A reader from California, Joe Carroll, writes with an update on political goings-on in his state:
Our governor and legislature have been quite active, passing new bills to confirm our Supreme Court decision that Uber-style employment arrangements do not qualify for independent contractor status, curb spurious vaccine exemptions, set a statewide rent control cap, limit the NCAA’s right to keep student-athletes from being paid for endorsements, somewhat strengthen oversight of charter schools, limit police officers’ ability to legally use deadly force, ban private prisons (eventually… probably…), and possibly even limit payday loan rates to a merely-obscene 36% + the federal funds rate. (We’ll see if that one’s too hot for the governor, as reinstituting the Obama administration’s rules on for-profit colleges apparently was.) All laudable liberal advances, all breaths of fresh air compared to what we’re seeing from the federal government, but also so frustratingly, painfully incremental and notable for their omissions: the governor campaigned on a fracking ban that promptly evaporated; our cap-and-trade program appears to be creating incentives for industry to pretend that they were considering development so that they can sell the credits from deciding not to; cities remain free to determine that a low-income housing development or apartment complex is “out of character with the neighborhood” and insist that it be relocated to someone else’s backyard, while my growing city is closing elementary schools because people increasingly can’t afford to live here while they’re young enough to have school-age children.
So, pretty mixed: some encouraging, some discouraging, but a lot happening that will have major consequences for people’s lives and for the planet generally. I’m grateful for Joe’s update, because I think he has a strong sense for what actually matters and is worth paying attention to. The top three stories on the New York Times right now are “Trump Publicly Urges China To Investigate The Bidens,” “Democrats’ Subpoena Threat Is Latest In Rapidly Unfolding Inquiry,” and “Trump Does It All Himself, And That Worries Republicans.” And the New York Times remains one of the most substantive publications in the world. (The next story is a terrifying piece of reportage about ICE’s use of new surveillance technology.) If you visit MSNBC.com, nearly every story is about Trump. On the main page right now, you’ll find the following stories:
‘A president alone’: Trump lashes out amid inquiry
Trump tries again, publicly recommends Ukraine and China investigate the Bidens
Trump grows emotional as impeachment takes aggressive steps ahead
MaddowBlog: Report implicates VP Pence in intensifying Trump scandal
Analysis: As impeachment war turns hot, Trump sounds partisan rallying cry
There is ‘clear obstruction’ from Trump admin.: Rep. Max Rose on supporting
impeachment inquiry
Trump, GOP accuse Schiff of orchestrating whistleblower complaint (...)
I’m about 1/3 down the page. I give up. You get the point. (You’re also told that if you want to “Keep up with the fast-developing impeachment story… Subscribe to the MSNBC Daily newsletter”) There are a few news stories on MSNBC unrelated to Trump. (There is, for example, a piece of climate change news: “Watch London climate change protest involving 1,800 liters of fake blood go horribly wrong.”) But for the most part, it’s utterly obsessed with the latest micro-developments in the plot of the Trump Show.
Ok, before we go any further: I am not saying that an impeachment inquiry into the President of the United States is not important. I am less concerned, however, with what Rep. Slotkin from Michigan’s 8th Congressional District thinks, or with whether Trump violated Nickelback’s copyright on Twitter. Certainly, since I hadn’t heard about half the things Joe told me about, I rather wish our news organizations had spent a bit more time on what states are doing about payday loans and fracking and a bit less time on what Donald Trump did or did not tell the president of Ukraine.
It somewhat frightens me when I realize how many people watch and enjoy MSNBC, because it shows just how distracted people are getting from what are fairly obviously the most important issues in the world: climate catastrophe, the increasing power of the plutocracy, the threat of nuclear armageddon, the 2 million people in our prisons and the tens of thousands committing suicide each year. These are, to be sure, extremely depressing, and watching Trump is like watching an insane alternate universe version of The West Wing where everybody is pure evil and has a screw loose. Hard not to want to stay glued to that. I understand why MSNBC, as a profit-seeking company, has chosen to focus on this bullshit rather than all the depressing stuff no one wants to hear about.
