates. McCain did not experience the divisions of the Nixon years, (The tired old wedge nonsense paraded around every election originated then) he was in a POW camp. Obama was a child in Hawaii.
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mesodude2 months ago
"McCain's latest staff shakeup (the 2nd already) has brought in some folks known for unsavory Rove like tactics. Should they employ them, I believe public opinion will backfire on them."
--How's that for irony? McShrub knows what it feels like to have a campaign sleazily derailed by Bush thugs so his philosophy is apparently why not learn from the best. So much for distancing himself from Chimper. Poor Mac. ;-(
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Radiofreeeuropa2 months ago
In one sense, the world of comedy will suffer when Bush is gone. But the laughs were certainly not worth the price.
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lvrofwolves2 months ago
well we otta at least get something out of the major screwing, better to laugh then cry.
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AntiNeoCon2 months ago
They have focused on the war while letting the country go to h ell in a handbag. Maybe we will pull out after the treasury is completely drained and China refuses to loan us any more money.
It would be nice to consider the issues you mention RFE, but I am not holding my breath. Sending another space telescope and other such items could be put on hold until we take care of the important issues you mentioned.
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berkeley2 months ago
the author thinks we're about to become less stupid. for half a moment, i imagined what that would be like. then i wondered what his evidence is.
i couldn't find any.
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Mdiar2 months ago
Basically, the idea is that the stupidity of late is based on culture wars, a sort of "blow back" from the 60s/70s. Assuming this is true, we will start to see certain issues effecting voters less and less and the hyper partisan politics fading away. Basically, as the younger people come into there own, the number of voters who care about those time periods decreases.
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chuck-the-canuck2 months ago
"Assuming this is true"
Pretty big assumption. It isn't some sort of sixties Mods and Rockers sort of thing and now that both gangs are out pricing electric wheel chairs all that ranker will go away and everyone will learn to play nice.
Free is nice. Brave is fine.
But a little more tolerance would go a long way too.
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memestryker2 months ago
Chuck, there are some issues on both sides that people seem to blindly buy into without thinking. I suspect most people are in the middle and not far right or far left, but it only takes a majority of the electoral college at election time.
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jordan112 months ago
the author thinks we're about to become less stupid. for half a moment, i imagined what that would be like. then i wondered what his evidence is.
i couldn't find any.>>>>>
That about sums it up, really.
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Beau78902 months ago
I think Mark Penn's tactics were a major reason Hillary lost the nomination, but possibly not the single most important.
So far the smears haven't reached critical mass in the sense that they've given one candidate an clear advantage. But they're still out there, and there are many people still buying into them (even among non-Propeller members!) as the Post-ABC News poll appears to indicate.
I'd love it if this article is correct and divisive messages that distract from issues are on their way out. But I'm not convinced yet.
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Radiofreeeuropa2 months ago
I'm not so sure, I think the main reason Mrs. Clinton did not get the nomination is the use of the "good ol ways" ny her campaign managers. (I'm Annie Oakley and Obama will take your guns away (Their records on gun control are awfully similar), that kind of thing. We've seen plenty of prodding from the media to try to get the BS going strong, but so far it's been fairly minimal in comparison to other years.... So Far. I think the candidates themselves honestly don't want this to be about nonsense, the question is how willing are they to sell out their principals to those who inevitably will be pushing them to do so. It seems so far the conventional wisdom about smearing the other candidate just hasn't worked...we shall see.
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