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Nov
30
One Way to Induce Narcissistic Rage? Eliminate Them!
Filed Under Illness, Mental health, Politics, Sarah Palin | Leave a Comment
Thank you to a fairly regular commenter at The Moderate Voice for linking to this New York Times article, “A Fate That Narcissists Will Hate: Being Ignored,” on the elimination of Narcissistic Personality Disorder from the upcoming DSM revision. It’s a very well-written article that crystalizes the key differences between people who have a lot of self-love and those who are clinically ensconced in themselves. An excerpt:
The central requirement for N.P.D. is a special kind of self-absorption: a grandiose sense of self, a serious miscalculation of one’s abilities and potential that is often accompanied by fantasies of greatness. It is the difference between two high school baseball players of moderate ability: one is absolutely convinced he’ll be a major-league player, the other is hoping for a college scholarship.
…
The second requirement for N.P.D.: since the narcissist is so convinced of his high station (most are men), he automatically expects that others will recognize his superior qualities and will tell him so. This is often referred to as “mirroring.” It’s not enough that he knows he’s great. Others must confirm it as well, and they must do so in the spirit of “vote early, and vote often.”
Finally, the narcissist, who longs for the approval and admiration of others, is often clueless about how things look from someone else’s perspective. Narcissists are very sensitive to being overlooked or slighted in the smallest fashion, but they often fail to recognize when they are doing it to others.
Sigh. Maybe the Me Decade is coming back.
See also: Sarah Palin Benefits from Insatiable Narcissism, When Will We?
By Jill Miller Zimon at 11:37 pm November 30th, 2010 in Illness, Mental health, Politics, Sarah Palin | Please comment
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Nov
30
If Looks Could Kill, McConnell Is Gunning For Cantor
Filed Under Politics, Republicans | Leave a Comment
- From Getty Images via Huffington Post
OMG. Seriously. Look at how McConnell is trying to control Cantor with that stare, while Pelosi is trying to see if McConnell is giving Cantor the stare and Cantor is staring right into Obama’s eyes, which is what is making old Mitch all scared in the first place – because you know, if you look into Obama’s eyes, well – it’s just all over, right? Or maybe Mitch is thinking, “DOH! No! Don’t let him put his HAND on your shoulder!! GAD!”
Wow. How much more crazy freaked out can you be that someone might think or act independently than Mitch McConnell?
Here’s the article that went with the photo.
By Jill Miller Zimon at 7:53 pm November 30th, 2010 in Politics, Republicans | Please comment
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Nov
30
Joe Scarborough Picks Up “What Are You Scared Of?!” Call Re: Palin v. GOP Pres Potentials
Filed Under Politics, Sarah Palin, White House 2012 | 4 Comments
Over the holiday weekend, I wrote two “what are we supposed to be afraid of!?” re: Sarah Palin’s kinda sorta warnings to the media and the White House, here and here, that if they don’t stop…something, she’ll do…something.
Via Political Wire, now Politico has published a piece written by Joe Scarborough and titled, “Joe Scarborough tells GOP to man up and attack Sarah Palin.” In pertinent part:
If Republicans want to embrace Palin as a cultural icon whose anti-intellectualism fulfills a base political need, then have at it. I suppose it’s cheaper than therapy.
But if the party of Ronald Reagan, Paul Ryan and Marco Rubio wants to return to the White House anytime soon, it’s time that Republican leaders started standing up and speaking the truth to Palin.
Read the whole thing.
Seriously. We’re talking about people who pretend to want to vie for being leader of the free world. Fear is something that protects us – but as Scarborough echoes: what exactly are they afraid of?
By Jill Miller Zimon at 9:24 am November 30th, 2010 in Politics, Sarah Palin, White House 2012 | 4 Comments
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Nov
29
WLST Untabbed: 11/29/10
Filed Under Politics, WLSTUntabbed | Leave a Comment
I used to do Remains of the Day and Daily Exclamation posts – basically link round-ups. But since getting elected last year, it’s been very difficult for me to get a really consistent blogging pattern going, even though it feels like there’s more stuff to blog about than ever.
