Political Cortex: Brain Food for the Body Politic

So-called Fox News has been known to receive talking points regularly from the Republican National Committee.  These helpful hints are then funneled to "commentators".  Fox secured a major victory on Election Night of 2000 when no less than candidate George W. Bush's cousin, John Ellis, controlled the newsroom.

Ellis set off a network stampede by calling the election prematurely in favor of his cousin.  The stark fact that so little was reported and said about this incredible event at the time was indicative of the stranglehold the mighty corporate monopoly held on American communication channels.  

Fox News' director, Roger Ailes, later appeared before a congressional committee investigating 2000 election coverage.  In a bogus penitent charade, Ailes apologized and asked for the committee's forgiveness.  Ailes passed off the incident, which provided Bush with significant impetus and leverage during the tumultuous recount phase as presumed frontrunner, as merely an unfortunate but innocent mistake.  

Ailes, who began his political media career spearheading Richard Nixon's presidential candidacy in 1968, never bothered to explain why the Republican candidate's cousin was chosen for such a pivotal Election Night role, nor did the mainstream media press the point later.  

Ann Coulter registered disgust that the subject was even mentioned.  Would Republicans, beginning with Coulter, have remained silent had the cousin of Al Gore been selected for such a sensitive position?

The Kucinich quote pertaining to a "rigged game" surely related to his cognizance of what transpired in the two decades since Reagan removed the protective shackles from the FCC and created a free for all in which the rich held the upper hand.  Rush Limbaugh, a rotund, overweight former male nurse in Sacramento, California, realized that it paid big dividends to adopt a rightward stance.  

The result was a three-hour daily harangue of anti-liberal invective with the major focus directed toward President Bill Clinton.  It took a progressive media group, FAIR, to expose Limbaugh's barrage of half-truths, as the major media did nothing to expose blatant one-sidedness and prolific untruths.      

Meanwhile at Fox News similar opportunities developed for Bill O'Reilly and Sean Hannity to engage in right wing diatribes.  Fox emphasized that liberal guests also appeared, but the pattern of the broadcasts became immediately apparent to those viewing such joint appearances.  

O'Reilly revealed a short fuse when pressed and used his microphone control to good advantage during interviews, as did Hannity.  The Hannity technique featured moderating discussions with spokespersons of the right and left.  

Microphone control was exercised repeatedly as Hannity frequently ignored or barely recognized liberals while engaging in lengthy discussion with right wing spokespersons while other ill-favored parties cooled their heels.  Such is "Fox objectivity".  

Dennis Kucinich's candidacy featured a campaign platform that instilled fire in the bellies of genuine progressives.  Conversely, the dominant corporate structure that funnels inexhaustible sums of money into political campaigns and control the destinies of said individuals, were mortified by positions the Cleveland Congressman espoused.  

Three Kucinich positions in particular sent shock waves through the controlling corporate structure.  Kucinich was the only Democratic candidate to adopt an Iraq War policy that, if implemented, would have ended the machinations of Dick Cheney in installing American corporations starting with the one where he previously served as its CEO, Halliburton, along with Bechtel and Monsanto.  

A prospective corporate fiefdom and control over Iraq's precious oil commodity would have been disrupted through a proposal that was embraced in the world community.  Under the Kucinich plan U.S. troops would have been moved out of Iraq, but for those that would comprise a United Nations peacekeeping force.  

Another Kucinich plank that generated consternation in corporate ranks was his call for immediate withdrawal from the World Trade Organization and the North American Free Trade Agreement.  

This was one area where the corporate media was able to make an end run around debate by pointing to the bipartisan support that NAFTA received during the Clinton Administration as former presidents of both parties backed the legislation.  

Tom Friedman of the New York Times later referred to opponents of so-called "free trade" as "flat earthers", a pejorative term disseminated in a society where labels were substituted for substantive discussion.  The stern opposition of unions to NAFTA was explained as a classic case of the movement being "out of touch" with the modern world.

