October 27, 2009
Mack answers questions about Obama visit
news-press.com
http://www.news-press.com/article/20091027/OBAMA/91027025/1075
Rep. Connie Mack, R-Fort Myers, held a phone conference this morning to answer questions about his position on President Obama’s visit to the DeSoto County solar power plant. He said the president is on a sales pitch to increase his popularity on the taxpayer’s dime.
“Once again we see the president take a tour of the country in what appears to be a PR swing to move legislation and policies that the American people don’t want, don’t need — hurting the American people.”
He specifically mentioned the bailout and stimulus laws, health care reform bills and cap and trade legislation, as examples.
Mack said “liberal ideas” are destroying the “fabric of America.”
On the issue of alternative and renewable energy, Mack said the issue is about encouraging more energy products.
He is against a “tax and spend” philosophy and prefers “government getting out of the way” with less and smarter regulation.
for those who may be unfamiliar with this project, here’s some of the skinny.
Powering Up The Nation’s Largest Solar Power Plant
October 13th, 2009
http://www.alternative-energy-news.info/powering-nations-largest-solar-power-plant/
Florida Power & Light Company (FPL) has announced the near completion of its DeSoto Next Generation Solar Energy Center in Arcadia, Florida. This solar power plant will be producing electricity by the end of month. This project is ahead of its schedule. The plant has an impressive number of 90,000 photovoltaic panels. Experts claim that this solar power plant will generate around 110MW of electricity by the end of 2010. This will provide Florida with the distinction of the second largest solar power-producing state in the country
DeSoto Next Generation Solar Energy Center
http://www.fpl.com/environment/solar/desoto.shtml
Project facts
- Construction commenced in late 2008 and will be completed by October 2009
- At 25 megawatts, the DeSoto Next Generation Solar Energy Center will be the largest solar photovoltaic plant in the country
- Annual estimated generation will be about 42,000 megawatt-hours or enough power to serve about 3,000 homes
- Located on FPL-owned property in DeSoto County, Fla.
- Plant consists of more than 90,500 solar panels
Project benefits
- The project will provide around 400 jobs during the peak of construction
- DeSoto County will receive more than $2 million in additional property tax through the end of 2010
- The project represents one of the largest private capital investments in the county
- Over 30 years, the solar facility will prevent the emission of more than 575,000 tons of greenhouse gases; according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, this is the equivalent of removing more than 4,500 cars from the road every year for the entire life of the project
- Will decrease fossil-fuel usage by approximately 7 billion cubic feet of natural gas and 277,000 barrels of oil
- Photovoltaic technology requires no water
- Solar energy can help Florida secure its energy future since it is not subject to oil supply disruptions or price volatility
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ngJz5Gq5yzs&feature=player_embedded
and here’s some comments from some of the locals down here in Redneck City about mack the carpetbagger
10/27/2009 2:09:59 PM
CaseyStengel wrote:
Cornelius Macgillicudy IV aka Connie Mack is doing a disservice to his (not really his home) district. We have a financial crisis and he votes NO to any economic stimulus. We have one of the highest rates of unemployment and he votes NO to an extension of benefits. And Florida has one of the LOWEST weekly unemployment benefits nationwide - max $250 but an additional $25 because of the stimulus package.
Mack not only uses an alias but in his financial disclosure form his Fort Myers address is misspelled!
Mack wants private companies to provide jobs but his staff work for the federal government. Why not fire them to test his private job theory.
10/27/2009 1:44:17 PM
exilist wrote:
Connie "Let Them Eat Cake" Mack is such an embarrassment. Connie, how do you find the time to bash Obama in between doing nothing and nothing for your impoverished, hungry, unemployed constituents? Bashing the President for visiting an alternative energy facility... horrors! Stick your silver spoon back in your idiotic mouth. Now go back to your Scientologist in Palm Springs and do us all a favor... never run again. exilist
10/27/2009 1:44:17 PM
Voiceofcivility wrote:
Mack's comments have nothing to do with the FLP solar plant. I guess he sees plenty of solar plants around his home in Palm Springs, CA, so the new FPL plant is no big deal to him.
I really can’t add to anything these commentors have said. They reached the core of the problem with amazing clarity, you know, for rednecks. But still, I got to rant just a tad.
I know. I know, I know. Why does anybody act as if the republican party has any credibility left. They had little enough as it was, but they continue to show us new depths of idiocy and vindictiveness.
it’s gotten to the point where the republican governor of a state that is now the host of what will be the second largest solar plant in the country could be seen at the ceremony today, because the Democratic President of the United States was going to be there.
