Replies

The problem is that if the media narrative about a person is based on lies, in the longer run, those lies lose effectiveness as people learn the truth from other sources, and worse yet, the lies come back to haunt their purveyors because once the audience, having originally believed them, in the second instance realizes they’ve been scammed, they will thereafter no longer be inclined to believe another pronouncement given voice by that source.

Absolute rubbish! If this were true George Bush would be utterly exonerated for the calumny: "Bush lied and people died." But if you take a poll of the American people today, a substantial number will tell you that Bush lied to get us into the Iraq war about weapons of mass destruction. Karl Rove says that the biggest mistake in the Bush administration was George Bush's decision not to go on a public relations campaign to put aside that lie. Compare that with how Bill Clinton handled the impeachment. Was it Mark Twain or George Washington who said: "A lie will be halfway around the world before the truth can pull it's boots on."

It is much more difficult to disabuse people of their opinion then it is to convince them in the first place. Hence the aphorism, you only get one chance to make a first impression. Politics is not fair, it is ruthless. Electoral contests, like the battlefield, is not a place to play catch-up.

The general electorate is not comprised of political junkies like us who will scour the Internet to disprove a lie about George Bush's military service or exhaustively examine into the bona fides of a birth certificate. They will hear a sound bite or see a bumper sticker and draw a lifelong conclusion.

If you try to disturb their fixed opinion they will resent you.

I don't know whether Sarah Palin can overcome these obstacles to her electability but in making that judgment none of us should be confused by nonsense like this.

“The general electorate is not comprised of political junkies like us...”

Yes, and this is something political junkies like us seem to repeatedly fail to grasp.

I guess that is true for the poltical junkies on the other side too, that’s why they never understand say, how “W” got re-elected in 2004.

The average voter knows NOTHING about politics or politicians.

And there’s no point nattering on about how they know all about American Idol, etc. Yes, sure, the public should be better educated and maybe someday we can all help to make that happen.

But let’s face it, those of us here and our adversaries over on Kos or wherever, we’re ideologues. We care about the BIG THINGS.

That’s why we slog through all the incredibly boring parts of this political stuff.

Because to most people this stuff is DEADLY.

Most people can probably name the Pres, Veep, Gov, Senators, Mayor.

Here, we all know who Maxine Waters (just as an example) is, right? Well we saw a bit of her on TV the other day (it was probably because her townhall meeting went badly) and hubby, who watches Fox News Sunday with me, and suffers through the talk radio in the car said “Who’s Maxine Waters?”

And yes, the public does know Sarah Palin, and for that she can thank the MSM.

Now, does this help her? Yes. Can it ruin her? Yes. Has it already ruined her? The jury is still out.

I will say this, I hope she announces one way or the other on Sept. 3rd.

If this is another “big announcement” like: I’m going on a bus trip across the USA; or worse not an announcement of any kind, well at the risk of getting slammed I’ll just say that’ll ruin Sarah Palin’s “brand” for me.

She needs to get in or stay out because we need to get somebody who isn’t Romney ASAP and rally behind that person to rid ourselves of the incompetent and destructive Barack Obama.

Good to see you post. You are on-target, as usual.

Has there ever been an example of a politician so loathed by the media who has successfully turned around such wide-ranging negative perception?

The folks who think Palin can do no wrong, or who think that just because she has large and DEEP support among conservatives believe she will overcome that negative perception because they really, really want her to, don’t seem to want to put aside their passion and look at Palin’s situation without emotion.

This has been the trouble with her opponents, as well—they cannot put aside their blinding hatred and see WHY she is so popular with so many.

In the end, I can’t think of a single politician so thoroughly loathed by the MSM, and whose image is so set at this point in the presidential election season. If Palin runs, in order to win she has to overcome a media blockade unlike any other. Just because we’d LIKE her to change her perception by the public, doesn’t necessarily mean it is possible.

NathanBedford, I'm sorry to disagree. While it's true that superficial belief in widespread media lies can be intractable in the nation at large, I doubt they have much lasting effect among the relatively studious. The simple fact is that the same sort of airheads that are prone to uncritical belief in such lies either weren't going to vote for any republican, or simply aren't the sort to vote, in general. I have no doubt of the validity of your point in some contexts, but in the context of a republican primary, those lies will be swept aside. After that, by the time the rest of the electorate begins to pay their usual 90 days of attention, this will have been sorted out. I realize you disagree, but 'absolute rubbish' may be a bit overstated considered in the context I specified above. Thanks...

Ahhh, but in Sarah's case, nathan, Windflier is right.

Recall that Rove's favorite advice for Dubya was the *opposite* of your tagline: "BOHICA!"

The cretin didn't even fight back against the Valerie Plame lie when it was a top aide (Armitage) who "outed" her, and everyone within the admin knew it.

The *ONLY* possible justification for not standing up for the WMD in Iraq is that either

a) it jeopardized "methods and sources"

b) Russia helped move WMDs to Syria and were holding something over Bush's head to keep it quiet.

Sarah has a track record, and quite a good one: read Going Rogue (New York Slimes bestseller) or get The Undefeated when it starts selling at Wal-Mart.

The main problem Sarah is going to have is the resentment from the fat self-loathing man-hating lardass Oprah watchers who viscerally hate her for having a world-class stud as husband *AND* her own career and having kept her looks after five kids, dammit.

Recall that Sarah was both held on a leash by McCain *and* sabotaged by Nicole Wallace and whatshisname, Stephen Schmidt(?), during the last campaign.

And her resourcefulness and pluck is shown by the fact that instead of dying when they had her pinned down with all those Alinskyite "freeze, personallize, polarize" junk lawsuits in Alaska, she escaped the kill zone and went on the hunt.

They can try the "she quit" meme all they want, but I have a sneaking suspicion that she has a devastating riposte up her sleeve for the first autofellating East Coast Manhattanite liberal presstitute who tries a "gotcha" question with it on the campaign trail.

Incidentally : look at the Iowa State Fair and the all-but-campaign-commercial "Iowa Passion". Listen carefully to the soundtrack at 0:52 - 0:53 or so. That was no accident.

I understand you have chosen Perry, and I grieve for your temporary insanity ;-)

IF the choices were merely Bachmann and Perry, I'd understand your wanting Perry since Bachmann *really* has a hill to climb. Her best bet to the White House is likely an overture to Obama, to replace Biden as VP next time: he needs a reach out to the religious right, and Bachmann would be the smoothest path from Biden, since they're both human affe factories.

Full Disclosure: I finally figured out, "Stand up, Chuck!" was either Biden's attempt at faith healing to reach out to the religious voters, OR his attempt to stake his own claim to "this was the moment the planet began to heal" territory of Obama.

Cheers!