John McCain is an embarrassment. I don't think anyone would have predicted he would be such a horrible campaigner. He's like Fred Thompson redux.
His brain can't keep up with the heavy information load a presidential campaign imposes, so he looks like a moron daily.
He can't give a speech to save his life. He can't even pull off a statement to the press. I've really never seen a worse presidential candidate.
Then, there's the country. John McCain is a Republican. People are sick of Republicans. Our country is - sorry, there's no better word for it - fucked. And most Americans seem to understand that the Republicans are responsible for it.
Now, there were always going to be challenges to an Obama presidency. Our country has a lot of racist idiots. But there are a lot more who couldn't care a less about Obama's race. They want' some serious change and for that, Obama is the only game in town.
So given the political climate, Obama's exceptional abilities on the stump, the calls for change, and the fact that John McCain is simply an embarrassment, why isn't Obama winning in a landslide?
The corporate owned, establishment mass media of course.
On the right we have CNNDISNEYFOX. And on the right we have MSNBC minus Keith Olbermann and his 2 million viewers.
It's so bad that whenever any of them does something that isn't blatantly shilling for the McCain campaign, there's a recommended diary about it. BREAKING: Media Whore Tells Truth.
This is the first election in years where I haven't Tivo-ed 8 cable shows and two nightly news shows every day so I could see what these clowns are up to. So now, when I do pop in, I am actually even more shocked at how deceptive, manipulative, and banal they are.
Aide from Fox, CNN is the most blatant. They may as well just call it the Neocon News Network. Their coverage of the campaign is criminal. They are scumbags. MSNBC is absolutely no better. Covet your 1 hour a night. It's all you're going to get.
No, what we have here is a race between Barack Obama and the establishment media. I don't know why they fear him so. He's already sent out big olive leafs to the establishment. He has the backing of major establishment figures. He's not Howard Dean.
Perhaps he's not enough of a crazy militant. That is good for news you know. George Bush has been a boon to ratings.
But I think it goes deeper. They just don't trust him. He is an outsider after all. Didn't go to Yale. Not a member of the boys clubs like Skull and Bones or the CFR. Didn't spend years in the Congress proving how corruptible he is - like say Steny and Nancy. And what's with that Kenya thing. Is this guy even American?
The role of the establishment mass media is to sell you things. Whether it's cars, soap or an unnecessary war based on complete fabrications of evidence, whatever the establishment wants you to believe, that's what your TV is for. Sometimes they want you to believe it's actually a close election. Part of it is to boost ratings. But it's also to keep any one side from gaining too much power. Ask yourself what the statistical odds of almost every American election in 50 years being almost tied.
There's a long and fascinating history of the ruling class using the mass media to shape American society and manipulate our democracy. It is truly the most powerful force in American politics. And right now their in full force trying to stem a tidal landslide.
Perhaps they fear Obama. Or just the usual, can't let one party gain too much power. Real change might occur like it did in 1933.
But if you think that it's all just an accident, ask yourself how not one network gave more than a fleeting notice to the New York Times story on how Rumsfeld and the Pentagon planted Generals at the networks spreading propaganda about the Iraq war.
Or how come not one single network, or establishment paper for that matter, would touch possibly the greatest story since Watergate by allowing Sibel Edmonds to tell her story. It took the London Times to break the story.
Something has a stranglehold over the establishment media. And right now, it is the only thing giving a pulse to John McCain's lifeless campaign. It may serve Obama supporter's interests to focus on their real enemy for a change.