Like many people, I’m resorting to status updates on Facebook and Twitter to compensate for not taking the time to just open up a new blog post screen and write, but having struck out yesterday in trying to find a good app that lets my FB updates stream in my sidebar, and having no more time available to waste on trying to find something (although someone reading this can take pity on me and offer another suggestion – I’ve tried the apps that tell you to take the RSS for notifications and a few other suggestions already – they just gave me error messages in my sidebar), and still not feeling like I can kill my darlings of news and info that I think deserve a bigger audience, I’m going to try this untabbed approach.
The designation comes from the fact that I have a real thing about leaving open so many tabs in my browsers that I render my computer useless (I get the beachball and then it crashes). No guarantees on how this will go, but speaking of balance in life, I am missing writing very, very much.
1. From Cory Doctorow at BoingBoing: Menstruating woman subjected to TSA grope because panty-liner obscured her vulva on pornoscanner
2. So FB does have this activity feed thingy, but it only works with pages – I don’t want to turn into a page
3. Who says politics is not a popularity contest? Sarah Palin would win the Google vote
4. From Liz Gumbiner and the Cool Moms Picks, cool mom tech picks for the holiday season (some very good ideas in there)
5. Two flamingly opposite examples of leadership in Ohio: new County Executive (and Democrat) Ed Fitzgerald and the open government approach to filling positions versus Ohio Governo-elect (and Republican) John Kasich’s defensive justification for closed government approach to filling positions – editorial boards and open government advocates (including the media’s lawyers), please step it up. (And by the way – if you’re interested in a position on one of the county boards or commissions, you can see the full list here.)
6. Regarding record corporate profits reported last week, from Melissa McEwan speaks truth to power:
Deregulation, privatization, corporate personhood, the veneration of avarice, the conflation of wealth with morality, and the myth of a market that solves all problems. That’s what got us here.
The US public has told itself a lot of lies. The truth is this: The invisible hand belongs to a thief.
7. From one of my all-time favorite resources, National Conference of State Legislatures, a great post about creating apps for the legislative world – for citizens to connect to their electeds, electeds to connect to citizens and being able to access data about either all from smartphone and other mobile devices.
8. I hope more than just the Ohio Tea Party stay on John Boehner when it comes to his plan to kill the Office of Congressional Ethics. You’d think with all the investigating that Daniel Issa is planning on doing, even they’d recognize the hypocrisy. Ok – maybe not. Of course, I continue to harbor anger about the Ohio legislature’s 2005 killing of the office that oversaw charter schools. Moving on…
9. Res ipsa baby: It’s Time for Women to Lead and Men to Follow
10. And another: How Female Leadership Traits Can Benefit IT
11. From a mentor and leader of women into leadership, Why Pelosi Didn’t Fail
12. Matt Lewis is one of my favorite right of center observers and this post from 2008, Falling Forward in Politics: Six Tips on Enduring a Political Loss, should be a must-read for anyone involved in a campaign.
13. Despite headlines that focus on the turning away from Democrats in Dixie, here’s a good piece on the success of Terri Sewell, first African-American woman to represent Alabama in the House.
14. Cynthia Ruccia is known in Ohio (and beyond) for a few things – most notably, I’m guessing, her campaigns against John Kasich when he was running for Congress and her participation in election 2008 activities around calling out sexism. Here’s her current thinking on 21st Century Feminism.
15. Celebrating new Ohio statehouse elected, Kathleen Clyde from the Kent area.
16. Noting the path to Congressional seats – be a staffer of a sitting member of Congress. (LegiStorm also has data on earmarks.)
17. Finally, Technorati’s State of the Blogosphere 2010. With a “deeper dive” into the female bloggers section of the sphere.
By Jill Miller Zimon at 4:50 pm November 29th, 2010 in Politics, WLSTUntabbed | Please comment
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Nov
29
When New is Old: The Men in Charge of Women’s Magazines
Filed Under Gender, Media, Politics, Women, Youth | 2 Comments
From 11/29/10 New York Times pB1
And it involves the departure of two women – Ann Moore from TIME Inc. and Cathleen Black at Hearst who is Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s schools chancellor pick.
Their ages? 47, 49, 49, 50. Hey – wait a minute – that’s my generation. Almost exactly. Didn’t I have a lot of women in my generation who, you know, had the same opportunities etc.? Oh well – this isn’t “my” industry. I’m sure someone can explain the absence of women to me.