This is, of course, why I love Bernie Sanders so much. He has a way of hyperfocusing on what matters: people’s medical bills, the need for a Green New Deal, the rebuilding of the labor movement. He has this very satisfying contempt for issues that do not directly affect the conditions of working people’s lives. Yes, impeach the president, but can we talk about Medicare For All?
The alternative to this is something that vaguely resembles politics but is more like the internal drama of a royal court. Read this incredible New York Times profile of Rachel Maddow and you’ll see what I mean. It details how Maddow has become obsessed with Trump, and how her audience has grown and in turn become obsessed with her. (And I do mean obsessed with her. The profile includes a description of one fan who “had a Maddow-themed birthday party, at which her friends and her two young sons put on big black glasses and slicked their hair to the side. Also in attendance was a life-size cardboard cutout of Maddow, which is now in storage so as not to startle guests.”)
The profile describes how the Maddow show now devotes itself to the weaving of conspiratorial webs about Trump. Maddow “carries her viewers along on a wave of verbiage, delivering baroque soliloquies about the Russian state, Trump-administration corruption and American political history.” In the show’s office, “on the wall is a poster of ‘Trump Organization Projects and Partners,’ over which has been tacked the image of Carrie Mathison, the Homeland C.I.A. officer known for her paranoid conspiracy walls and unhinged (but often on-point) investigations.” In fact, Maddow is rather honest about where her interests lie and what kind of show she is doing: “I’m happy to admit that I’m obsessed with Russia. I realize it’s controversial, and people give me a lot of grief for focusing on it. But I make no apologies.”
Interestingly, the profile shows the degree to which Maddow has become a mirror-image version of FOX News, the only difference being that they are pro-Trump and she is anti-Trump.
Our governor and legislature have been quite active, passing new bills to confirm our Supreme Court decision that Uber-style employment arrangements do not qualify for independent contractor status, curb spurious vaccine exemptions, set a statewide rent control cap, limit the NCAA’s right to keep student-athletes from being paid for endorsements, somewhat strengthen oversight of charter schools, limit police officers’ ability to legally use deadly force, ban private prisons (eventually… probably…), and possibly even limit payday loan rates to a merely-obscene 36% + the federal funds rate. (We’ll see if that one’s too hot for the governor, as reinstituting the Obama administration’s rules on for-profit colleges apparently was.) All laudable liberal advances, all breaths of fresh air compared to what we’re seeing from the federal government, but also so frustratingly, painfully incremental and notable for their omissions: the governor campaigned on a fracking ban that promptly evaporated; our cap-and-trade program appears to be creating incentives for industry to pretend that they were considering development so that they can sell the credits from deciding not to; cities remain free to determine that a low-income housing development or apartment complex is “out of character with the neighborhood” and insist that it be relocated to someone else’s backyard, while my growing city is closing elementary schools because people increasingly can’t afford to live here while they’re young enough to have school-age children. So, pretty mixed: some encouraging, some discouraging, but a lot happening that will have major consequences for people’s lives and for the planet generally. I’m grateful for Joe’s update, because I think he has a strong sense for what actually matters and is worth paying attention to. The top three stories on the New York Times right now are “Trump Publicly Urges China To Investigate The Bidens,” “Democrats’ Subpoena Threat Is Latest In Rapidly Unfolding Inquiry,” and “Trump Does It All Himself, And That Worries Republicans.” And the New York Times remains one of the most substantive publications in the world. (The next story is a terrifying piece of reportage about ICE’s use of new surveillance technology.) If you visit MSNBC.com, nearly every story is about Trump. On the main page right now, you’ll find the following stories:
‘A president alone’: Trump lashes out amid inquiry
Trump tries again, publicly recommends Ukraine and China investigate the Bidens
Trump grows emotional as impeachment takes aggressive steps ahead
MaddowBlog: Report implicates VP Pence in intensifying Trump scandal
Analysis: As impeachment war turns hot, Trump sounds partisan rallying cry
There is ‘clear obstruction’ from Trump admin.: Rep. Max Rose on supporting
impeachment inquiry
Trump, GOP accuse Schiff of orchestrating whistleblower complaint (...)
