Time To Act

By now, you've no doubt noticed that we've had it with the corporate "mainstream media's" double standard in covering Hillary Clinton, embodied by the "Clinton Rules:"

1) Everything, no matter how ludicrous-sounding, is worthy of a full investigation by federal agencies, Congress, the "vast right-wing conspiracy," and mainstream media outlets. 

2) Every allegation, no matter how ludicrous, is believable until it can be proven completely and utterly false. And even then, it keeps a life of its own in the conservative media world. 

3) The media assumes that Clinton is acting in bad faith until there's hard evidence otherwise. 

4) Everything is newsworthy because the Clintons are the equivalent of America's royal family. 

5) Everything she does is fake and calculated for maximum political benefit.

For as long as the Clintons have been in the public eye, Republicans and their willing dupes in the media have been creating "scandals" and "controversies" and "perceptions" surrounding them. (Think Whitewater, Vince Foster, Filegate, etc.)  In recent years, we see it playing out with a vengeance in the Benghazi!!! , email server and Clinton Foundation nothingburgers.  With the transition of each of these from the right- wing noise machine into the "mainstream media," the desired effect of lowering the "trustworthiness" and "likeability" polling numbers of Hillary Clinton has occurred.  This process has been referred to as the right-wing "puke funnel," described by James Carville long ago.  A corollary is the "it's out there" rationale offered by Beltway sage Cokie Roberts as an excuse for "mainstream journalists" to catapult every piece of sh*t coming out of the puke funnel into our living rooms, because, "it's out there!"

Well, as "Howard Beale" put it,


Our brother blogger Tengrain at Mock Paper Scissors says it's time to take action, and we heartily agree. Go over and read his piece and then let your feelings be known about the media's smarmy contribution to the savaging of Hillary Clinton and the rise of neo- fascist Donald "Rump" Trump.  We're going to start with our local newspaper, the once great Washington Post Bezos Bugle, which has made a cottage industry out of pursuing "perceptions" surrounding the Clintons. Here's Tengrain's list of collaborators who need to hear from people about their puerile coverage:

NBC News
30 Rockefeller Plaza
New York, NY 10112

CBS News
524 West 57th St.
New York, NY 10019

ABC News
47 West 66th Street
New York, NY 10023

Copy on communication to networks:

Federal Communications Commission
445 12th Street, SW
Washington, DC 20554

Heading into the homestretch of the campaign, we need to make our voices heard. This is an existential election for what's left of American democracy.