The Nation‘s John Nichols follows up on the Obama campaign’s response to Fox News’ Chris Wallace’s comments about his network’s coverage of the Obama/Wright Faux Controversy.
A commenter on Nichols’ post provides the following links, showing that Wright’s comments were, of course, taken out of of context and blown out of proportion by Fox News:
9 Minute “Chickens have come home to roost” video. [YouTube]
Full Audio of Wright’s sermon, with reflections about September 11 victims. [Odeo.com]
“God Damn America”, in context. [YouTube]
Alliances between Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp. empire and Hillary Clinton have been brewing since 2006, when his New York Post endorsed Hillary’s New York Senate run– and even urged readers to “re-elect Hillary in 2012.”
But unlike The Age, I don’t think that Rupert Murdoch’s endorsement and fund raiser are borne of an old Conservative going soft in old age. I think the alliance between Fox News and The Clintons run a lot deeper politically and economically than Clinton’s supporters are willing to acknowledge. The Fox News game– taking quotes out of context, editorialized coverage and unabashedly playing the ratings game– is clearly anti-Obama. Murdoch’s reputation as political King(or Queen)maker is dangerous– not because of who he endorses, but because one media tycoon should never be responsible for swaying the electorate in so many outlets.
I watch Fox News almost exclusively these days. It is not so much a news source as a catalyst to remind me why I hold my beliefs and values– I prefer to get actual news from reputable and varied sources. My affair with Fox News is more like a personal study of everything that is wrong with corporate, mainstream media. Of course, Fox News’ biases are well-treaded territory to any Progressive who has been paying attention to Alternative media for the past ten years, but there’s a difference between seeing the selected, edited clips on Media Matters (O’Reilly’s hated “smear-merchant”) and watching the vitriol fly live and in living color. Even though Fox News is a pitiful excuse for journalism, at best, it’s interesting to see just what kind of media conditions have aligned the American Neoconservative movement.
Fox News was initially the only media outlet to hang on to the Jeremiah Wright non-story for dear life. Many times, when I am in my Fox News bubble, I have a skewed view of just how far-reaching news stories are. Fortunately, most of the stories they exploit the most never see the light of day in more trustworthy mainstream media outlets. But within a matter of weeks, MSNBC, ABC News and CBS picked up on the story, fueling a fire that Obama couldn’t afford to ignore.
I’m convinced that most voters will transcend this issue, but the fact remains that Fox News’ latest attacks on Obama and his associations with Rev. Wright are predicated on race baiting and fear mongering. Fox News’ audience– largely White, suburban/rural conservatives– are threatened and somewhat alienated by Wright’s contentious sermons. Fox News goes above and beyond news reporting and makes a concerted effort to select the most caustic soundbites to discredit the Pastor and, by extension, Senator Obama.
This is what we’re up against: It’s more profitable to manufacture fear in audiences than it is to invoke a sense of unity. Murdoch’s tactics do not reflect what’s good for this country; they reflect what is good for his bottom line. This is another reason why I just can’t trust Hillary Clinton: Accepting endorsements from a man with this kind of agenda goes against the very equality that she supposedly believes in! If we’re judging Obama by the company he keeps, why aren’t we judging Clinton and her associates by the companies they run?
The racial problem in this country is a black behavior problem. There’s lots of earnest discussions about it, and liberals mostly blame “hidden racism,” but this is the essential reality. No liberal will admit this, and that’s why it’s an intellectually bankrupt philosophy. This behavior problem is the reason whites move to suburbs. It’s the reason blacks die so frequently in shootouts. It’s the reason blacks do worse in school, save less, have worse credit, and make neighborhoods less pleasant places to be. Some of this might be endemic, but black America, working with the same raw material, was not always this screwed up.
Yes, of course, there are many exceptions to this rule. There are decent, humane, polite, Christian, and civilized black people. But they are not so numerous as they should be (or once were) and, most important, they tend to make excuses for their less well behaved brothers and sisters. In positions of leadership, their pandering is immense. Notice Obama asks much of white America–support for affirmative action, understanding of Wright and his raucous church–but only asks blacks to believe that this terrible weight of oppression can be lifted by supporting him and his run-of-the-mill liberal program, uniting with whites to go after evil corporations.
Jeremiah Wright denies this black behavior problem exists and projects the various deficiencies, disorders, and hatreds of the black community on whites. He has to justify this rampant all-consuming hatred–hatred he foments every Sunday–with something, so he creates and recreates a bogeyman: the legions of white racists who continue to hold down black people. There is much smoke here, but almost no fire.
Barack says, in effect, Wright’s is a correct analysis of the problem. Blacks at worst exacerbate or contribute to their own racism-caused problems. But he also says there’s hope for change through something he wants us to forget we’ve been trying for thirty years: liberal government programs and white acknowledgement of their current and past racist actions, including such egregious sins as his grandmother being scared of thuggish young black men.
This is not a patriotic, humane, or sensible approach to the issue. It is, at best, the simulation of a courageous address about race. Obama falls back on the stale diagnosis and stale solutions of LBJ and the Great Society.