It's Time for Obama to Come Out fighting

by Norman Markowitz

There is a fine article by progressive critic Frank Rich in today's New York Times calling for Senator Obama to begin to go after John McCain.

That should be a no brainer. McCain represents an administration that even centrist analysts have put on the short list of the very worst in U.S. history. His militarism is unabashed. He hasn't a clue to the way a large majority of Americans live paycheck to paycheck on the installment plan. He is still "Johnny McCain" trying to prove to everyone that he is right and they are wrong and he can beat them in any game of chicken whoever they are, the Iranians, the North Koreans, the Russians.

Obama must lead in bringing the fight to McCain and the Republican right, throwing them back on their heels by making it clear over and over again that this election is about a chasm of inequality obscured by a mountain of public and consumer debt, a government which has literally sold out the American people to transnational corporations, banks and insurance companies, and military contractors--a government that has fought wars for oil and profit and is now putting up as its presidential candidate a man who is likely to fight wars for the hell of it.

This is the best way that Obama can challenge the racism that remains the Republicans ace in the hole--by pledging to the people that he is much closer in his values and aspirations, in the struggles that he has experienced in his life, than Bush or McCain or Cheney.

The nomination of Joe Biden, a traditional liberal Democrat is a good start. But Obama cannot make the mistake that John Kerry made four years--that is, letting the convention become an infomercial, and then waiting while Bush and the Republican Right took the initiative. He should use the convention to showcase the campaign, to appeal to the "righteous anger" of the millions who supported him in the primaries, win over the Clinton supporters who share much of that anger against the Republican Right, and go on the offensive until election day, regardless of media criticisms. Rich cites a study that 72% of media coverage of Obama has been negative, only 28% of the coverage positive, continuing a very old tradition, going back to the late 19th century, where the great majority of the press at first and when it came into existence the electronic media supported Republican presidential candidates over Democratic ones (with Roosevelt it was over 80 percent) and usually the more conservative of the candidates in primaries.

This is Obama's election to win; labor's election to win; all progressive groups election to win. But militancy along with flexibility is the path to victory, not compromise and consensus with a right wing political machine that has no respect for either and which views politics as search and destroy military exercises.

McCain Agrees With Questioner Who Calls for Military Draft

From ThinkProgress.org:

During a townhall meeting yesterday, an audience member asked a long-winded question that ended with a call to enact the military draft in order to “chase bin Laden to the gates of Hell.” McCain immediately replied, “I don’t disagree with anything you said.”

And apparently a heavily biased media is giving McCain a free pass on essentially either agreeing with a military draft or not have the mental alertness to express his real feelings on the matter.

Further, McCain has never been enthusiastic about pursuing Bin Laden anywhere, preferring in 2002 and 2003 to push for war in Iraq and to leave pursuit of the people responsible for the 9/11 terrorist attacks for another day.

See the video of McCain agreeing with the need for a draft;

Another not so scientific poll and "scientific evidence" of media bias for the GOP

by Norman Markowitz

First I spoke with a retired professor who is 88 years old, needs a walker to get around, and has nursing care. But he voted, and he voted for Obama.

He is an old socialist who voted when he was a young man for Norman Thomas. His view is that both Clinton and Obama are acceptable, but he considers Obama the better, more hopeful candidate. He is someone by the way who taught briefly in a Southern historically Black college shortly after WWII.

Meanwhile, there was an interesting story in the New York Time which mentions that John McCain is getting more coverage than either Clinton or Obama over the last week, even though they are among the two most interesting candidates in presidential history, in terms of media values (the first women and the first African American candidate who have serious chances to win a major presidential nomination and the presidency).

McCain over the last week received 37% of all news coverage on the Republican side of the election as against 34% and 32% for Obama and Clinton respectively. This from a scientific study by the Project for Excellence in Journalism, which has used traditional content analysis survey research methodologies to study dominant news stories since the beginning of 2007.

The study also showed that Rudy Giuliani, running as a candidate with many powerful supporters and very few voters, campaigning on the myth of his "leadership" during the September 11th attacks, got much more coverage in his withdrawal than John Edwards, a former Vice President running on a progressive anti-corporate, anti-poverty and pro labor program.

This should tell all those who don't already know that the rightwing's attack on the "liberal" media is as phony as the media fantasy that John McCain's candidacy is opposed by "conservatives."

The press and TV, especially Cable TV, are owned by the corporations and are as separate from the corporations and the rich as the Catholic and Orthodox Churches were from feudal Lords in the Middle Ages.

I guess they would say that they are being "objective" in giving McCain so much coverage, whereas they would also say that they were being "objective" in denying coverage to Kucinich, Edwards, Gravel, and others because of their low vote totals.

I would suggest that readers who are interested in looking at news analysis which comes from an honest and open pro labor and progressive perspective should read the People's Weekly World and Political Affairs, in print (important, because the publications need the subscriptions) and online. While this might sound and sort of is a commercial, it is a commercial for a press which is represents different class interests, not the press that Marc Blitzstein captured in his social realist opera, "The Cradle Will Rock," in the song that went "The Press, The Press, Freedom of the Press/for the One Who Pays the Best."

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