Nothing in the article about content, mostly it’s about business. The companies are Hearst, Meredith, Condé Nast and Time Inc. Magazines they publish:
Hearst:
Meredith:
- American Baby
- American Patchwork & Quilting
- Better Homes and Gardens
- Country Home Country Gardens
- Diabetic Living
- Do It Yourself
- Family Circle
- Fitness
- Ladies’ Home Journal
- Living the Country Life
- Midwest Living
- More
- Parents
- ReadyMade
- Renovation Style
- Scrapbooks, Etc.
- Successful Farming
- Traditional Home
- Wood
Condé Nast:
Fashion and lifestyle
Home
Bridal
Golf
Food
Travel
Technology
Culture
Time Inc.:
Hoping to get Jenn Pozner and maybe even the Women’s Media Center to comment on this. One of the arguments that is often made about coverage of women has to do with how business and editorial don’t have nearly enough women in charge and that alone changes when women get covered as well as how women get covered. I’m guessing one or more of these men have daughters. Will that influence their choices? (Don’t bother with the “should it matter” retort – yes – it should.)
By Jill Miller Zimon at 11:07 am November 29th, 2010 in Gender, Media, Politics, Women, Youth | 2 Comments
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Nov
26
Palin Realizes How Scary She Is: Jabs Are Warnings That If We Don’t Behave, She’ll Run
Filed Under Mental health, Politics, Sarah Palin | 6 Comments
Because Sarah Palin believes that the threat of her running for president is that scary.
Sarah Palin took the media and even President Barack Obama to task Thursday in a Thanksgiving message posted online.…Palin’s Facebook statement served as both a warning shot to the media and to the White House. She has made it clear in the Past several weeks that she is considering running for president, telling ABC that she could defeat Obama. [emphasis added]
So – if I’m reading this right, Sarah Palin is warning us about how the price to be paid, if the media and others do not apply standards evenly to all candidates on their slip-ups, is that she’ll become a presidential candidate. And that that “sanction” should frighten us enough to apply even standards, or else…she’ll run.
This means that, now, even she is buying how scary she is. Maybe we’re making some progress, except I suspect that as with so many words in the English language, she just doesn’t define them the same way most people do.
Of course, the reality is that it doesn’t matter if everyone on the left and the right and in between write about this person every waking moment of every day. Sarah Palin is a world-class narcissist and her need for attention will never be satiated, neh-ver ever ever. As in – at no such time as will ever exist in any dimension.
To boot, she is a person who trusts no one except possibly but not even necessarily those who espouse precisely what she does. Who within her circle who has influence on her deviates from her preferences? This nearly 8,000 word piece from last week’s New York Times magazine sure doesn’t seem to indicate that there’s anyone. And she spends day in and day out defending her paranoia and deflecting criticism in anyway she can. For more understanding of what her behaviors tell us about her, read this.
And now, if you believe Politico’s take, she wants us to behave the way she thinks we should behave by virtue of the power she believes exists in the threat that she may run for president?
This takes fearmongering to a whole new level.
Hattip to Joanne Bamberger.
Other worthwile and provocative reading on this subject from Addie Stan and Elizabeth Wurtzel.
By Jill Miller Zimon at 5:26 pm November 26th, 2010 in Mental health, Politics, Sarah Palin | 6 Comments
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Nov
24
Women in Media & News Exec Dir on TSA Saving Us from Explosive Power of Her Breasts
Filed Under democracy, Government, Law, leadership, Politics, Security, Social Issues, Transportation | 1 Comment
And let me just say, having met Jenn Pozner a few times (and adoring her and her work), she is not joking about that power! An excerpt, but go read the entire post for yourself – it’s not a laughing matter and she does a good job grounding it in her own experience:
I am thankful that my TSA experience wasn’t particularly gropey and didn’t feel assaultive, though it was definitely uncomfortable. I chose not to ask for a private screening room, because I wanted others to know that they can (and I believe should, considering we really don’t know enough about the potentially awful health risks of the backscatter machines) refuse the cancer box and opt for a search. But I was really disturbed by the fact that the searches can be outrageously intrusive and aggressive or relatively benign, and there’s no way to know until some stranger’s fingers are poking your genitals and/or breasts, (or not, as the case may be).
