Watching Christine O’Donnell debate Chris Coons last night, we were struck by how sensible a person like O’Donnell can seem, given our brain-dead political norms, if she has been prepared in a few modest ways. O’Donnell tossed off familiar claims about “supporting big government,” “raising taxes” and “supporting the special interests” (along with a few specialized inanities about having once been a “bearded Marxist”). But our discourse has been so dumb for so long, it truly sounded, by American norms, like she was making real statements.
Bob Somerby, getting it exactly right.
You want an existential threat to Our Republic (as the GOP so frequently labels everything, large or small)? This is it. Until somebody in the media goes to work on raising the level of discourse that is allowed to pass for debates and serious discussions in this country, and then continues working on that same issue for a decade or more, we’ll be one downturn, one election, one heartbeat away from utter disaster. Nobody else can do it, and nobody but nobody in the MSM seems at all interested in taking up the cause, even for an hour a week. Oh look, a shiny penny!
You want an existential threat to Our Republic (as the GOP so frequently labels everything, large or small)? This is it. Until somebody in the media goes to work on raising the level of discourse that is allowed to pass for debates and serious discussions in this country, and then continues working on that same issue for a decade or more, we’ll be one downturn, one election, one heartbeat away from utter disaster. Nobody else can do it, and nobody but nobody in the MSM seems at all interested in taking up the cause, even for an hour a week. Oh look, a shiny penny!
Lemkin 