here we go again

If you've just had the misfortune of losing the presidential election and being beaten soudly in congressional races, as the democratic party has, I suppose it's not strange or unreasonable to go looking for the reason. What is unfortunate, however, is that journalists feel like they have to get involved and that they have to have the answer by tomorrow. What's doubly unfortunate is that whatever answers the news makers can come up with overnight is usually the one that becomes common knowledge.

And so it wasn't surpising that the folks who make news up here on the upper right coast turned to their favorite whipping child, the heartland evangelical. After all, there's tons of b-roll of these folks, and the New York Times has been hating on them for months now. You can read that entire piece here. It's astonishing to me that Ron Suskind and the folks at the Times could be so verbose and self-congratulatory in the process of myth-making.

But, myth or reality, they are the ones who write the news. And when some exit poll data came along which showed "moral values" as a top reason voters went to the polls last Tuesday that was more than enough evidence for news makers to come together and craft the story line for post election analysis: The (Christian Implied) Moral Values Majority Rebuked The Secular Leftists And Flexes Religous Piety Muscle.

Sounds clever right? And it gives the secular (non-religous) types all the excuse they need to croon about the religious freaks who live in the middle of the country. After all, it's best to pin your failures on people you already despire, it makes the hating that much easier. And since this narrative had already been reheared over and over in the minds of those who frequent the New York Times Sunday Magazine, all that was left to do on Wednesday night was build a factual case for what they already knew the narrative was. That method sounds familiar doesn't it? Suskind had just spent 8,000 words spelling it out and denouncing it. The whole reality-based notion gets foggy at this point.

No, I'm afraid the losses last week aren't that simple. And I'd recommend that folks put down their hate mongering and get at least two other opinions from people who may have taken a bit more time to think about things.

I can forgive the newsies their sins of beating a straw beast - they've gotten into the habit of doing it, but when I saw this, I knew I had to say something.

anybody wanna be on mtv?

dear readers and ravenous mtv addicts (not necessarily mutually exclusive), check out this once in a lifetime chance to get your face on mtv along with your little message to world about why you're going to vote in the election.

i'm sending in my picture right now, i'm just having a little trouble coming up with a pithy message for the kids. here's some that i'm toying with:

• i'm voting to save the whales
• i'm voting in hopes of joining a class-action suite against the voting box that disenfranchised me
• i'm voting to meet some new people in my neighborhood
• i'm voting to get the cool sticker
• i'm voting to get the fbi cold case on elvis' death re-opened

i'm hopeless, anybody got an extra reason i can use?

Posted by Owen at 11:03 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

Importa Senator

I can't decide how I feel about Alan Keyes (a long time Maryland resident) flying out to Illinois to run for Senate. Mr. Keyes is a smart guy, but I think I agree more with Keyes four years ago.

In 2000, when Hillary Clinton had moved up to New York to run for Senate, some Empire State republicans approached Keyes (after Guliani had dropped out of the race) about moving up there and run against her. At that point he said:

I deeply resent the destruction of federalism represented by Hillary Clinton's willingness to go into a state she doesn't even live in and pretend to represent people there. So I certainly wouldn't imitate it.

There certainly is something to be said for principles being the same no matter what state you're in - Hillary embodies the New York spirit or Alan has the same moral compass as Illinoians - but there's something distasteful about it as well.

To me it smacks too much of "because we can." I think it's a bad thing to smack of.