Elitism, issues, and electibility
April 23, 2008
Just throwing this out there.
Obama’s come off a rather long stretch of having people call him elitist and Hillary Clinton trying to prove both that she’s a regular joe and qualified to handle a 3 AM emergency phone call.
Then we have a content free debate where we talk about flag pins, and ABC defends it by saying they are addressing the issue of “electability,” which is just as important an issue as, well, the issues.
Now, it may just be me. But it seems to me that they’re saying “electability” does not depend on actual issues but silly crap like a candidate’s wardrobe or choice of drink.
So either issues are something for elitists to worry about and no regular joe would actually care about whether or not government functions properly, or regular joes simply can’t comprehend serious issues, even when explained slowly and broadly.
The first strikes me as an anti-American position. After all, representative democracy depends on participating in government. And the second just seems condescending and insulting.
Posted in Politics
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April 23rd, 2008 at 1:20 pm
Anti-American, condescending, and insulting… yup, that sounds like political news coverage in America to me.
I’m with Jon Stewart on this: when did elitism become such a bad thing? When did we stop wanting the best person for the job. We’ve had eight years of a “regular joe” as President, and that certainly hasn’t gone well. Especially not the real regular joes out there. Maybe it’s time we started electing someone who’d be too busy running the country to have a beer with us, and maybe it’s time for news coverage to focus on the issues, not the manufactured ridiculousness of the horse race.
Not that they will, of course. I’m just saying.