Operative BJ writes in with a then-timely but just-barely-by-the-time-we-got-to-it letter:
| Your Fearsomeness, I’m sure you were aware of the debate between Brown and Shaheen in New Hampshire last Thursday, and how there was (yet another) “Crowley Moment®” during a major political event just before an election. Once again, a moderator “corrected” a Republican candidate during a debate, and once again the moderator was wrong and had to apologize. James Pindell asked Brown where Sullivan county was, and Brown said “West of Concord” (the state capital). Pindell corrected Brown during the debate twice–but later had to admit that Sullivan county is both north and west of Concord (it’s on the state’s west border, for crap’s sake!). Some polls show that the mainstream media has an approval rate as low as Congress – if that was even possible. Perhaps this latest incident is merely another example of why: The People expect an independent and free press, not a media made up of lapdogs and partisans. The People expect the news to be reported fairly, evenly, and without bias – and they know that’s not what they’re getting. Regardless of the election results, this lowly one expects the media to take out its frustrations on the American public and to continue to treat the American public like dolts, children, and brain-damaged idiots. And this lowly one expects the American public to… … not react at all. After all, they have their new iPhones, Black Friday is only a couple of weeks away, and the cost of gasoline is below $3.00/gal for the first time in years. Panem et circenses ad omnes. |
The Czar is indeed aware of this, and so are people generally. No, not so much the entire “Where is Sullivan County” question, but the fact that many debates are being held on hostile ground, with questions asked by heavily partisan media types intent on ridiculing Republican candidates.
Making Republican candidates look stupid is essential to them, for some reason. Perhaps the candidates should be asked what being hoisted by one’s own petard means: the news of the public apology and the page 46 correction by the so-called moderator will never generate the same interest as “Scott Brown got it wrong.”
What a waste of time—probably a vast majority of New Hampshire residents have no clue where Sullivan County is, either, and if anything this generated sympathy.
Three paragraphs ago, the Czar mentioned that people, generally, are aware of this new trend: try to humiliate the Republican candidate while protecting the Democrat. The Brown v. Shaheen debate was by no means the second of these, nor was Romney v. Obama the first. Head of the GOP, Reince Priebus, has been particularly aggressive about this, basically taking the position that debates help Democrats more than they help or hurt Republicans. As a result, he mandated a while back that Republican candidates should not be participating in debates until the facts are known about how they will be presented. Not surprisingly, Democrats howled at this, but ultimately capitulated for the most part.
For example, here in Illinois, gubernatorial candidate Bruce Rauner refused to participate in any debate—an empty podium was left for him—except for a very few. And not surprisingly, the debates he stayed out of were using far-left journos as moderators. The few he in which he agreed to participate were moderated by respectable, even-handed, not evidently partisan presenters.
In other states, you will note this year, the same strategy played out. And in many of these debates, the Democrats looked terrible, with audience members bursting out in laughter at some of the inanity. There literally are too many examples for the Czar to backtrack and list. But Priebus’ strategy seems to be working effectively.
Republicans too often are the Stupid Party, but they don’t stay stupid for long.