Tiger Beat On The Potomac

The Media. Everyone complains about it in some way or another it seems, especially "other" people in media. I wish there were a way to distinguish "the media" from "sources of news and information" because the term has certainly taken on a definition that is far removed from the original meaning. We can definitely dismiss any media criticism from the right, which consists almost exclusively of "working the refs" to gain advantage and intimidate reporters and editors. Especially the "jump the shark" quality of the Trump campaign's whining about the "liberal media" and how unfair they are. The eminent Driftglass discusses a phenomenon on his blog called "republican detachment disorder" whereas conservatives with an inexplicable job for life perch on cable news talk as though they are not part of the problem. No, you see, the problem is with those other republicans, over there. There seems to be a similar disorder among members of the media at large, even in the publication I am about to rail against, where they, the speaker/writer, is never part of "the media" and can therefore use this conduit of transmission of news and information that they occupy to criticise those other inhabitants of the conduits for transmission of news and information, over there. I am certainly not qualified to judge or even analyze "the media" at large and probably will not do a very good job of looking at this one publication, but damnit they have been getting under my skin lately and I want to take a few minutes of your time to stomp my feet about it. I speak of Politico, specifically their podcast called the 2016 Nerdcast.

It was almost a whim that brought me to this podcast, I was in the market for a mainstream view on national politics and the presidential election. Politico is less a "mainstream" publication as an "inside the beltway village" publication, which is why Brother Charlie Pierce of Esquire commonly refers to them as Tiger Beat on the Potomac. This magazine and whatever else it spills forth as "media products" rarely is interested in ideas or intellectual study of the American republic as far as I can tell and mainly concerns itself with people. Which is, as Eleanor Roosevelt said, the domain of small minds. TBotP has a reputation for being People Magazine for the people that matter inside our nation's capital. I was first introduced to the eye-rollingly and cringe-worthy superficial style of the magazine and principal operators in the book This Town by Mark Liebovich, who did an in-depth analysis of the personalities involved.

Anyway, the Nerdcast, as they call it, is a collection of writers and editors for the magazine from managing editor Kristin Roberts to senior politics editor Charlie Mahtesian and a collection of simple-minded stooges who seem to approach all aspects of American governance and elections as a team sport where they are critical and indispensable insiders solely and uniquely able to discern what matters for all of us proles watching from the outside. Kristin, according to her bio page is a qualified and experienced journalist, has a pompous style as the boss of this rogue's gallery that makes her basically insufferable to listen to. The one that really bothers me is Kenneth Vogel, for both his sweeping style of inconsequential and unnecessary generalizations about the nature of candidates for office, the American electorate, and the process of elections; and his god awful annoying voice which I know he can't really help but combined with the aforementioned hollow pronouncements of prognostication approaches the level of a backpfeifengesicht, or face in need of a fist.

I have tuned in for a few months now and heard this crew fawn about Donald Trump "what are his chances? What does it say about the nature of Washington (you know the one we help define and shape on a day to day basis) that so many people voted for him in the primaries?" And, "can he come back from this series of gaffes and crass insults?" I listened to them speculate beyond reason about "the tea party" as though it were a real thing and not an astroturf invention of republicans looking to shake the shame of having voted for GWB twice and backed his greed-soaked blunders to the end. They have done a real service to all the professional ratfuckers out there looking to tarnish and delegitimize Hillary Clinton as a candidate and leader by accepting the frame of said ratfuckers and endlessly repeat them. This all from a supposedly "neutral" and "objective" source of media commentary. Charlie especially displays such a lack of self-awareness as he prattles on about the role of political media in the ascension of He, Trump to fascist leader status while ignoring the role he and his publication play in that ascension.

This is the "mainstream" of political opinion and analysis in America, rightfully dismissed by those of us in the real world as a fawning teeny-bopper spectacle (for those of us too young to remember Tiger Beat, think MTV when they stopped playing music videos in favor of "reality" programming). This is the way to be fair in American media, there can be only one way of perceiving any developing story or existing reality; both sides are relatively equal and bad. Therefore they need to kneecap Democrats whenever they can and elevate Republicans by dismissing or looking the other way in spite of continuous deplorable behavior and lies from the GOP. It is a model that does not work and rightfully earns the scorn of everyday Americans outside of the beltway. It took the "pussy-grabbing" incident to finally earn Trump the designation of being in "freefall" and much of the episode is hand-wringing and worrying about the state of political analysis when their preferred "both sides" model has finally been exposed like a scabbed over rat bite being ripped off to reveal the septic pus-filled abscess of lies they have been covering for all the previous months of this campaign.

Yes, the media, with Politico in the lead, has propped up Donald Trump since the beginning. But what kind of pushed me over the edge in terms of even taking them with a grain of salt as the saying goes was their new sponsor. In this election season of deplorables, alt-right racists, pearl clutching about emails, and a carnival barker con man masquerading as a fascist dictator, during the last debate laughingly moderated by fact-check averse Chris Wallace there were a couple of questions out of right field about the "debt and entitlement crisis" and how would each candidate cut benefits to "save" Social Security and Medicare. These questions seemed out of place in a race not defined by formerly "serious" questions that frame conservative economic and class war orthodoxy as received conventional wisdom, but they were inserted by an outfit that has been obnoxiously inserting itself into every political nook and cranny with it's own pet issue of fear mongering on the federal debt and how we must cut Social Security and Medicare in order to save the nation and those programs out of a misplaced sense of virtue. But of course the answer is never asking the rich, who have siphoned off so much of our national wealth for themselves, to pay a penny more. No, you, average American, must suffer because previous (Republican) leaders in America squandered fiscal responsibility on the altar of trickle down, supply side tax cuts... that will unleash unprecedented economic growth... any day now.

Anyway, this committee for a responsible federal budget started sponsoring the Nerdcast. So now, to listen to the drivel meant as serious commentary and analysis you first have to listen to the drivel about how serious the national debt is and unless we cut [social] spending to the bone we will suffer complete collapse. And that, fair readers, is the Fonzie jumping the shark episode that has pushed me from tolerance to outright derision on this podcast. It may be unfair to Politico but fuck it, we should demand better from the supposed wise journalists who form the basis of our outlook on our government. At least I didn't have to pay to subscribe to this 'cast.