Channels of Influence (Krugman: Being Anti-Dixie Chicks Makes You Part of American Kristallnacht!)

The New York Times ^ | March 25, 2003 | Paul Krugman

[Timesink]

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March 25, 2003

Channels of Influence

By PAUL KRUGMAN

y and large, recent pro-war rallies haven't drawn nearly as many people as antiwar rallies, but they have certainly been vehement. One of the most striking took place after Natalie Maines, lead singer for the Dixie Chicks, criticized President Bush: a crowd gathered in Louisiana to watch a 33,000-pound tractor smash a collection of Dixie Chicks CD's, tapes and other paraphernalia. To those familiar with 20th-century European history it seemed eerily reminiscent of. . . . But as Sinclair Lewis said, it can't happen here.

Who has been organizing those pro-war rallies? The answer, it turns out, is that they are being promoted by key players in the radio industry ? with close links to the Bush administration.

The CD-smashing rally was organized by KRMD, part of Cumulus Media, a radio chain that has banned the Dixie Chicks from its playlists. Most of the pro-war demonstrations around the country have, however, been organized by stations owned by Clear Channel Communications, a behemoth based in San Antonio that controls more than 1,200 stations and increasingly dominates the airwaves.

The company claims that the demonstrations, which go under the name Rally for America, reflect the initiative of individual stations. But this is unlikely: according to Eric Boehlert, who has written revelatory articles about Clear Channel in Salon, the company is notorious ? and widely hated ? for its iron-fisted centralized control.

Until now, complaints about Clear Channel have focused on its business practices. Critics say it uses its power to squeeze recording companies and artists and contributes to the growing blandness of broadcast music. But now the company appears to be using its clout to help one side in a political dispute that deeply divides the nation.

Why would a media company insert itself into politics this way? It could, of course, simply be a matter of personal conviction on the part of management. But there are also good reasons for Clear Channel ? which became a giant only in the last few years, after the Telecommunications Act of 1996 removed many restrictions on media ownership ? to curry favor with the ruling party. On one side, Clear Channel is feeling some heat: it is being sued over allegations that it threatens to curtail the airplay of artists who don't tour with its concert division, and there are even some politicians who want to roll back the deregulation that made the company's growth possible. On the other side, the Federal Communications Commission is considering further deregulation that would allow Clear Channel to expand even further, particularly into television.

Or perhaps the quid pro quo is more narrowly focused. Experienced Bushologists let out a collective "Aha!" when Clear Channel was revealed to be behind the pro-war rallies, because the company's top management has a history with George W. Bush. The vice chairman of Clear Channel is Tom Hicks, whose name may be familiar to readers of this column. When Mr. Bush was governor of Texas, Mr. Hicks was chairman of the University of Texas Investment Management Company, called Utimco, and Clear Channel's chairman, Lowry Mays, was on its board. Under Mr. Hicks, Utimco placed much of the university's endowment under the management of companies with strong Republican Party or Bush family ties. In 1998 Mr. Hicks purchased the Texas Rangers in a deal that made Mr. Bush a multimillionaire.

There's something happening here. What it is ain't exactly clear, but a good guess is that we're now seeing the next stage in the evolution of a new American oligarchy. As Jonathan Chait has written in The New Republic, in the Bush administration "government and business have melded into one big `us.' " On almost every aspect of domestic policy, business interests rule: "Scores of midlevel appointees . . . now oversee industries for which they once worked." We should have realized that this is a two-way street: if politicians are busy doing favors for businesses that support them, why shouldn't we expect businesses to reciprocate by doing favors for those politicians ? by, for example, organizing "grass roots" rallies on their behalf?

What makes it all possible, of course, is the absence of effective watchdogs. In the Clinton years the merest hint of impropriety quickly blew up into a huge scandal; these days, the scandalmongers are more likely to go after journalists who raise questions. Anyway, don't you know there's a war on?

[Timesink]

Don't expect an answer. The fact that this thread only has 20 reponses shows that nobody gives a damn.

[PBRSTREETGANG]

In the Clinton years the merest hint of impropriety quickly blew up into a huge scandal...

