This is my first diary, so I hope you will forgive my mistakes.  I have been reading comments from supposed Obama supporters on different sites, mostly this one and HuffPo, and have become more and more distressed. While there are some who are looking at Obama's comments and positions since winning the primary with an open mind, there are many who are, in my humble opinion, being herded quite easily down the chute by the corporate owned media to their own destruction.

Please follow below if you will allow me my rant...

Once on a charter fishing boat off Miami, I noticed a discreet sign on the topdeck:

Marriages performed by the Captain are valid only for the duration of the voyage.

I assume the same protocol holds true for a campaign bus such as the "Straight Talk Express." All the journalists who have fallen in love with John McCain — to the point of being blinded to his endearing faults, contradictions, blunders, and closet Bushism — will eventually go back to their wives, and husbands, but mostly wives.

On Monday a tragedy happened in my community, Greenville, SC.  A beautiful 8 year old girl named Dymia Woody was sexually assaulted and killed. She was found in a closet of an abandoned mobile home.    Another child, a fourteen year old boy has been arrested and charged in the case.  Below is the story as reported by our local NBC affiliate:

CNN:

With the dust having finally settled after the prolonged Democratic presidential primary, a new CNN/Opinion Research Corporation poll shows Sens. John McCain and Barack Obama locked in a statistical dead heat in the race for the White House.

With just over four months remaining until voters weigh in at the polls, the new survey out Tuesday indicates Obama holds a narrow 5-point advantage among registered voters nationwide over the Arizona senator, 50 percent to 45 percent. That represents little change from a similar poll one month ago, when the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee held a 46-43 percent edge over McCain.

Nate links us to a primer by the National Council on Public Polls that tells us how media should report on polls:

Certainly, if the gap between the two candidates is less than the sampling error margin, you should not say that one candidate is ahead of the other. You can say the race is "close," the race is "roughly even," or there is "little difference between the candidates." But it should not be called a "dead heat" unless the candidates are tied with the same percentages. And it certainly is not a “statistical tie” unless both candidates have the same exact percentages [...]

When the gap between the two candidates is more than the error margin but less than twice the error margin, you should say that Candidate A "is ahead," "has an advantage" or "holds an edge." The story should mention that there is a small possibility that Candidate B is ahead of Candidate A.

Obama is ahead in this poll. There is a chance the poll is wrong, given the 3.5% margin of error, but when the poll says Obama is ahead by five points, it means something, and it's not the same as if the poll was 45-45.

Furthermore, the Pollster.com national poll composite currently has Obama leading 48.5 - 43.9, just shy of the 5-point margin in the latest CNN poll. In other words, chances are that its results are not an outlier.

Of course, CNN desperately wants their dead heat. It's good for ratings.

The pundits with not much to do during the political slow season have been reading the tea leaves to see how far Barack Obama is tacking to the center in order to reposition himself for the general election:

Most of us don't really need any more examples to know how far our media has strayed from it's traditional role of informing the public and acting as the public's watchdog because we've already seen far too many examples of that fact. But for me, A Media Tale of Two Generals is about a subject far too important for me to let it go without comment.

Here's a classic example of Media Manufacture: a story that is reported wrong (i.e. the incident never happened), gets picked up by various op-ed blowhards, and becomes "fact".

Yesterday, the pool reporter following Obama reported the following:

He left to check in on other classes, thanking teachers and students. He then came back to the room where the children were drawing pictures. Stooping over a table, he autographed a number of drawings. The children were delighted; one girl held her picture to her cheek after Obama signed it.

As he left, a boy tried to give him a fist bump. Obama said no.
"If I start that ..." his voice trailed off.

http://thepage.time.com/...

Oh no! Obama doesn't want to fist-bump a little boy!  You know where this is going...

It's been just 12 years, but it seems like an eternity ago -- the day I grabbed that sheepskin, packed every worldly possession into a pile of UPS boxes, and set off across the country to pursue my dream of becoming a journalist.

My first job was 2,500 miles from home, and paid the princely sum of $21,000 a year.  No matter, I thought; this was the first step in a noble career as a servant of the people and the truth.

Six years later, burned out and disillusioned after years on small newspapers across the country, I shut the door on journalism.  There were many reasons: financial, work-life balance, overwork, stress.  But disillusionment was the biggest.  Put simply, I had decided that engaging in hack journalism -- sensationalizing and exaggerating the story, rather than simply presenting the facts -- was the surest path for advancement to the big leagues of journalism.  And I couldn't do it.

The past 72 hours have provided me with a stark reminder of why I left.

