My friend who writes Faithfool (link included below) wrote to me the other day, saying he keeps his blog tidy; short and sweet. A great idea. I'll emulate.
In Weekend Opinionator, a feature of the NYTimes, they conclude a poor review for Obama's ABC Health Care Special. With 4.7 million viewers, Obama had less than half the number of viewers of CSI: New York, rerunning itself on who knows how many channels. Pardon my french, but whoopty-shit - just because America the Beautiful are junked out TV zombies, that doesn't make 4.7 million a small number of people. I'd be much more worried if more Bill O'Reilly videos were us-Tubed during the same period.
However, in the same breath I have to say not every Obama article need be favorable. Personally, I remember him saying, "make me do it" (referring to reform) and so I'd be perfectly happy if every media bit about Obama included a heady critique or three of his policy making. That being said, the NYTimes puts crap in it's html when they call 4.7 million a flop.
If I were Aristotle, I'd analyze that rhetorical point - the NYTimes announces a 4,700,000 viewer TV special a "ratings loser" (which kind of sounds like a good Onion headline). I'd say, well, maybe instead of trying to say 4.7 mill is a ratings loser, they're really just professing the viewpoint that watching the President isn't very popular. Even if I weren't Aristotle I'd be able to see that if everything that's less popular than CSI: New York (and the few other shows that beat Obama for rating that night) then literally more than ninety-nine percent of TV sucks. I figured that out myself long ago, but with different reasons. Using a misleadingly simple analogy, like determining popularity by measuring it against CSI: Miami is what the Greeks liked to call fallacy.
If I were the media, I'd be worried about providing a reform oriented President hours worth of direct persuasion to swaths of the country at a go. After all, hailed as the second coming by Oprah the Baptist, there is no telling what all this President might do. Bush really warmed up the plate for him by putting all our hopes and anxieties into a packed stadium with a six year losing streak. So Status Quo stadium is a little dumpy right now but if more of us cheer for the home team, maybe our Congressional players will make enough runs to get us the pennant. Meanwhile, please don't believe the people who think a President talking to America on the TV is a bad thing. What would Bush have said for an hour? Maybe one of the great purposes to civilization creating things like leaders is so that the leader can unite the people just enough to escape the denizens of fear and folly. Of all the things that can destroy the financial well-being of the country, steeply rising health care costs is probably the most likely, most needless, and the hardest to explain and understand. Even if you disagree with him and the liberal conspiracy which is quickly transforming the younger generation into secular pragmatists of great hedonism and worldly conscience, even if you're afraid that the government will end the good thing we don't have going with health care, even if you are supremely confident that the newest CSI is a new eschelon of entertainment perfection and is the one thing your entire day's joy comes down to, I urge you to listen; if Obama speaks we should centrally process what he's saying. You can bring your gun to church if you don't like what he says - that'll show him.
As a post-script, it's worth mentioning that television does more harm to America than every jihadist in the world put together. If obesity were a spirituality, TV would be it's holy icon. If an informed electorate were a rubix cube, TV would be the cretin that beat the cube with a big hammer for outsmarting him. If TV were a religion, it would be the Baptist evangalism brought to you by Coke, Holy War, Falwell, and Bakker, but it's only pay per view if you believe in god.
