Down for the count, going in to the bottom of the ninth, she picked herself off the mat and kept swinging the racket, finally kicking the winning field goal on her way to a big time victory, said the mixed metaphor pundits.
But after being left for dead, just how did she come out on top?
Was it because of her pluck or her luck?
Was it Bill? How about Stephanopoulus?
Nupe. Not even close.
The man who swung the big bat that produced the winning margin in Pennsylvania, sending the Obama crowd home dejected was one of Clinton’s former worst nightmares. None other than that horrid vast right wing conspiracy all wrapped up in one hunk of Fox manhood.
Little ole Sean Hannity.
You think Colbert’s got heat?
Hannity's so hot, you could cook an egg on any one of his twenty-one hours a week on TV and radio.
Think Chris Matthews plays hardball?
Try ducking out of the way of one of Hannity’s chin high, knock-down,100 mile-per-hour kitchen sink-loaded questions.
He may not have invented talk radio, but Hannity has ushered the talk game into the steroid era. In this election cycle, Hannity has been doing things that politically can only be deemed: unnatural. He’s not only batting from the right side of the plate, he batting from the left...and he’s doing it AT THE SAME TIME.
He’s not only pitching for his team, he’s become the designated hitter for the second place team in the other division And he seems to be able to knock it out of the park with one hand on the bat. He’s always been a heavy-hitter, but this election, if he isn’t swinging a corked bat, this guy has to be on the juice.
Sure, Al Gore was knocked back off the plate with hard up and under the chin, brush back pitches, and John Kerry basically had to play hurt from a severe swift boat knee-capping, but that was just your standard all’s fair in love, war and politics gamesmanship. Hannity has pretty much become his enemy’s (Hillary’s) greatest asset. Think the Boston Red Sox fans cheering for the Yankees.
"While the left wing moveon.org media fails to do their job," claims Hannity, "all I am doing is trying to get beyond the candidates bumper stickers and slogans and find out as much as possible about the people who want the most important job in the world."
And he’s gone yard, touching them all, not only making the Reverend Jeremiah Wright story an albatross around Obama’s neck, but personally delivering the William Ayers debate question to George Stephanopoulus.
"The fact that the media was a full year behind us on the Rev. Wright story, and months behind us on the Ayers story speaks for itself, " claims Hannity. "Are the American people better off when they know more or less about the candidates?"
Democrats may think that Hillary Clinton’s continued run for the big prize may be just a waste of time, Sean Hannity Bonds knows that it ain’t over until it’s over...and that means, if not a Hillary win, a battle-scarred Obama, having to go extra-innings in the Democratic playoff, will be limping into the November World Series with his best hitters and pitchers on the injured list.
It seems like only yesterday that conservative talk radio did everything it could to knock John McCain out of the race, and Hillary Clinton's loss was a forgone conclusion. Today, if Pennsylvania is any indication and Sean Hannity swinging the lumber, January may mean a walk off grand slam for right wing talk and McCain.
Look, I'm a confirmed, card-carrying liberal who's probably filled more column space with anti -right wing radio rants - including royally slamming Hannity - than anyone else on the literary planet, so don't take this as in no way am I condoning Hannity's tact. But I'm also a Philadelphia 76er fan. And as much as I remember hating Larry Bird when the Celtics came into town, there's no doubt I would have loved having him on my team. I might not be happy with his approach, but winning the championship and watching the victory parade sure beats the hell out of whining "wait till next year (four years)."
Award-winning TV writer, Steve Young, is author of "Great Failures of the Extremely Successful" www.greatfailure.com
www.greatfailure.com
A talk show host, author, columnist,award-winning television writer and filmmaker, his inspiring book, "Great Failures of the Extremely Successful" (Tallfellow Press) has been published internationally and has become required reading in the Wharton School of Business Masters Program. His "All The News That's Fit To Spoof " column appears every Sunday on the L.A. Daily News Oped Page.
Steve has appeared all over national TV and radio with his unique brand of satirical punditry and social observations appearing in national periodicals from the Los Angeles Times and The New York Times, to his own weekly Internet column "The Lords Of Loud," at AlbionMonitor.net and The Huffington Post.
