This is going to be a very glass half-empty diary, so if you not up for that right now, no offense taken if you find it defeatist. But the next two years are gonna make the last two seem like a cakewalk.
The situation President Obama now finds himself in is almost hard to completely comprehend. On one hand, he has the right-wing media to fight, Limbaugh, Hannity and their hundreds of acolytes throughout the AM radio stations all over the country. They are always on message, they repeat it constantly, and they lie with impunity. Fox News has become the bully that that mainstream press will not stand up to, and they define the narrative of televison news coverage.
Now we have a House of representatives that has two goals in mind. Investigate a White House that hasn't had a hint of scandal in two years unitl it breaks, and make sure the economy doesn't improve by 2012 so Obama can't get re-elected.
Now everyone is going to say, "we need to fight back" Well of course we need to fight back, but is it going to make any difference? How does one overcome the right-wing cacophony? Because the American public at large is not capable of doing so. They believed Saddam was involved in 9/11, they believed in death panels, and at least 25% of the population believes the President is a Kenyan Antichrist.
We are talking about a hideously cynical Republican party that plays for keeps, a media operation whose large-scale lies and message disipline would make Goebbels proud, and a American electorate that for the most part can't even name the 3 branches of government, much less distinguish fantasy from reality. And is incredibly impatient and fickle to boot. I'm sure there is a solution to this problem. I'm just not sure any mortal has it.