A third area where Kucinich raised hackles among the corporate elite was his call for the creation of a single-payer system of universal health care.  The creation of health maintenance organizations and their octopus-like reach has generated billions of dollars while more Americans received no or inadequate health care.  Those that were covered saw more of their paychecks vanishing to maintain coverage.

To the potent corporate health care lobby the idea of emulating the successful Canadian plan was anathema.  The corporate media had orchestrated frequent hatchet job attacks on the Canadian system    

Progressives were also heartened by Kucinich's courageous position in advocating the repeal of the Patriot Act, his espousal of legalizing same-sex marriage, of abolishing the death penalty, of ending the drug war, of preventing the privatization of social security, of ratifying the ABM Treaty and the Kyoto Protocol, and for the creation of a cabinet level Department of Peace.    

The corporate media strategy revolves around avoiding debate on key issues through a form of snobbish minimalism.  The objective is to stifle debate by making a cause or individuals espousing it appear naïve or out of touch, as per Friedman's associating anti-World Trade Association thinking with a belief that the earth is flat.  

Senator Byron Dorgan of North Dakota, an opponent of the fast track NAFTA legislation proposed by President Clinton, focused on the mainstream media's strategy in a penetrating article in the January/February 1994 issue of the Columbia Journalism Review.  Dorgan lamented the absence of real public debate on such an important issue both nationally and globally, writing:

"Instead, the media caricatured NAFTA opponents and created straw men: Pat Buchanan the nativist and primitive, Ross Perot the kook, plus a bunch of Smoot-Hawley retards, labor dupes, and backwoods isolationists.  (Our opposition was based solely On `fear of change and fear of foreigners,' asserted Anthony Lewis in The New York Times, expressing the condescension of the mainstream press.)"

Dorgan cited the irony as well as hypocrisy of mainstream newspapers preaching free trade for the economic marketplace while practicing intellectual protectionism, a kind of journalistic Smoot-Hawley in the marketplace of ideas.

"The cheerleading became so loud that I decided to count copy," Dorgan revealed.  "From January (1994) on, the Washington Post devoted some sixty-three feet to pro-NAFTA editorials and columns, while the anti-NAFTA side got only eleven feet.  At other major papers, the ratio was about the same, or even more lopsided.  The news pages, meanwhile, were implicitly conveying the same message: we opponents deserved no more than the obligatory balancing quote.  Stories in the New York Times quoted three NAFTA supporters for every NAFTA opponent, according to FAIR, the media-watch group.  At the Post, the tilt was more than four to one."

Given Kucinich's positions on so many issues seen as abhorrent to the corporate power structure and its effective media mouthpiece outlets, the chosen strategy was to circumvent debating them.  The point that was consistently made was that the Cleveland Congressman was outside the mainstream of American political thought.  As such he could not be taken seriously as a presidential candidate.

Kucinich began his political career in his twenties.  He made national headlines by being elected mayor of one of America's major cities at 31.  

In a conflict that presaged the grave tragedy of Enron wielding a club over California by regulating the power it would release to the Golden State's citizenry unless disgracefully high rates were received, Kucinich ran afoul of the powerful Cleveland Electric Illuminating Company, opposing CEI's effort to acquire the city's publicly owned electric company, Municipal Light.  

Mayoral candidate Kucinich, running as a populist reformer in the tradition of Tom L. Johnson, Cleveland's progressive mayor from 1901 to 1909, campaigned in his winning 1977 race against the sale.  Once he became mayor the pressures were exacerbated, and when the youthful mayor refused to support the sale of Muni Light to CEI, the foe of privatization was targeted for removal.  

When Kucinich cancelled the impending sale that had been supported by his predecessor, Mayor Ralph Perk, a successful effort was mounted that resulted in him being forced into a recall election.  Kucinich survived the effort, but prevailed by only 236 votes.  