So its no mystery to 90% or so of the people here that actually bother to watch some FOX News from time to time, but in case you've been living under a rock let me break it down for you:

They are biased. Shamefully and absurdly biased. While they may operate under a slogan of "Fair and Balanced" they are a few stone throws away from outright Rush Limbaugh partisanship to the GOP.

However, you will probably encounter numerous people throughout the U.S. who will argue that FOX is in fact NOT biased and that its "the liberal media" (IE: everything that isn't right wing talk radio, right wing publications or FOX) that is in fact biased and the real problem. Many have differed on what exactly to say to these confused individuals. But today I present to you something so egregious and shameful that you can simply point to it and not have to go further in wasting your time -

... otherwise he would be talking about it every goddamned day:

In the past 48 hours the following has happened.

1.  John McCain spoke at a company which unlawfully and intentionally failed to pay its workers the prevailing minimum wage.

2.  John McCain admits he doesn't know the price of gas.

3.  John McCain puts up an ad which has a price almost $2 a gallon below the national average.

4.  One of McCain's top fundraisers, John Lindner, supports unrepentant terrorists.

5.  John McCain's camp swiftboats Wesley Clark by claiming Clark said things he never said all while having his surrogates and talk radio show minions attack Clark's service.

But where's are the networks and major newspapers?

We here at dkos often complain, and rightfully so, about the media's tendency to treat John McCain with kid gloves and to be complicit in helping McCain maintain a bogus "maverick" image. So let's give kudos when the media actually do their job. Today the conservative-leading Tampa Tribune published a front-page story that blasts the "McCain maverick" myth and exposes the seedy underside of his closest adviser, Charlie Black (who was a University of Florida grad, who knew?).  The information in the article is nothing new to most kossacks, but I think it's significant that the media is starting to finally tell -- gasp! -- the truth about McCain -- and a conservative paper in Florida to boot.

h/t Americablog

It must be really nice being an on air gasbag.  I mean you can say just about anything you want, it floats off into the ether, and tomorrow, you get to do it again.  BRILLIANT!

Sure I guess there are rules and all that, but since the line between journalist and pundit/gasbag/opinion turd, has been smeared all over the place leaving no perceptible  trace of journalist, just shit all over the place.  Maintaining any level of journalistic standards is probably too time consuming.

I'm still pissed about the way the media, and Obama, have been treating General Clark. Now the Columbia Journalism Review is critiquing the coverage and the phrase "mock outrage" is in first sentence.  Nice!

The article points out the ways the media has mis-reported the Clark comments.

More after the flip...

By now, we've all seen TPM's: Wes Clark Hyperventorama, which was frontpaged by SusanG.  Gen Wes Clark (USA, Ret) praises John McCain's military service, but goes on to say his experience falls short of executive level foreign policy experience.

Then, Clark is baited into a glib soundbite originated by an arrogant sounding and overbearing Bob Schieffer, which by and large the corporate media and "shocked and appalled" McCain supporters have joined forces to omit.  McCain himself has gone so far as to advise Obama to "cut him [Clark] loose." Why would this innocuous exchange result in such a frenzy?

SCHIEFFER: I have to say, Barack Obama has not had any of those experiences either, nor has he ridden in a fighter plane and gotten shot down. I mean...

Gen. CLARK: Well, I don't think riding in a fighter plane and getting shot down is a qualification to be president.

SCHIEFFER: Really?

I spend a lot of time on the internet these days, perusing the various articles regarding the election in blogs, newspapers, and magazines. They discuss polls, they weigh statements, they play neutrality or sometimes forthright partisanship. They provide real information, for those who can parse it, that educates and enlightens us about not only the election, but the entire political process, as the lens on our government becomes increasingly large during presidential election years.

Into the eye of the enemy, or what?

Is anyone else feeling dispirited?  Am I only the one who's getting tired of being "Sister Souljah"-ed every time there's a presidential election?  

The issue is not whether I'm going to vote for Barack Obama in November, because of course I will.  The issue is why it is that EVERY SINGLE TIME, our Democratic nominees are never able to articulate any kind of progressive vision in an effective manner, instead choosing to run on "We won't make any Scary Changes; we're as traditional and conservative as they are, only we aren't completely, utterly bats**t crazy."

Is this really the best we can do?  Is this the best our candidates can do?

[more on the flip]

In May, I diaried the phenomenon of Fauxrage, an infantile disorder, now defined by the Urban Dictionary as:

   Fauxrage: n. fo-rage., fô rāj′

Frenzy created by media or blogs to inflate a usually minor, perceived  offense into a major scandal or continuing political event.

Congress, in a fit of fauxrage, passed a resolution condemning a newspaper ad about a General. The fauxrage was stoked primarily by Faux News.

The Wesley Clark incident is the latest in the seemingly unending parade of fauxrage perpetrated by the right and their media abettors.