What's all this cheerleading for Sean Hannity? And on a self-proclaimed progressive site? Hannity is merely another bigmouth chicken hawk, as he demonstrated admirably, evidently, on a Manchester street in January when he ran in panic from a few Ron Paul supporters -- the man even ditched his female companion. (Evidently he did some quick "ducking" himself, into a hotel lobby.) Yes, a real mouth warrior in action. The new symbol of American manhood! But I'm really puzzled why this right-wing love affair with Hannity is on this site? Who and what will be next? George "Champaign Unit" Bush is a real patriot? Dick "got wife pregnant for deferment" Cheney is one tough hombre? Back to our Hannity in panic, what evidence is there that this wimp had any effect on the Pennsylvania primary? I know of nothing.
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Stewart Nusbaumer (10 articles, 0 quicklinks, 1 diaries, 18 comments)
on Thursday, April 24, 2008 at 6:02:03 PM
Good analogies! People don't realize how powerful Hannity & Limbaugh really are. We cannot dismiss the #1 and #2 radio shows in the US today - their numbers are far and away the biggest and they do noticably move poll numbers.
Check out Hannity and Limbaugh: The Worst of America? to read how they began to get away with domestic propaganda and the tricks they use to get around legal regulations and ethical guidelines.
Also Taking a Proper Gander at Sean Hannity looks in on the way Hannity manipulated listeners to pull down Obama's poll numbers while selling them on his "objectivity". He also responds to anti-Hannity bloggers ....
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Gustav Wynn (51 articles, 34 quicklinks, 5 diaries, 238 comments)
on Thursday, April 24, 2008 at 9:38:22 PM
I don't buy the line that conservative American radio is driving Democratic elections. Makes no sense to me. Who cares how large and who their listerners are, since few vote in Democratic primaries.
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Stewart Nusbaumer (10 articles, 0 quicklinks, 1 diaries, 18 comments)
on Friday, April 25, 2008 at 2:44:01 PM
It's still sickening to hear Paulbots applaud their ambush against Sean Hannity. What would your reaction be if Mike Malloy or Keith Olbermann were given the same treatment? Huh?
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Scott (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 415 comments)
on Friday, April 25, 2008 at 9:10:38 PM
Sean Hannity is a devote of "SILLY LOGIC". He takes a real issue. He makes an unproven assumption to explain the issue. He extrapolates that assumption to a conclusion and then uses that to justify a policy position that is suppose to solve the original concern. His audience loves it. A neat little package that takes an observation, a reason for the observation, what that means and how to fix it. Life is great, and Hannity has all the answers to their questions.
Of course there is only one little hitch, Hannity's answers never add up because they are based on faulty assumptions that have no support from the get go. For example, he will say something like "Government doesn't work." Probably no one can disagree that government isn't working very well and under the Republicans it's ineffectiveness has reached new lows. However, Hannity assumes, "Government doesn't work because it is not competitive, it is a monopoly." Now, this assumes the MAJOR reason government does not working well is because it lacks competition which automatically makes it inefficient.
This is really a silly assumption, and if you think about having 3 or 4 or 5 Ferderal Governments writing laws, carrying out foreign policy, imposing legal decisions so we had more competition, it becomes clear quickly how absurd that statement really is. Still, that does not deter Hannity from pushing forward and seeing monopoly as the basis for inefficient government. Hannity now takes his assumption and extrapolates it to a conclusion -- if government is monopolistic and thus inefficient, we need to reduce government size and outsource its functions. He extrapolates his initial unproven assumption until he reaches an absurd conclusion. In place of government doing things, we let the private sector carry out those functions of government. Then he repeats his explanation over and over as repetition is central to ingraining his silly solutions in his audience.
Democrats want to make government bigger to solve your problems, that obviously won't work because Hannity has already told his audience the whole structure of government is wrong. We need to get rid of those Neaderthal Democratic thinkers, those liberals who just want to tax you to death and "tell you what to do". After all, what other purpose would Democrats have for wanting a bigger Government that clearly doesn't work and is the totally wrong model for efficient function. He reinforces his twisted logic until his followers have it memorized and call him up beaming with pride "I get it, you are so right".
I suspect this bump will always exist without a better educated population. The "snake oil salesmen" have always been here, ready to take advantage of those who don't understand exactly what it is they are really selling. Since many can get it free, they all think Hannity is their friend and political spiritual guide.
Help people see the real issues and understand the faulty explanations provided by these demigods of Conservative thought. If people could see Hannity and Limbaugh for what they really are, "snake oil salesmen without the snake oil" their audience just might shrink and with their departure the reason for even putting them on the air at all. Many of the most ardent listeners appear to be individuals with less to gain and the most to lose by embracing their conservative rhetoric and snake oil logic.
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Peter Wedlund (2 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 154 comments)
on Saturday, April 26, 2008 at 10:31:11 AM