Jenn’s a great chronicler and writer and storyteller so I would highly recommend both that post and her book (on whose site the post appears). Thanks for taking one for the girls, Jenn and writing about it very maturely.
By Jill Miller Zimon at 4:38 pm November 24th, 2010 in democracy, Government, Law, leadership, Politics, Security, Social Issues, Transportation | 1 Comment
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Nov
23
Response to David Brooks: First Voters Must Show Support for Equilibrium
Filed Under democracy, leadership, Politics | Leave a Comment
David Brooks’ column today, Sin and Taxes, is excellent. In particular:
For centuries, American politicians did not run up huge peacetime debts. It wasn’t because they were unpartisan or smarter or more virtuous. It was because they were constrained by a mentality inherited from the founders. According to this mentality, a big successful nation exists in a state of equilibrium between its many factions. This equilibrium is fragile because we are flawed and fallen creatures and can’t quite trust ourselves. So all of us, but especially members of the leadership class, should practice self-restraint. Moral anxiety restrained hubris (don’t think your side possesses the whole truth) and self-indulgence (debt corrupts character).
This ethos has dissolved, on left and right. The new mentality sees the country not as an equilibrium, but as a battlefield in which the people, who are pure and virtuous, do battle against the interests or the elites, who stand in the way of the people’s happiness.
The ideal leader in this mental system is free from moral anxiety but full of passionate intensity. This leader pushes his troops in lock step before the voracious foe. Each party has its own version of whom the evil elites are, but both feel they’ve more to fear from their enemies than from their own sinfulness.
Brooks says that the ethos of choice right now is in the “new mentality” of the country as battlefield, not equilibrium. I’d refine that by saying that the ethos of nationwide political leadership has always held our country to be a battlefield but we’ve addressed that reality by making leadership choices that prioritized equilibrium over taking one’s sour grapes and hurling them back at what’s been built over more than 200 years until it’s destroyed and you can replace it with whatever you prefer.
Unfortunately, when political figures who prefer hurling over healing exploit conditions so that voters support hurling over healing too, equilibrium looks pretty unattainable – even if more necessary than ever.
By Jill Miller Zimon at 2:50 pm November 23rd, 2010 in democracy, leadership, Politics | Please comment
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Nov
22
RIP, Hugh Prather
Filed Under Culture, RIP, Writing | Leave a Comment
I’ve got Notes on Love and Courage on my nighttable (lower shelf but it’s still there). I’m not sure where my Notes to Myself copy is – but I’ve had these books for decades. Ah yes – growing up in the era of Leo Busclagia et al – very different than growing up in the era of reality shows depicting in a far more forced and edited style what Prather and Busclaglia wrote about (i.e., The Bachelorette and The Bachelor). Hmm – or is it?
This section from the NYT obit on Prather made me laugh – having lived through it first-hand too:
“Notes to Myself” was spoofed by the comedy writer Jack Handey as a set of public musings known as “Deep Thoughts.” First published in National Lampoon, “Deep Thoughts” became a recurring feature on “Saturday Night Live” in the 1990s and was released as a series of books. Among Mr. Handey’s observations are these:
¶“If I ever get real rich, I hope I’m not real mean to poor people, like I am now.”
¶“I can picture in my mind a world without war, a world without hate. And I can picture us attacking that world, because they’d never expect it.”
¶“If you lose your job, your marriage and your mind all in one week, try to lose your mind first, because then the other stuff won’t matter that much.”
RIP, Hugh Prather. I cannot believe he was 72.
By Jill Miller Zimon at 9:36 am November 22nd, 2010 in Culture, RIP, Writing | Please comment
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Nov
21
Will Sarah be to GOP ’12 Primary as Bristol is to current DWTS Finals?
Filed Under Campaigning, Elections, Politics, Republicans, Sarah Palin, White House 2012 | Leave a Comment
Frank Rich’s column suggests that that might be the case, though polls of Republicans right now seem to indicate otherwise.
Some 54 percent of registered voters surveyed say they have unfavorable impressions of Palin, with more than twice as many holding “strongly unfavorable” as holding “strongly favorable” ones. Thirty-nine percent view her positively. These numbers are little changed from earlier this year.