And then the mack’s snide snark. I tell you.
Well, I got news for this null nutted snideman, the only job the President really has regarding legislation, is to sign it when Congress gets around to actually passing a bill, and then enforcing it when it becomes law. And he can do that anywhere in the world.
Maybe you and your fellow repugs might want to actually DO some WORK at YOUR job, before you criticize anyone for not doing theirs. And then to be so embarassingly wrong. It’s in the Constitution. Congress makes the laws, not the president
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
Sunday, October 25, 2009
Let Them Filibuster
by Mary Pitt
October 25, 2009
The Democrats are terribly worried about their ability to gain the sixty votes required for cloture in order to vote for passage of their health plan in the Senate. There are many of us, particularly on the Progressive side who see the benefits of bringing the bill to the floor regardless of the pre-vote count and let the speeches begin!
The Republicans are griping that the discussions regarding the content of the bill have not been open and transparent as promised by Candidate Obama. Committees have had meetings and administration officials have consulted experts in closed door sessions. Now it is time for the "transparency" for which they pine.
Those bills should be brought to the floor in the state prepared by the respective committees and then allow the floor debates to be aired on C-Span. The benefits for the American people will be enormous. There in all their splendor will stand various and assorted "statesmen" in the very act of speaking for the people of their own states and giving their reasons for the direction of their impending vote.
Allow all the seniors who have been told that their benefits would be threatened by the passage of these measures understand precisely what is in the proposed legislation. Let them know without a doubt that there is no provision for "unplugging Granny".
Allow the unemployed heads of household to watch C-Span as they attempt to pay the family bills with not quite enough money while they worry about the cough that awoke them during the night. They live daily with the fear of yet another doctor's bill which could cost them their home and require that they seek shelter elsewhere.
Allow the low-income worker who is suffering from an ache or an intermittent pain who dares not go to the doctor to have it checked out because of the high deductible required by his employer's decision to cut the coverage to save on expenses. These things may not generate enough pressure against the nay-sayers but it will certainly be remembered by the voters in each and every district next November.
Then let them stand before the final Court of the land. the people, whom they vowed to represent in the Halls of Congress and try to persuade them that the reasons they gave their fellow solons were for the good of the listeners. We have seen the Tea Baggers and the other manipulated minions of the Right with their prepared talking points. Now let the "public advocates" explain the facts to their fellow legislators and the angry voters why they should vote on their behalf rather than for the insurance companies who have filled the campaign coffers with all those lovely dollars.
"We, the people" have limited opportunity to make our needs felt and to offer direction to our representative to Congress. The next chance for us to speak with authority will be next year. Let us really witness the performance of those who were elected to represent us and then to determine whether they have done it properly or whether some changes need to be made. That decision will only be made easier if we are allowed to see their performance in their own arena.
Please, let them filibuster!
The author is a very "with-it" old lady who aspires to bring a bit of truth, justice, and common sense to a nation that has lost touch with its humanity in the search for "societal perfection".
October 25, 2009
The Democrats are terribly worried about their ability to gain the sixty votes required for cloture in order to vote for passage of their health plan in the Senate. There are many of us, particularly on the Progressive side who see the benefits of bringing the bill to the floor regardless of the pre-vote count and let the speeches begin!
The Republicans are griping that the discussions regarding the content of the bill have not been open and transparent as promised by Candidate Obama. Committees have had meetings and administration officials have consulted experts in closed door sessions. Now it is time for the "transparency" for which they pine.
Those bills should be brought to the floor in the state prepared by the respective committees and then allow the floor debates to be aired on C-Span. The benefits for the American people will be enormous. There in all their splendor will stand various and assorted "statesmen" in the very act of speaking for the people of their own states and giving their reasons for the direction of their impending vote.
Allow all the seniors who have been told that their benefits would be threatened by the passage of these measures understand precisely what is in the proposed legislation. Let them know without a doubt that there is no provision for "unplugging Granny".
Allow the unemployed heads of household to watch C-Span as they attempt to pay the family bills with not quite enough money while they worry about the cough that awoke them during the night. They live daily with the fear of yet another doctor's bill which could cost them their home and require that they seek shelter elsewhere.
Allow the low-income worker who is suffering from an ache or an intermittent pain who dares not go to the doctor to have it checked out because of the high deductible required by his employer's decision to cut the coverage to save on expenses. These things may not generate enough pressure against the nay-sayers but it will certainly be remembered by the voters in each and every district next November.
