Forrest Gump is "the story of a man with an IQ of 75 and his epic journey through life, meeting historical figures, influencing popular culture and experiencing first-hand historic events while largely unaware of their significance, due to his lower than average intelligence." (Wikipedia summary)
Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and mainstream media heavyweights such as Charlie Gibson, George Stephanopoulos, and Tim Russert are on quite public "epic journeys" themselves these days, as the Democratic Party enters the final phase of the nomination contest for what I believe will be the most important election in modern history. As I said in my blog about Wednesday's debate, a Perfect Storm of national and global socioeconomic issues is coming ashore. For this reason, the American people must elect someone capable of breaking free of conventional thinking. And only heroic efforts on the part of our mainstream journalists will prevent voters from drowning in a sea of useless, trivial, or false information.
In a way, I'm happy that more than 10 million people watched Wednesday's debate; because all of those voters got to see "that which should not be done at all" being done very well.
They got to see stupid, "electability" questions being asked for the first hour, most of which had been adequately addressed by both candidates already. (And, in the case of Barack Obama's relationship to Rev. Wright, addressed in the form of a lengthy, celebrated-by-many speech on race relations in America in the very same building.)
I say "stupid, electability questions," because it takes so little intelligence to ask them. "Gotcha" is a game we all learned when we were little children. Any of us could moderate that kind of debate.
It also takes little intelligence to spend all your time wondering about the horse race side of the contest. Tim Russert spent his entire MSNBC show fixated on this electability issue. "How can Hillary win?" he kept asking his guests, as if all his brain could wrap itself around was the "unimaginable just last year" (in Tim's words) concept that Hillary Clinton could lose the Democratic nomination.
Asking Hillary and Barack - or other pundits, in the case of Tim Russert - about things like the torture memo written by John Yoo (which, according to the AP, the Justice Department is now investigating) would take some real intellectual firepower.
I also say "stupid," because you have to be a journalist with very little awareness of ordinary voters' concerns - in other words, a journalist who doesn't know how to do his or her job - to focus so intensely on who will win. The public has already expressed their feelings about this. In a recent poll, 67 percent of all Americans said they believe "traditional journalism is out of touch with what Americans want from their news."
Finally, I say "stupid," because mainstream journalists are completely unaware of the transformational nature of the times in which we live. They keep saying "Voters acted a particular way in the past, so that's how they will act this year as well," as if this year were not a unique moment... as if the American voters are not capable of learning and growing themselves.
I believe voters have. Like a woman who has tolerated being in an abusive relationship - because her husband has said "I love and care about you" even as he has beaten her up on a regular basis - but finally reaches a point where she sees the truth of the situation and leaves him for good, I believe this is the election where millions of voters want to get rid of politics as it's being played... they want to get out of this abusive political relationship.
This is the year that voters finally realize that "that which should not be done at all" - including mainstream media coverage focused on the trivial - is being done very well and needs to stop!
Which brings me to Hillary Clinton... and why her name is the most prominent of them all in the title of this essay.
When I read that Hillary said Barack Obama was complaining about how tough the questions were in Wednesday's debate... which is what SHE had been doing for months, going so far as to reference a Saturday Night Live sketch at one point and release a "piling on" video at another... I finally shook my head and realized "She's too stupid to see that her world of fighting over who will be the dominant force - the alpha female (in her case) - is on the way out. She can't see that we are entering an age of interdependent living - the only way we will solve the global warming and food crises - which will require leaders who are skilled collaborators, not just "the smartest person in the room" types like Hillary.
Hillary can't see that her time - the time of her world view on politics - is coming to an end.
Steve Brant is an independent researcher, theorist, and Corporate Social Responsibility brand-building consultant. His mission is to help the Corporate Social Responsibility movement transform the global sociopolitical economic system so that sustainable peace and prosperity for all becomes a reality. Through Trimtab Management Systems, Steve offers an innovation-based synthesis of the systemic redesign principles developed by Drs. Russell L. Ackoff, W. Edwards Deming, and R. Buckminster Fuller as the most powerful approach for achieving that global transformation. Key innovation leverage points for Steve are the CSR movement's potential capability to make war obsolete by advocating a "one world/one human family" political reality, and the entertainment industry's ability to communicate a hopeful vision of the future to the public at large. Such a vision is essential if humanity is to live together in peace. Steve has participated in The UN Global Compact since 2001 and is currently writing his first book, entitled "A World Beyond War In Our Lifetime".
of comparing Americans to women in an abusive relationship. It is time to leave. It is time to walk away from politics as usual. Obama gets it, I just hope enough Americans will realize it too.
by
Judy Ramsey (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 72 comments)
on Tuesday, April 22, 2008 at 8:42:53 AM