…
Democrats and independents are broadly skeptical of Palin’s presidential qualifications, while Republicans divide evenly (47 percent say she is qualified; 46 percent say not). Even 46 percent of those who say they voted for the McCain-Palin ticket in 2008 now see Palin as unqualified for the presidency.
…The more condescending the attacks on [Sarah Palin], the more she thrives. This same dynamic is also working for her daughter Bristol, who week after week has received low scores and patronizing dismissals from the professional judges on “Dancing with the Stars” only to be rescued by populist masses voting at home.
…Sooner or later Palin’s opponents will instead have to man up — as Palin might say — and actually summon the courage to take her on mano-a-maverick in broad daylight.
Short of that, there’s little reason to believe now that she cannot dance to the top of the Republican ticket when and if she wants to.
I cannot wait for the Republican presidential primary opponents to summon that courage and take her on in broad daylight. Frankly, the fact that they haven’t yet is completely absurd. If they want to demonstrate politics not as usual and their own form of maverickism, then they should just do it. What on earth are they waiting for? She sure isn’t.
By Jill Miller Zimon at 5:20 pm November 21st, 2010 in Campaigning, Elections, Politics, Republicans, Sarah Palin, White House 2012 | Please comment
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Nov
19
Pelosi on How Politics Is Harder On Women
Filed Under leadership, Politics, Women | Leave a Comment
From this coming Sunday’s New York Times Magazine:
In what ways is politics harder for women than men?
For example, when I became the speaker, we won 30 seats. It was a victorious thing — I was the first woman speaker. It didn’t get that much play. And I’m not a publicity seeker, so it was O.K. with me. Boehner, before the election, they had him on the cover of Newsweek. Now he’s on the cover of Time, and women are coming to me and saying, “Is the job less important when a woman holds it?”
I’m sure you were on the cover of Newsweek and Time when you became Madame Speaker.
No. No.
Maybe Tina Brown, the new editor of Newsweek, can put you on the cover now, only four years too late.
My point is that when a man holds the job, the press seems to view it as more worthy of that kind of attention. But when a woman — even though it was historic — holds the job, they view it as less important. We have to dispel the notion that it’s not as big a job when a woman has it.
By Jill Miller Zimon at 9:59 pm November 19th, 2010 in leadership, Politics, Women | Please comment
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Nov
19
Who shapes the campaigns we follow – we run – for which we are the candidates? Check it out here. My panel:
10:30 a.m. Old Media/New Media: Communicating with Voters
Moderator: Stephen Brooks, Bliss Institute
John Brabender, Brabender Cox
Anthony Bellotti, Connell Donatelli Inc. Campaign Solutions
Frank Girolami, InfluentialData
Jill Zimon, writelikeshetalks.com
Costas Panagopoulos, Fordham University
What would you want to be sure this panel addresses? Thank you again to the folks who’ve invited me. It is a pleasure and an honor.
By Jill Miller Zimon at 12:09 am November 19th, 2010 in Campaigning, Elections | 1 Comment
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Nov
18
[video] Gillibrand: Vote Against Fair Pay is Outrageous, Egregious
Filed Under employment, Gender, Law, leadership, Politics, Sexism, Women | Leave a Comment
By Jill Miller Zimon at 12:19 am November 18th, 2010 in employment, Gender, Law, leadership, Politics, Sexism, Women | Please comment
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Nov
17
Oldest Excuse in the Book: Excessive Litigation in the Small Biz Community
Filed Under activism, Business, employment, Gaza, Law, leadership, Politics, Sexism, Social Issues, Women | 1 Comment
Why do human rights so often lose out to fears of “excessive litigation” in the small business – or any business community? This fearmongering was used today, again, to prevent extending civil rights – via equal pay for women, and to legalize the violation of those rights. Read more here about how the US Senate failed to pass a motion for cloture (and allow debate) on the Paycheck Fairness Act.
For me, the real underlying question is: Why doesn’t the logic that if the businesses were doing what is proper in the first place, there’d be no need for the law in the first place govern the way businesses function?
That, I can answer: because it’s more profitable for it not to govern. And so long as business gets priority in the minds of enough legislators, they can keep on violating the civil rights involved and will not be taken to task for a slack conscience. God forbid anyone be called on to do the right thing lest it interfere with – dare I say – BUSINESS.