Actually during the Clinton years, I believe it was the reverse. The hugest scandals were treated as mere improprieties. (If they were even dealt with at all.)

[Timesink]

A Yale Law School blog is giving Krugman's Hate Article free publicity, conveniently omitting the little Kristallnacht thing. Luckily, you can post comments, either anonymously or by signing your name. GO THERE AND POST!

[CyberAnt]

Excuse me ... I think Mr. Krugman needs to check the ratings of ABCNBCCBSCNN and FOX and then tell me I don't have a right to voice my opinion on anything. I VOTE WITH MY TV CHANNEL - and I don't buy the NEW YORK TIMES.

[Colt .45]

'This is an intellectual tragedy. The Marxist left, whatever else one might say about it, has traditionally offered a valuable perspective from which even the greatest conservative thinkers have learned — including Schumpeter and Thomas Sowell. But if it cannot rid itself of its current penchant for fantasy ideology of the worst type, not only will it be incapable of serving this purpose; it will become worse than useless. It will become a justification for a return to that state of barbarism mankind has spent millennia struggling to transcend — a struggle that no one felt more keenly than Marx himself. For the essence of utopianism, according to Marx, is the refusal to acknowledge just how much suffering and pain every upward step of man’s ascent inflicts upon those who are taking it, and instead to dream that there are easier ways of getting there. There are not, and it is helpful to no party to pretend that there are. To argue that the great inequalities of wealth now existing between the advanced capitalist countries and the Third World can be cured by outbreaks of frenzied and irrational America-bashing is not only utopian; it is immoral.

The left, if it is not to condemn itself to become a fantasy ideology, must reconcile itself not only with the reality of America, but with its dialectical necessity — America is the sine qua non of any future progress that mankind can make, no matter what direction that progress may take.

The belief that mankind’s progress, by any conceivable standard of measurement recognized by Karl Marx, could be achieved through the destruction or even decline of American power is a dangerous delusion. Respect for the deep structural laws that govern the historical process — whatever these laws may be — must dictate a proportionate respect for any social order that has achieved the degree of stability and prosperity the United States has achieved and has been signally decisive in permitting other nations around the world to achieve as well. To ignore these facts in favor of surreal ideals and utterly utopian fantasies is a sign not merely of intellectual bankruptcy, but of a disturbing moral immaturity. For nothing indicates a failure to understand the nature of a moral principle better than to believe that it is capable of enforcing itself.

It is not. It requires an entire social order to shelter and protect it. And if it cannot find these, it will perish.' - Excerpt from 'The Intellectual Origins of American Bashing' by Lee Harris of Policy Review

This writer Paul Krugman is obviously one of the leftist with moral immaturity. His order is destined to go down in history as the Dummies of the World. It sickens me how the left has always used our Bill of Rights to try and weaken our beliefs. We must fight them, and fight back hard! We must expose their lies and filth for what they are. Damn the Dixie Chickens, or Baghdad B*tches (if you prefer). And I damn every anti-war protestor as an amoral coward and a parasite, they are vermin and should be treated as such. Its too bad so many valiant men have laid down their lives to allow these spawn to have the freedom to spread the filth they propagate about our country. I am a proud veteran whose served for 20 years on active duty to defend our way of life, and I am saddened that these ba*tards call themselves Americans. To my brothers who still fight and serve, I support you 100%!

[CrimeOf73]

Since nobody else has, I will call Godwin's Law on Mr. Krugman's column -- specifically the allusion to Kristallnacht.

[Beck_isright]

This from the newspaper that thought Pravada was a useful news source from 1946-1992.

V

[RippleFire]

Tin Foil Topper BUMP

[Tamzee]

This guy is beneath contempt. I can't believe there isn't anything we can do to stop NYT from publishing deliberate falsehoods as "reporting".

[Tamzee]

An FYI you may want to look at.

Krugman at NY Times is claiming that Clear Channel set up all the "Rally for America" events.... as a favor to Bush. He apparently also made a Nazi reference calling us part of "American Kristallnacht". That now appears deleted from the current version.