Then let them stand before the final Court of the land. the people, whom they vowed to represent in the Halls of Congress and try to persuade them that the reasons they gave their fellow solons were for the good of the listeners. We have seen the Tea Baggers and the other manipulated minions of the Right with their prepared talking points. Now let the "public advocates" explain the facts to their fellow legislators and the angry voters why they should vote on their behalf rather than for the insurance companies who have filled the campaign coffers with all those lovely dollars.
"We, the people" have limited opportunity to make our needs felt and to offer direction to our representative to Congress. The next chance for us to speak with authority will be next year. Let us really witness the performance of those who were elected to represent us and then to determine whether they have done it properly or whether some changes need to be made. That decision will only be made easier if we are allowed to see their performance in their own arena.
Please, let them filibuster!
The author is a very "with-it" old lady who aspires to bring a bit of truth, justice, and common sense to a nation that has lost touch with its humanity in the search for "societal perfection".
Monday, October 12, 2009
Charge Of The Beckerheads...
By Sheila Samples
October 12, 2009
I didn't know Van Jones. I didn't know Van Jones was a friend of mine -- at least not until the stench billowing from the Fox Hate Channel became so foul I was forced to take a closer look at this terrifying creature. No -- not Jones, whom President Obama wisely had hired as Special Advisor for Green Jobs at the Council on Environmental Quality -- but the sobbing, lying, deliriously insane Glenn Beck.
According to Beck, who began his assault on Jones in a July 23 disjointed rant, wherein he claimed Jones is not only "a communist-anarchist radical," but a former black nationalist, avowed communist-anarchist radical. Or something. Anyway, according to Beck, Jones is really really dangerous -- a racist just like Obama, who has a "deep-seated hatred for white folks" and whose entire agenda is restructuring America into a land of reparations, social justice and jobs for minorities.
The appalling thing about the intellectually challenged Beck, like the Limbaugh-loon he so desperately struggles to impersonate, is that he is given a podium from which to spew his hate. Even more appalling is that he is allowed -- encouraged -- to do so with no reservation, no regulation, and no repercussion. Unless, of course, you consider the multi-million-dollar salary he receives for telling lies and for whipping paranoid masses of gun-toting racists into glassy eyed fury, then it's easy to see Beck is hitting the repercussion jackpot -- over and over again.
As Alexander Zaitchik points out in his three-part Salon series on Beck's background, Beck has always been desperate for two things -- attention and ratings. And he learned early in his career that nothing works as quickly nor as well with the media as personal insults, public humiliation and character assassination.
With few exceptions, the mainstream media fawn over him, laugh at his blatant lies, his death threats and his fake tears. Beck has long been obsessed with destruction -- even murder. In March 2001, he fantasized about killing Rep. Charles Rangel (D-NY) with a shovel as well as lining up several others and shooting them in the head. On his May 17, 2005 Glenn Beck Program, he chortled...
"Hang on, let me just tell you what I'm thinking. I'm thinking about killing Michael Moore, and I'm wondering if I could kill him myself, or if I would need to hire somebody to do it. No, I think I could. I think he could be looking me in the eye, you know, and I could just be choking the life out -- is this wrong? I stopped wearing my What Would Jesus -- band -- Do, and I've lost all sense of right and wrong now. I used to be able to say, "Yeah, I'd kill Michael Moore," and then I'd see the little band: What Would Jesus Do? And then I'd realize, "Oh, you wouldn't kill Michael Moore. Or at least you wouldn't choke him to death." And you know, well, I'm not sure."
And more recently, on his Aug 6 Fox program, Beck regaled at least himself by giggling about putting poison in House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's wine....
Not a pretty picture. No -- not Beck, who should have the FBI nipping at his heels like other "homegrown terrorists" for threatening the lives of legislators and sowing dissent within the government -- but the media, going all Hunter Thompson on us, curled up at Beck's feet like so many chimps in a zoo cage, feverishly pumping out masturbatory praise for the low-class dirty trickster.
When Jones, rather than sink to Beck's level, resigned his position over the Labor Day weekend, some in the media were ecstatic. NBC Deputy Political Director Mark Murray whooped it up in his 8 Sep "First Read"...