This is not rocket science. We have regulations and laws like these because people seeking profit cannot always be trusted to do anything other than what is best for their profit ambitions. We have seen this over and over again, and in recent and past history. The gall of ignoring what it takes to have a civil society and treat each other civilly on all levels is beyond disappointing and depressing.
If you want to learn more about the boilerplate and fearmongering use of the “excessive litigation” excuse, start here. Shame on the women Republican senators (Snowe, Collins and Hutchison) in particular who voted for the Lilly Ledbetter Act but could only mutter this lame talking point excuse against cloture.
By Jill Miller Zimon at 8:29 pm November 17th, 2010 in activism, Business, employment, Gaza, Law, leadership, Politics, Sexism, Social Issues, Women | 1 Comment
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Nov
16
Murkowski Shows Political Courage in Obama, Palin Statements
Filed Under Congress, Courage, democracy, Elections, Government, leadership, Media, Politics, Republicans, senate, Voting, Women | 4 Comments
She’s not my U.S. Senator so maybe it’s easier for me to write this, but anyone who says this is going to have me listening to them:
“I will tell you, I am not one of those who wants Obama to fail,” Murkowski said. “If he does well, that means the country’s doing well. We don’t have time as a nation to spend all of what we do blocking. We have got to figure out how we get to a point where we can be sitting around the table and talking about these difficult problems and advancing some solutions.”
That we’re even calling speaking up this way as requiring courage should tell us something as well.
In the short clips at this CBS article about Murkowski’s interview with Katie Couric, Murkowski talks about needing to be there for all Alaskans – not just the ones that vote for her. I’ve been talking until I’m blue in the face lately about my concern that many electeds no longer even give lip service to this concept, let alone act on it. While there, you also can watch the portion of Katie Couric’s CBS interview in which Murkowski lauds Sarah Palin for her ability to connect with people but also critiques her for lacking “intellectual curiosity” and “leadership qualities.”
I completely agree with this:
“I want somebody that goes to bed at night and wakes up in the morning thinking about how we’re going to deal with our national security issues, how we’re going to deal with our economy, how we’re going to deal with providing better education or peace in the Middle East.”
As with Olympia Snowe, Susan Collins or Nancy Pelosi for that matter, these electeds reflect their voters, don’t pander to the screed of the hour and instead somehow manage to communicate an emphasis on being a public servant with political skill, and not on being a politician. Murkowski was criticized for her primary loss precisely because she wasn’t political enough. And Snowe is being targeted specifically because she builds bridges – those after her literally seek to blow up the figurative bridge between ideological approaches to common interests. Read more
By Jill Miller Zimon at 9:41 am November 16th, 2010 in Congress, Courage, democracy, Elections, Government, leadership, Media, Politics, Republicans, senate, Voting, Women | 4 Comments
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Nov
15
Tina Brown Rising and How Newsweek’s “DNA Will Just Slightly Shift” (toward women that is)
Filed Under Gender, Media, Politics, Women, Writing | Leave a Comment
Watch and listen. What chances do you give Newsweek’s future with Brown at the helm (The Daily Beast)?
More curious to me – the Daily Beast post with this clip seems to suggest that the shift is about garnering more female readers. I thought she was talking about having more female writers and editors. You?
By Jill Miller Zimon at 2:54 pm November 15th, 2010 in Gender, Media, Politics, Women, Writing | Please comment
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Nov
14
If PD’s Reader Representative Reps Readers, PD’s Demise Closer Than We Know
Filed Under Cleveland+, Ethics, Media, Politics | 7 Comments
I’ve lifted this description from Connie Schultz’s’ Facebook page primarily because it’s succinct (apologies but due linkage to Connie):
Plain Dealer reader rep, in the comments thread of his column today, wrote that “a lot of us are troubled by the obvious conflict” of my role as a columnist, married to a U.S. Senator. I was stunned. I posted a response, on Cleveland.com, copied in comment below.
I read Ted Diadiun’s column, all the comments there (as of about 11am), I left a comment myself, and read all the comments in Connie’s Facebook thread (linked to above).
