Politics and Entertainment
"Donna: Why are you a Republican?
Cliff: Because I hate poor people. I hate them, Donna. They're all so poor, and many of 'em talk funny, and don't have proper table manners... my father slaved away at the Fortune 500 company he inherited so that I could go to Choate, Brown and Harvard and see that this country isn't overrun by poor people and lesbians." --The West Wing
Pull up a chair for storytime, boys and girls.
Last night I watched this video a friend posted on her Facebook page. Turns out she meant to post this video. Watch a few seconds of each to realize they aren't the same video before continuing.
Now, Sharon and I have been talking about the amount of crap (read: utter distortions and falsehoods) being thrown around this election. I don't think we're denizens of policy, so when we recognize huge misrepresentations being thrown around surely that means that to real politicos this election must just be a whopper of spin. We saw the first video above last night before bed and thought it was really funny, because it is obviously so over the top that certainly it was meant to be funny (though, we've seen a number of email forwards with the same level of poise, so obviously it does hit home to some people.)
Today, I see this post on a blog of a new friend of ours here in Grove City. As you will see in my comment on said blog, I think he is referencing the first video posted above, when in reality he is referencing the second, and I say something over the top about propaganda. I was pretty upset, you see, because I thought he was taking the first video seriously, when in reality he was making the point that the first video was clearly produced to make fun of.
What is the moral of today's story, boys and girls (other than, of course, to always follow links and never do real work because if you don't watch the whole video there might be slaughter of innocent bunnies at the end!)? There is an unbelievable amount of crap in this election, and I think it's because both sides are very very scared of the opposition.
I'm not really sure how we got to this point. I've been friends with a lot of people pretty far to the right and pretty far to the left, and while I obviously have my preferences I don't think any candidate up for election is a terrorist or a Nazi or a bimbo or a normal middle class guy (Obama, McCain, Palin, and Biden, respectively - and yes, that last one was a joke). So can we please stop saying it and have an informed discussion?
So, anyway, I'm apologizing in detail over here on my blog (since a multi-page comment didn't seem to make sense) for misreading Warren, my new friend, about his post.
But it does open up the larger issue about why we care about what we care about in the political season. Warren's comment is telling: "If McCain was at the center of something like that, I would be just as creeped out and I suspect the McCain campaign would distance itself from it." I'll buy that, but why should it even matter much? People do creepy/strange/stupid things (yes, Warren mentions it was on the Obama website, but I doubt it would've been if people weren't looking for "feel good" reasons to vote anyway instead of hard facts.)
I think the reason it seems to matter (it certainly is for me when I admit it) is that politics actually is getting too complicated. I frequently read things in op-ed pieces that I later find out are just flat wrong or misrepresented: how many of the facts that I hold on to are actually opinions reached by oversimplification just to fit into a newspaper (or web) article?
Anyway, rather than offer you a bunch of cutting insight into a load of political issues (which I can't do) I'm gonna instead go to the other extreme. Here are the SNL appearences of McCain and Obama. (The Obama appearence isn't as funny, though the rest of the sketch mostly is. If you just want to see Obama say the famous line, skip to about the 4:45 mark. Also, I googled for that clip, and frankly the content on broadcaster.com is a little scary, so maybe don't look around too much. McCain's news editorial, on the other hand, is really quite funny.)
Cliff: Because I hate poor people. I hate them, Donna. They're all so poor, and many of 'em talk funny, and don't have proper table manners... my father slaved away at the Fortune 500 company he inherited so that I could go to Choate, Brown and Harvard and see that this country isn't overrun by poor people and lesbians." --The West Wing
Pull up a chair for storytime, boys and girls.
Last night I watched this video a friend posted on her Facebook page. Turns out she meant to post this video. Watch a few seconds of each to realize they aren't the same video before continuing.
Now, Sharon and I have been talking about the amount of crap (read: utter distortions and falsehoods) being thrown around this election. I don't think we're denizens of policy, so when we recognize huge misrepresentations being thrown around surely that means that to real politicos this election must just be a whopper of spin. We saw the first video above last night before bed and thought it was really funny, because it is obviously so over the top that certainly it was meant to be funny (though, we've seen a number of email forwards with the same level of poise, so obviously it does hit home to some people.)
Today, I see this post on a blog of a new friend of ours here in Grove City. As you will see in my comment on said blog, I think he is referencing the first video posted above, when in reality he is referencing the second, and I say something over the top about propaganda. I was pretty upset, you see, because I thought he was taking the first video seriously, when in reality he was making the point that the first video was clearly produced to make fun of.
What is the moral of today's story, boys and girls (other than, of course, to always follow links and never do real work because if you don't watch the whole video there might be slaughter of innocent bunnies at the end!)? There is an unbelievable amount of crap in this election, and I think it's because both sides are very very scared of the opposition.
I'm not really sure how we got to this point. I've been friends with a lot of people pretty far to the right and pretty far to the left, and while I obviously have my preferences I don't think any candidate up for election is a terrorist or a Nazi or a bimbo or a normal middle class guy (Obama, McCain, Palin, and Biden, respectively - and yes, that last one was a joke). So can we please stop saying it and have an informed discussion?
So, anyway, I'm apologizing in detail over here on my blog (since a multi-page comment didn't seem to make sense) for misreading Warren, my new friend, about his post.
But it does open up the larger issue about why we care about what we care about in the political season. Warren's comment is telling: "If McCain was at the center of something like that, I would be just as creeped out and I suspect the McCain campaign would distance itself from it." I'll buy that, but why should it even matter much? People do creepy/strange/stupid things (yes, Warren mentions it was on the Obama website, but I doubt it would've been if people weren't looking for "feel good" reasons to vote anyway instead of hard facts.)
I think the reason it seems to matter (it certainly is for me when I admit it) is that politics actually is getting too complicated. I frequently read things in op-ed pieces that I later find out are just flat wrong or misrepresented: how many of the facts that I hold on to are actually opinions reached by oversimplification just to fit into a newspaper (or web) article?
Anyway, rather than offer you a bunch of cutting insight into a load of political issues (which I can't do) I'm gonna instead go to the other extreme. Here are the SNL appearences of McCain and Obama. (The Obama appearence isn't as funny, though the rest of the sketch mostly is. If you just want to see Obama say the famous line, skip to about the 4:45 mark. Also, I googled for that clip, and frankly the content on broadcaster.com is a little scary, so maybe don't look around too much. McCain's news editorial, on the other hand, is really quite funny.)
1 Comments:
Dude. Can I just say how ridiculously sick I am of politics these days!?!?! I mean, I usually get pretty tired of the race long before election day, but this time around, I just want to go hide under a rock until it's over! It has just been particularly bizzar this time around.
So, I've decided that from here on out, I shall decide who I vote for based solely on appearances on SNL. And frankly, McCain/Palin have Obama/Biden beat hands down on this one. You mentioned the McCain appearance in your post, but did you see the Palin appearance? Amy Poehler rocks my world....as does Tina Fey. Aha! I have a new idea! I'm writing in Fey/Poehler! Now THERE's a ticket!
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