The mainstream media would use to discredit Kucinich the recall election alongside the fact that, on Kucinich's watch, Cleveland became the first major American city to default on its financial obligations since the Great Depression when the clock struck midnight on December 15, 1978.

In a move reminiscent of Ken Lay's Enron power gargoyle a generation later, CEI engaged in price gouging.  The potent company worked diligently behind the scenes to block Muny Light from buying power from other companies.  

CEI went to court to demand that Muny pay $14 million in damages for power it had purchased while Ralph Perk was mayor.  Kucinich's election stopped the sale of Muny to CEI and kept the lawsuit alive.  CEI then went to U.S. Federal Court to obtain an order to attach city equipment.

Cleveland Trust, the city's largest bank, would not renew the city's credit on $15,000,000 of loans taken out by the Perk Administration unless Kucinich would agree to the controversial sale of Muny to CEI.  The Ohio's largest newspaper, the Cleveland Plain Dealer, later revealed that Cleveland Trust and CEI had seven interlocking directors.  Cleveland Trust was CEI's bank.  

In addition, Cleveland Trust, with another bank, owned a substantial share of CEI stock and had numerous other mutual interests.

While Kucinich was caricatured regularly by the media during his tenure as Cleveland's mayor as "Dennis the Menace" and blamed for the city's economic woes, a fast-forwarding to the late nineties vindicated Kucinich's position in the privatization vs. public power controversy.  

The Kucinich position as advanced one generation before privatization became the key economic issue to be exploited by Cheney-Bush Republicanism along with the long term effects of NAFTA and globalization with the scores of American workers displaced and exploitation both foreign and domestic provided timely debate opportunities in the 2000 presidential election.  

The same held true with Kucinich's position on Iraq and the opportunity to avoid the type of spiraling calamity being articulately criticized by Congressman John Murtha of Pennsylvania.

These three hot button issues were so timely that corporate awareness of Kucinich's opportunity to propel them into the forefront made it incumbent to destroy his candidacy before it could generate momentum.  

A major point in the corporate media's favor was that Kucinich's positions would assure that he would be tremendously outspent by other candidates in a position to benefit from corporate campaign largesse.  

The corporate strategy, as alluded to earlier, called for avoiding confronting the issues that Kucinich was running on by turning the tables and proclaiming that his views were extreme and outside the mainstream, thus eliminating him from serious consideration.  As Senator Dorgan noted, debate can be squelched by an exhaustive and expensive effort to obfuscate.  

Hence, the logic follows that the reason Kucinich cannot be taken seriously in that his views are not embraced by the mainstream.  What the power brokers earnestly hoped was that curious voters not explore how these mainstream positions were derived.    

A wild card entered the equation in the form of the Internet and its rapidly increasing popularity.  A new breed of informed citizen used the broadly based technology to access information, much of it global, to explore the major issues of the day.  

It was not long before Rush Limbaugh warned his faithful Dittoheads to steer clear of this new informational tool due to the myriad of heresies revealed within its broadly extensive confines.

Internet progressives, looking beyond the simplistic jargon of major news networks, fastened attention on the information stream.  One progressive website, MoveOn.org, began attracting significant attention and held its own online presidential preference poll.  While Howard Dean with his better-financed organization finished first, Kucinich emerged as a surprise second.  

The response on the part of four letter spouting reactionaries in the wake of the MoveOn.org and other preference polls showing surprising strength for Kucinich was predictable.  

Taking their cues from a mainstream media they excoriate for being left wing dominated, right wing zealots flooded the Internet with comments that, in addition to calling his supporters "traitors", indicating that the one writer they would read was Ann Coulter, they ridiculed Kucinich supporters for not observing the simple truth that he was polling so low in national polls conducted by Gallup and other organizations.

Despite the fact that Kucinich was a favorite of so many of the dispossessed, individuals unable to contribute any but small amounts of money, a survey of his supporters indicated that well informed grassroots progressives were also drawn to his populist message.  