My opinion: Although such an out of date, out of line, out of touch with reality column as Ted has written reads mostly like linkbait, I would urge people to leave comments at that column on Cleveland.com anyway.
The most obvious sign of not being of the times is Ted’s suggestion that only people who write for newspapers are journalists -as opposed to people who write for online outlets. In responding to a comment in the column’s online thread, Ted wrote: Read more
By Jill Miller Zimon at 12:41 pm November 14th, 2010 in Cleveland+, Ethics, Media, Politics | 7 Comments
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Nov
13
Cleveland’s #1…In Number of Political Ads Aired
Filed Under Campaigning, Elections, Government, Media, Ohio, Politics, Transparency | Leave a Comment
How sick is that? From Hotline On Call:
Viewers in some states saw more political spots than others. If you live in the Cleveland, Ohio, media market, you saw more ads than anyone else in America. In October, 29,689 political spots ran in the Cleveland market, accounting for 23.44 percent of all ads run last month. To put it another way, there were 40 political ads aired every hour of every day in the month of October.
Voters in Columbus, Ohio saw almost as many ads; 24,693, or 23.37 percent of all television ads, were political. The runners up were Portland, Ore. (21.78 percent), Sacramento, Calif. (21.18 percent) and Seattle, Wash. (19.47 percent). [emphasis added]
I’m feeling in a charitable mood so I’m going to stay away from the very obvious jabs at who exactly contributed to our #1 ranking, and the content that did it.
And more importantly than how ill this is, consider how much money was wasted on this kind of yes, free speech, compared to the literally billions that is going to be cut from the Ohio budget?
Up is down.
By Jill Miller Zimon at 9:48 am November 13th, 2010 in Campaigning, Elections, Government, Media, Ohio, Politics, Transparency | Please comment
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Nov
12
Out With The Independence: Tea Party Patriots, FreedomWorks Spend Big on Congressional Newbies
Filed Under Congress | Leave a Comment
The e-mail said Tea Party Patriots had spent “in excess of a hundred thousand dollars flying in local Tea Party coordinators and arranging the facility for this meeting.” The Patriots mocked the event by Claremont, a California-based group that promotes a return to what it calls the founding principles of the nation; the Patriots said Claremont was being run by lobbyists and “members of The Ruling Class,” and noted that its keynote speaker was Bill Bennett, a former secretary of education and now a prominent pundit in Washington.
…
And then there is the retreat today led by FreedomWorks, the Washington group that has helped the Tea Party movement grow, and that is led by Dick Armey, a former Republican House majority leader, lobbyist, and, yes, D.C. insider. About 40 new House members are attending that orientation at the Inner Harbor Hyatt in Baltimore. FreedomWorks was providing new lawmakers with briefing books on policy. The general message from Mr. Armey was: don’t be co-opted by the Establishment. But lawmakers might be forgiven if the lines between establishment and antiestablishment are seeming increasingly unclear. [emphasis added]
They. Have. Noooooooo. Idea.
By Jill Miller Zimon at 4:52 pm November 12th, 2010 in Congress | Please comment
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Nov
12
Diminishing Marginal Returns on Bashing Obama
Filed Under Barack Obama, Congress, conservatives, democracy, Government, Independents, leadership, Republicans, Research, Voting | 2 Comments
People know they’re going to hit that, right? There’s little more amplification that can be done on the tactic of blamming the President for this, that and the other thing. It’s not just piling on, it’s making people turn away and tire. It’s fill in the blank headline time – who even bothers to read the articles when you see the variation on the same theme ad nauseum:
Chris Matthews Blasts Obama While Getting Tingles on His Thigh
Spike Lee Blasts AND BLAMS Obama
Neil Armstrong Blasts OFF on Obama
Jon Stewart Laughs And Blasts Obama
Sarah Palin OF COURSE Blasts Obama
Just Google “blasts Obama.” You’ll see.
Combine all that with new research out from Pew that shows people are not all that excited, happy or eager to have as big an influx of red as we got last Tuesday, and you better believe that we’re soon approaching the point of diminishing marginal return on blasting our president. Read more
By Jill Miller Zimon at 1:02 pm November 12th, 2010 in Barack Obama, Congress, conservatives, democracy, Government, Independents, leadership, Republicans, Research, Voting | 2 Comments
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