Facts do not matter anymore. Sorry I've been so slow to get that.

[No Elephants]

For as long as I have been posting, I have railed against politicians, media and, to a lesser extent, "commentators." I did not grok until last night (Tuesday) that the common thread is deceptiveness.


How did I finally catch on? Last night, I was half listening to the Lawrence O'Donnell show while working on some tasks. The subject was the Dream Act.

O'Donnell had on a number of people who were predictable unconditional supporters of Democrats and/or the Dream Act. Or so I assumed.

But, then they ran a clip of Obama talking about enforcement. And one of the Latino members of the group. Celso Mireles, said, "Our community has been enforced more than enough.....Now, it's time to find a way to keep families together."

Clunk.

An implied criticism of the President from a member of the panel what was supposed to praise the President or, at least criticize only Republicans.

So, O'Donnell, apparently at a loss, acknowledged that Democrats, like Republicans, were emphasizing, "tough, but fair," and turned to an MSNBC "contributor" whose sole function at MSNBC seems to be to protect Obama first, and, if required, other Democratic politicians.

Without the least bit of hesitation, she stated flatly that Obama "has to" talk about enforcement in order to get reform passed. He was giving something so that Republicans in Congress would have something to take back to their constituents.


In reality, and this "contributor" knows this better than I do, Obama has done quite a bit of "enforcing" of immigration laws at the Mexican border in the past four years, certainly a lot more than Dummya. Maybe more than any President. Between that and the recession, which makes us less attractive as an immigration destination, we have had fewer border crossings that at any time since Nixon.

To be fair, she did acknowledge that Obama had done a lot of enforcing during his first term. However, she spun that as establishing his "bona fides." The implication/spin, being that those 4 years of record enforcement toughness was simply to qualify him to pass immigration "reform."

In general, she did do a wonderful job of weaving facts into her narrative, but only to spin them. It came out as "Obama is not now, and never really was, behind enforcement. He did it for 4 years to a historic degree only to get to the point where his "right" to propose this bill was established. And he is now saying that it is the number one priority only so he can get this wonderful bill passed."

If you're "enforcing" at the border only to give Republicans an excuse to pass a bill five years down the road, doing a lot of enforcing all along is 180 degrees the wrong strategy. The way to go would hae been to look the other way. Then, an immigration bill making enforcement "the number one priority" is a carrot, not a yawn.

(Aside from spinning, her statement was bizarre: when did it supposedly become normal for a Democratic President to publicly help Republican politicians sell their actionns to their constituents, using a highly publicized, highly televised speech: The Republicans are going to vote for a bill because their political life of their Party depends in part on appealing to Latino voters. If their base gets angry about it and starts voting third party, oh, well, too bad for Republican politicians, I guess.)

All I can say is, if her job is to distort facts, she earned every penny. And so did the other panelists, who let her do this.

Of course, for their part, Republicans, like Rubio, are already lying that the President is lying about enforcement. So, the circle of lies, er, I mean the circle of life, in D.C. is complete.

P.T. Barnum was wrong. Suckers are born a lot more often than once a minute. Otherwise, how would all these liars become so rich and powerful?

Anyway, Hitler lost WWII, but Goebbels didn't. Apparently, his Big Lie Theory has been an inspiration. And, I have to say, it does seem to work with many people. At least, I cannot think of another reason why we put up what we put up with from politicians and from media.

Bottom line: I apologize for saying Hillary was wrong: facts do matter. Facts are only inconvenient things to be ignored, spun or otherwise dispensed with. Only the narrative matters.

[No Elephants]

1. P.S. Later in he same show. Alter, who self describes as a neoliberal, and

O'Donnell were talking together.

Alter laid out what he thought the way forward for Republicans might be, saying that Democrats had failed to get rid of the welfare state.

O'Donnell, who self-describes as a Socialist, said absolutely nothing.

That is how much honest and vigorous debate there is on TV anymore.

These are not political commentators. They are show business personalities posing as sincere.

[Divine Discontent]

2. and they make bank... lots of it. :(

[No Elephants]

4. I owe you the biggest apology of all, DD, because I remember posting

on your Hillary thread that Hillary was mistaken because "Facts matter."

Facts come and go. The narrative, however, is all that matters.

That's why "objective" shows have a host, one guest giving the Republican narrative and another guest giving the Democrative narrative.

No one on the show concerns themselves with unadulterated facts.


Me and my silly Sunday School girl notions.

[Enthusiast]

3. We will watch O'Donnell in an hour or so.

You are so right about the big lie. Facts have become flexible things. Deception is front and center. Deception is everywhere, on every TV channel and on every internet site.

I wage a constant battle with myself to determine if what someone just said was part of a ruse designed to distort the issue. I often feel that "someone" has succeeded in manipulating my understanding of an issue. There are millions of unknowing dupes. And I suspect I have unknowingly passed on faulty information.

[No Elephants]

5. Follow the money. Advertisers buy based on ratings. Facts don't increase ratings.

Ginned up controversies, telling people what they want to hear, or at least what they are comfortable hearing, showmanship (Beck, Linbaugh) and political gossip increase ratings. So does the train wreck effect, as in not being able to keep your eyes off one, which is probably why quite a few Democrats watched Limbaugh and Beck.


Facts, meh. Too dry. Too bland. Tto boring.