I’m about 1/3 down the page. I give up. You get the point. (You’re also told that if you want to “Keep up with the fast-developing impeachment story… Subscribe to the MSNBC Daily newsletter”) There are a few news stories on MSNBC unrelated to Trump. (There is, for example, a piece of climate change news: “Watch London climate change protest involving 1,800 liters of fake blood go horribly wrong.”) But for the most part, it’s utterly obsessed with the latest micro-developments in the plot of the Trump Show.
Ok, before we go any further: I am not saying that an impeachment inquiry into the President of the United States is not important. I am less concerned, however, with what Rep. Slotkin from Michigan’s 8th Congressional District thinks, or with whether Trump violated Nickelback’s copyright on Twitter. Certainly, since I hadn’t heard about half the things Joe told me about, I rather wish our news organizations had spent a bit more time on what states are doing about payday loans and fracking and a bit less time on what Donald Trump did or did not tell the president of Ukraine.
It somewhat frightens me when I realize how many people watch and enjoy MSNBC, because it shows just how distracted people are getting from what are fairly obviously the most important issues in the world: climate catastrophe, the increasing power of the plutocracy, the threat of nuclear armageddon, the 2 million people in our prisons and the tens of thousands committing suicide each year. These are, to be sure, extremely depressing, and watching Trump is like watching an insane alternate universe version of The West Wing where everybody is pure evil and has a screw loose. Hard not to want to stay glued to that. I understand why MSNBC, as a profit-seeking company, has chosen to focus on this bullshit rather than all the depressing stuff no one wants to hear about.
This is, of course, why I love Bernie Sanders so much. He has a way of hyperfocusing on what matters: people’s medical bills, the need for a Green New Deal, the rebuilding of the labor movement. He has this very satisfying contempt for issues that do not directly affect the conditions of working people’s lives. Yes, impeach the president, but can we talk about Medicare For All?
The alternative to this is something that vaguely resembles politics but is more like the internal drama of a royal court. Read this incredible New York Times profile of Rachel Maddow and you’ll see what I mean. It details how Maddow has become obsessed with Trump, and how her audience has grown and in turn become obsessed with her. (And I do mean obsessed with her. The profile includes a description of one fan who “had a Maddow-themed birthday party, at which her friends and her two young sons put on big black glasses and slicked their hair to the side. Also in attendance was a life-size cardboard cutout of Maddow, which is now in storage so as not to startle guests.”)
The profile describes how the Maddow show now devotes itself to the weaving of conspiratorial webs about Trump. Maddow “carries her viewers along on a wave of verbiage, delivering baroque soliloquies about the Russian state, Trump-administration corruption and American political history.” In the show’s office, “on the wall is a poster of ‘Trump Organization Projects and Partners,’ over which has been tacked the image of Carrie Mathison, the Homeland C.I.A. officer known for her paranoid conspiracy walls and unhinged (but often on-point) investigations.” In fact, Maddow is rather honest about where her interests lie and what kind of show she is doing: “I’m happy to admit that I’m obsessed with Russia. I realize it’s controversial, and people give me a lot of grief for focusing on it. But I make no apologies.”
Interestingly, the profile shows the degree to which Maddow has become a mirror-image version of FOX News, the only difference being that they are pro-Trump and she is anti-Trump.
by Nathan J. Robinson, Current Affairs | Read more:
Image: uncredited
[ed. See also: The Anatomy of MSNBC (Jacobin).]
