Sunday, March 21, 2004
Bush makes my head explode, part 1
Bush before the cheering crowd:
This is an excellent sound bite. Maybe Dennis Miller isn't the washed up has-been we all thought he was. (The sound bite also neatly preempts the fact that gas prices are rising.)
No question, Bush is good at this, and he has the money to make himself look even better.
What worries me is the sheer effrontery, the level of twistedness implicit in what Bush is doing. The idea that Bush will say or do anything to get elected is not a metaphor or an exagerration—it's the cold truth.
What I'm hearing is not just the lying we are used to. It's completely unhinged demagoguery, delivered with a smile and played for a laugh. And I'm not sure how to counter it, except by somehow changing the rules of the game, but with the SCLM structured the way that it is, I don't see how that is possible either. I don't think the "just the facts" approach has the juice to counter what Bush is unleashing. Street protests won't do the trick either; they'll be a thousand times worse than the Dean scream. Readers?
"[Kerry] wanted you to pay all that money at the pump and wouldn't even throw in a free car wash," Bush declared.
(via AP)
This is an excellent sound bite. Maybe Dennis Miller isn't the washed up has-been we all thought he was. (The sound bite also neatly preempts the fact that gas prices are rising.)
No question, Bush is good at this, and he has the money to make himself look even better.
What worries me is the sheer effrontery, the level of twistedness implicit in what Bush is doing. The idea that Bush will say or do anything to get elected is not a metaphor or an exagerration—it's the cold truth.
What I'm hearing is not just the lying we are used to. It's completely unhinged demagoguery, delivered with a smile and played for a laugh. And I'm not sure how to counter it, except by somehow changing the rules of the game, but with the SCLM structured the way that it is, I don't see how that is possible either. I don't think the "just the facts" approach has the juice to counter what Bush is unleashing. Street protests won't do the trick either; they'll be a thousand times worse than the Dean scream. Readers?