Hope I pinged some of the appropriate rally organizers, wasn't sure who else would want to see this.

[Toddsterpatriot]

The answer, it turns out, is that they are being promoted by key players in the radio industry ? with close links to the Bush administration.

I guess they paid off all the protestors to show up. Krugman is an economic imbecile. Politically he's even worse.

[sport]

Whatever he calls me for not having anything t do with the dixie chicks because of their remarks about President Bush, I plead guilty to being.

At least I don't spend my days and nights dreaming about giving bill clinton a lewinsky like he does.

[wardaddy]

Being Paul Krugman means you are prime to be a victim of Kritallnacht again because you are weak.

He needs to spend a month on the West Bank or in a Gaza settlement and get back to us.

[Timesink]

Paul Krugman's Fascist Fantasy:

The competition is stiff, but Paul Krugman is probably the Times' most reliable Bush-bashing columnist. His latest "Channels of Influence," doesn't disappoint in that regard, but Krugman saved his most vicious comment for war supporters.

Krugman doesn't trust the media company Clear Channel Communications, which he accused of organizing pro-war rallies as a political favor to the Bush administration. "The company appears to be using its clout to help one side in a political dispute that deeply divides the nation," Krugman wrote. (The Times would never do anything like that, of course, and neither would Krugman.) As for "deeply dividing the nation," the Times front-page poll on Saturday showed 70 percent of Americans approved of Bush's handling of Iraq.

 Truly offensive was Krugman's comment on a pro-war rally not organized by Clear Channel: "One of the most striking took place after Natalie Maines, lead singer for the Dixie Chicks, criticized President Bush: a crowd gathered in Louisiana to watch a 33,000-pound tractor smash a collection of Dixie Chicks CD's, tapes and other paraphernalia. To those familiar with 20th-century European history it seemed eerily reminiscent of ... But as Sinclair Lewis said, it can't happen here."

People are catching on.

[Bob J]

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[Pietro]

Don't you understanding that by spreading this information you will be infringing upon Mr. Krugman's first amendment rights (to say nothing of his livelihood)?

Criticism of liberals is a latent, though potent, form of Nazism. Proving once again that conservatives are really nazis, or is klansmen? I get so confused.

"NAZIs, NAZIs, NAZIs" The liberal equivalent of a well reasoned argument.

[stanz]

This guy's just another stock leftist-socialist-pig apologist- - -the kind you want to shove an umbrella up into and open. Kristallnacht indeed. It was people like him who, through their apathy, allowed for the real Kristllnacht to be possible.

[Rocky]

As Jonathan Chait has written in The New Republic, in the Bush administration "government and business have melded into one big `us.'"

The marxists have been saying this for over 100 years. Don't they ever get tired of singing the same song? Everywhere these people get the upper hand, they leave a trail of tears and tragedy. Yet, our society stupidly listens to their nonsense, and continues to give them a stage from which to proclaim their vile dogma.

The evil is never with socialist tyrants. It is always with the U.S. Government and big business. They are conspiring to enslave the proletariat. Poor enslaved proles, the poorest of them are richer than half the people in the world.

[baseballmom]

It was my understanding, that a lot of these rallies were promoted by Glenn Beck, in response to people calling him and emailing him. The listeners to his program were fed up with all the anti-America, anti-Bush rallies. They wanted to DO something to show the troops that we supported them, and were behind them and our country 100%.

This is such a BS article. People, like me, were clamoring for our voices to be heard. I don't give a damn about the Dixie Chicks or anyone else. Let them say what they want. I just wanted my voice to be heard.

I attended the DC Chapters Rally for America on March 1st. and the Rally for America at Valley Forge on March 16. It would be big news to Kristinn and the DC chapter, that they were a subsidiary of Clear Channel.

[BossLady]

"would be big news to Kristinn and the DC chapter, that they were a subsidiary of Clear Channel"

No kidding!!! AND.....our rallies last weekend would have tripled if ads and such were on every Clear Channel station!

I cannot believe how much of a total ignoramus this guy is......