"Van Jones resigns: Speaking of distractions, Glenn Beck got his man -- Van Jones, who resigned from the administration over the weekend. And judging by how Beck responded to the news of the resignation of the mid-level staffer, he won't be satisfied with this scalp. Beck made it sound like he might even have a list of "Who's next," which will embolden defenders of the administration to start focusing on Beck and others. [...] As for Jones, clearly, that 9/11 stuff made him indefensible and does call into question the White House's vetting process. The irony in all of this: Beck never lost his job for calling Obama a racist, but Jones did…"
Time Magazine, a partner of CNN, has led the charge to cover Beck's every move, every word, every teardrop in a desperate effort to get a piece of Beck's attention-and-ratings action. See here, here, here, here, here, and here.
Then, of course, there's Time's photo gallery" and the much-heralded Sep 17 cover story wherein author David Von Drehle takes 3,598 words to debunk his own headline, "Mad Man: Is Glenn Beck Bad for America?" and to paint Beck as nothing more than a feisty, lovable -- albeit controversial -- little whippersnapper...
"Glenn Beck: the pudgy, buzz-cut, weeping phenomenon of radio, TV and books . . . The old American mind-set that Richard Hofstadter famously called "the paranoid style" — the sense that Masons or the railroads or the Pope or the guys in black helicopters are in league to destroy the country — is aflame again, fanned from both right and left. [...] No one has a better feeling for this mood, and no one exploits it as well, as Beck. He is the hottest thing in the political-rant racket, left or right. A gifted entrepreneur of angst in a white-hot market.
[...]
Beck is 45, tireless, funny, self-deprecating, a recovering alcoholic, a convert to Mormonism, a libertarian and living with ADHD. He is a gifted storyteller with a knack for stitching seemingly unrelated data points into possible conspiracies — if he believed in conspiracies, which he doesn't, necessarily; he's just asking questions. He's just sayin'. In cheerful days of yore, he was a terrific host of a morning-zoo show on an FM Top 40 station. But these aren't cheerful times. For conservatives, these are times of economic uncertainty and political weakness, and Beck has emerged as a virtuoso on the strings of their discontent."
Not to be outfoxed by her peers, on Sep 22, CBS Evening News anchor Katie Couric premiered her new one-on-one high-profile online interview show "@katiecouric" with Beck, whom she introduced as a "one-man cottage industry." Beck fielded Couric's painfully shallow questions, such as, "Do you feel that you're...you're kind of being divisive?" with sly grins and winks. "Let me see, here," Beck said, giggling and rolling his eyes while tapping his forehead, "how can I answer that? You're just trying to make some news -- you just want me to give you a sound byte..."
But the most interesting -- and entertaining -- take on Beck comes from Fox News' Chief Beckerhead Chris Wallace, who boasts that he "is on the Glenn Beck bandwagon," and insists that "Beck is a meteor here at Fox News." Wallace was taking the irrepressible Shepard Smith to task for not giving Beck the proper respect; even accused Smith of being jealous of Beck's fame. "Oh no," Smith proclaimed, fighting back fake tears -- "We are here to celebrate, worship and adore..." You gotta watch this.
Most mainstream media -- if they acknowledge Beck's attacks -- present them as news, such as the czars fiasco, the fake Fox ACORN videos, etc. However, there are some, even on the right, who are concerned enough about the damage being done to sound the alarm. The New York Times' David Brooks writes, not only about Beck, but Limbaugh, Hannity and others whose lust for power (attention and ratings) knows no bounds...
"For no matter how often their hollowness is exposed, the jocks still reweave the myth of their own power. They still ride the airwaves claiming to speak for millions. They still confuse listeners with voters. And they are aided in this endeavor by their enablers. They are enabled by cynical Democrats, who love to claim that Rush Limbaugh controls the G.O.P. They are enabled by lazy pundits who find it easier to argue with showmen than with people whose opinions are based on knowledge. They are enabled by the slightly educated snobs who believe that Glenn Beck really is the voice of Middle America.
So the myth returns. Just months after the election and the humiliation, everyone is again convinced that Limbaugh, Beck, Hannity and the rest possess real power. And the saddest thing is that even Republican politicians come to believe it. They mistake media for reality. They pre-emptively surrender to armies that don’t exist.
They pay more attention to Rush’s imaginary millions than to the real voters down the street. The Republican Party is unpopular because it’s more interested in pleasing Rush’s ghosts than actual people. The party is leaderless right now because nobody has the guts to step outside the rigid parameters enforced by the radio jocks and create a new party identity. The party is losing because it has adopted a radio entertainer’s niche-building strategy, while abandoning the politician’s coalition-building strategy.
The rise of Beck, Hannity, Bill O’Reilly and the rest has correlated almost perfectly with the decline of the G.O.P. But it’s not because the talk jocks have real power. It’s because they have illusory power, because Republicans hear the media mythology and fall for it every time."