His list of supporters included Howard Zinn, Studs Terkel, Pete Seeger, Sean Penn, Willie Nelson, Arun Gandhi (grandson of Mahatma Gandhi), Ben Cohen (of Ben and Jerry), Ed Asner and Hector Elizondo.

The Kucinich candidacy did its best in state caucuses.  This was understandable in view of the fact that delegates in such state party contests involve informed progressives who are less apt to be influenced by the media's message of a candidate's necessity to appeal to the mainstream as understandably defined by their spokespersons.  

To many seasoned observers the key moment of the primary season came during a Democratic candidates' debate held in Arizona with ABC's Ted Koppel as moderator.  When it was time for Koppel to supply a question to Kucinich he aimed for what he hoped would be the jugular.  

It instead resulted in a stirring message evoking memories of a similar television appearance by Senator Robert Kennedy with Walter Cronkite following his victory over Senator Eugene McCarthy in the 1968 Indiana primary.

Koppel repeated the prevailing litany about Kucinich, asking him what he was doing even running for president and diluting time and attention from serious candidates with reasonable chances of securing their party's nomination.  Kucinich's well-reasoned response harkened back to his quote concerning his quest for the presidency involving a "rigged game".

Kucinich's measured response drew the loudest applause of the evening and prompted a sheepish expression from Koppel.  Kucinich explained what was wrong with the system, with corporate lobbyist money glutting the system and constipating democracy.  

He argued that greater access was needed for candidates and that the dangerous link between big money and politics was crippling the system.  Kucinich took direct aim at the thrust of Koppel's question by pointing out that mainstream media commentators determined "prominence" of candidates through their emphasis or de-emphasis of specified individuals.

The Kucinich response provided one of the few high points of the 2004 presidential campaign.  The major reason was that it was not a canned response.  It was not the result of a consensus of advisers following clusters of focus groups.  

Kucinich's lucid response provided a twofold effect in revealing what a presidential campaign where issues are emphasized could be as well as the deficiency of orchestrated media events involving coached candidates delivering well-rehearsed responses.

In 1968 Robert Kennedy delivered a response that deviated from the sound bite norm in being interviewed by Walter Cronkite following his Indiana Democratic Primary victory.  

Rather than deliver sound bite points distinguishing him from his rival for his party's nomination, fellow anti-Vietnam War candidate Eugene McCarthy, Kennedy caught the seasoned commentator by surprise as he delivered a case for making free time available for candidates.

It was one of the first well-articulated calls for presidential election reform.  Current populists like Dennis Kucinich are advocating the government financing of elections, which would break the stranglehold of big money.

How refreshing as well as vital it would be to hear candidates talk about the issues on a frequent basis and thereby be compelled to deviate from the pabulum orchestrated by highly paid consultants.  Current presidential debates, including those between George W. Bush and John Kerry in the general election, are play it safe exercises long on sound bites and deficient in substance.

Dennis Kucinich's candidacy emphasized three basic issues: why the situation in Iraq needed to be internationalized with American troops removed, save those that would serve as part of a peacekeeping venture; NAFTA and the overall issue of globalization; creating a single-payer system of universal health care.

Were those three key issues satisfactorily addressed in the general election?  The mainstream media knew what it was doing in minimizing the Kucinich candidacy.  The corporate elite and their faithful lobbying brigade did not want a comprehensive, issues oriented campaign.  

After all, why put Chris Matthews, Bill O'Reilly, George Will and Sean Hannity out of business?  Are they not the designated opinion molders for America?  

In the light of today's headlines about prison bound bribe artists Jack Abramoff, every warning word Dennis Kucinich articulated about the phony democracy generated by lobbyists rings one hundred percent true.    Tragically, the current American style corporate controlled democracy being exported to Iraq, with death, debt and destruction, makes a mockery of this entire ghastly and hypocritical charade.