I generally like Chuck Todd, but just now on Countdown he was repeating to Rachel Maddow the narrative that everyone in the media and the right seem to agree on: that this election is a referendum on Barack Obama.
What makes me so mad is that this is just the narrative-builders' way of covering up all of John McCain's weaknesses. After all, if the election is a referendum on Obama, then the media doesn't need to cover John McCain's flip flops, his 95% mimicing of Bush, his inability to keep Iraq and Iran straight, his colorful personal life, his financial corruption, etc as they would for similar issues with Obama.
Basically, the corporate media is fashioning a "referendum on Obama" narrative which allows them to maintain a double standard of exaggerating Obama's problems while hushing up McCain's.
This is not journalism. It's pro-GOP corporate media propaganda.
One might think that the election might be a referendum on gas prices.
Or a referendum on health care.
Or a referendum on the economy.
Or a referendum on the war.
Or a referendum on Republican policies.
You know, the stuff that actually matters to voters and not the elitist corporate media.
But the media want to make it all about Obama.
I think I know why they are repeating this meta-meme so much now. It's the summertime. A lot of people are not paying attention now. So the media is taking the opportunity to lay a contrived narrative groundwork in anticipation for the personal assault they plan on Obama this fall after Labor day in collusion with the right wing attack machine.
Since the election will "be all about Obama," according to the narrative-manufacturers, they will be able to justify in their cynical minds making news cycle after news cycle in the fall devoted to distorting Obama's positions and attacking him personally. It will be vicious.
Meanwhile, John McCain will gets lots and lots of passes. Because if this election is a referendum on Obama, they will so conveniently reason, then that means that John McCain is the default and so he doesn't have to do anything other than make BBQ and dish up ironic jokes on the lapdog express in order to get a pass on everything he does.
Again, the media declares that he is the default. He just has to show up. He gets lowered expectations on everything. How much do you want to bet that no matter what happens in the debates, John McCain will magically be declared the winner by the pundit class because he passed the basement-low expectations that the media conveniently contrived for him? McCain's coming "victory" in the debates is a fait accompli.
You want more evidence of media chicanery? Reporters and pundits have been increasingly talking about how John McCain was counted out last summer and he came back to win the primary and gosh o jolly gee, history just might repeat itself. The media is itching to manufacture and massage the news in order to make wishful thinking of a McCain comeback into self-fulfiling prophesy.
This is also why the media is playing up Obama's "problems" with his base. The media are trying to curtail Obama's fundraising because the more money Obama has for organization and paid media, the less determinitive will be McCain's incredible advantage in free and favorable corporate media narrative generation.
I know it's easy to look at the polls and be complacent, but the media pouncing on "refinement" is evidence that the media is looking for any excuse to hit Obama while they look for any excuse to excuse John McCain.
So whenever you hear pundits say this election is all about Obama or a referendum on Obama, remember that this is their way of copping out on giving John McCain a fraction of the scrutiny they give to Barack Obama.
Referendum on Obama, my ass.