Like Chris Wallace says, they are all just meteors exploding across this nation's sky. Perhaps someone should remind Wallace and others in the media that the shining streak they're hanging onto is nothing but a trail of gas, and when it enters Truth's atmosphere, it will disintegrate -- taking the Beckerhead Bandwagon with it.
Sheila Samples http://sheilastuff.blogspot.com/ is an Oklahoma writer and a former civilian US Army Public Information Officer. She is a regular contributor for a variety of Internet sites.
October 12, 2009
I didn't know Van Jones. I didn't know Van Jones was a friend of mine -- at least not until the stench billowing from the Fox Hate Channel became so foul I was forced to take a closer look at this terrifying creature. No -- not Jones, whom President Obama wisely had hired as Special Advisor for Green Jobs at the Council on Environmental Quality -- but the sobbing, lying, deliriously insane Glenn Beck.
According to Beck, who began his assault on Jones in a July 23 disjointed rant, wherein he claimed Jones is not only "a communist-anarchist radical," but a former black nationalist, avowed communist-anarchist radical. Or something. Anyway, according to Beck, Jones is really really dangerous -- a racist just like Obama, who has a "deep-seated hatred for white folks" and whose entire agenda is restructuring America into a land of reparations, social justice and jobs for minorities.
The appalling thing about the intellectually challenged Beck, like the Limbaugh-loon he so desperately struggles to impersonate, is that he is given a podium from which to spew his hate. Even more appalling is that he is allowed -- encouraged -- to do so with no reservation, no regulation, and no repercussion. Unless, of course, you consider the multi-million-dollar salary he receives for telling lies and for whipping paranoid masses of gun-toting racists into glassy eyed fury, then it's easy to see Beck is hitting the repercussion jackpot -- over and over again.
As Alexander Zaitchik points out in his three-part Salon series on Beck's background, Beck has always been desperate for two things -- attention and ratings. And he learned early in his career that nothing works as quickly nor as well with the media as personal insults, public humiliation and character assassination.
With few exceptions, the mainstream media fawn over him, laugh at his blatant lies, his death threats and his fake tears. Beck has long been obsessed with destruction -- even murder. In March 2001, he fantasized about killing Rep. Charles Rangel (D-NY) with a shovel as well as lining up several others and shooting them in the head. On his May 17, 2005 Glenn Beck Program, he chortled...
"Hang on, let me just tell you what I'm thinking. I'm thinking about killing Michael Moore, and I'm wondering if I could kill him myself, or if I would need to hire somebody to do it. No, I think I could. I think he could be looking me in the eye, you know, and I could just be choking the life out -- is this wrong? I stopped wearing my What Would Jesus -- band -- Do, and I've lost all sense of right and wrong now. I used to be able to say, "Yeah, I'd kill Michael Moore," and then I'd see the little band: What Would Jesus Do? And then I'd realize, "Oh, you wouldn't kill Michael Moore. Or at least you wouldn't choke him to death." And you know, well, I'm not sure."
And more recently, on his Aug 6 Fox program, Beck regaled at least himself by giggling about putting poison in House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's wine....
Not a pretty picture. No -- not Beck, who should have the FBI nipping at his heels like other "homegrown terrorists" for threatening the lives of legislators and sowing dissent within the government -- but the media, going all Hunter Thompson on us, curled up at Beck's feet like so many chimps in a zoo cage, feverishly pumping out masturbatory praise for the low-class dirty trickster.
When Jones, rather than sink to Beck's level, resigned his position over the Labor Day weekend, some in the media were ecstatic. NBC Deputy Political Director Mark Murray whooped it up in his 8 Sep "First Read"...
"Van Jones resigns: Speaking of distractions, Glenn Beck got his man -- Van Jones, who resigned from the administration over the weekend. And judging by how Beck responded to the news of the resignation of the mid-level staffer, he won't be satisfied with this scalp. Beck made it sound like he might even have a list of "Who's next," which will embolden defenders of the administration to start focusing on Beck and others. [...] As for Jones, clearly, that 9/11 stuff made him indefensible and does call into question the White House's vetting process. The irony in all of this: Beck never lost his job for calling Obama a racist, but Jones did…"
Time Magazine, a partner of CNN, has led the charge to cover Beck's every move, every word, every teardrop in a desperate effort to get a piece of Beck's attention-and-ratings action. See here, here, here, here, here, and here.
Then, of course, there's Time's photo gallery" and the much-heralded Sep 17 cover story wherein author David Von Drehle takes 3,598 words to debunk his own headline, "Mad Man: Is Glenn Beck Bad for America?" and to paint Beck as nothing more than a feisty, lovable -- albeit controversial -- little whippersnapper...
"Glenn Beck: the pudgy, buzz-cut, weeping phenomenon of radio, TV and books . . . The old American mind-set that Richard Hofstadter famously called "the paranoid style" — the sense that Masons or the railroads or the Pope or the guys in black helicopters are in league to destroy the country — is aflame again, fanned from both right and left. [...] No one has a better feeling for this mood, and no one exploits it as well, as Beck. He is the hottest thing in the political-rant racket, left or right. A gifted entrepreneur of angst in a white-hot market.
[...]
Beck is 45, tireless, funny, self-deprecating, a recovering alcoholic, a convert to Mormonism, a libertarian and living with ADHD. He is a gifted storyteller with a knack for stitching seemingly unrelated data points into possible conspiracies — if he believed in conspiracies, which he doesn't, necessarily; he's just asking questions. He's just sayin'. In cheerful days of yore, he was a terrific host of a morning-zoo show on an FM Top 40 station. But these aren't cheerful times. For conservatives, these are times of economic uncertainty and political weakness, and Beck has emerged as a virtuoso on the strings of their discontent."
Not to be outfoxed by her peers, on Sep 22, CBS Evening News anchor Katie Couric premiered her new one-on-one high-profile online interview show "@katiecouric" with Beck, whom she introduced as a "one-man cottage industry." Beck fielded Couric's painfully shallow questions, such as, "Do you feel that you're...you're kind of being divisive?" with sly grins and winks. "Let me see, here," Beck said, giggling and rolling his eyes while tapping his forehead, "how can I answer that? You're just trying to make some news -- you just want me to give you a sound byte..."
But the most interesting -- and entertaining -- take on Beck comes from Fox News' Chief Beckerhead Chris Wallace, who boasts that he "is on the Glenn Beck bandwagon," and insists that "Beck is a meteor here at Fox News." Wallace was taking the irrepressible Shepard Smith to task for not giving Beck the proper respect; even accused Smith of being jealous of Beck's fame. "Oh no," Smith proclaimed, fighting back fake tears -- "We are here to celebrate, worship and adore..." You gotta watch this.
Most mainstream media -- if they acknowledge Beck's attacks -- present them as news, such as the czars fiasco, the fake Fox ACORN videos, etc. However, there are some, even on the right, who are concerned enough about the damage being done to sound the alarm. The New York Times' David Brooks writes, not only about Beck, but Limbaugh, Hannity and others whose lust for power (attention and ratings) knows no bounds...
"For no matter how often their hollowness is exposed, the jocks still reweave the myth of their own power. They still ride the airwaves claiming to speak for millions. They still confuse listeners with voters. And they are aided in this endeavor by their enablers. They are enabled by cynical Democrats, who love to claim that Rush Limbaugh controls the G.O.P. They are enabled by lazy pundits who find it easier to argue with showmen than with people whose opinions are based on knowledge. They are enabled by the slightly educated snobs who believe that Glenn Beck really is the voice of Middle America.
So the myth returns. Just months after the election and the humiliation, everyone is again convinced that Limbaugh, Beck, Hannity and the rest possess real power. And the saddest thing is that even Republican politicians come to believe it. They mistake media for reality. They pre-emptively surrender to armies that don’t exist.
They pay more attention to Rush’s imaginary millions than to the real voters down the street. The Republican Party is unpopular because it’s more interested in pleasing Rush’s ghosts than actual people. The party is leaderless right now because nobody has the guts to step outside the rigid parameters enforced by the radio jocks and create a new party identity. The party is losing because it has adopted a radio entertainer’s niche-building strategy, while abandoning the politician’s coalition-building strategy.
The rise of Beck, Hannity, Bill O’Reilly and the rest has correlated almost perfectly with the decline of the G.O.P. But it’s not because the talk jocks have real power. It’s because they have illusory power, because Republicans hear the media mythology and fall for it every time."
Like Chris Wallace says, they are all just meteors exploding across this nation's sky. Perhaps someone should remind Wallace and others in the media that the shining streak they're hanging onto is nothing but a trail of gas, and when it enters Truth's atmosphere, it will disintegrate -- taking the Beckerhead Bandwagon with it.
Sheila Samples http://sheilastuff.blogspot.com/ is an Oklahoma writer and a former civilian US Army Public Information Officer. She is a regular contributor for a variety of Internet sites.
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