I have long advocated that Democrats and progressives refrain from appearing on Fox News (see Starve the Beast). To some extent that advice has been heeded and many prominent Democrats are staying away or curtailing their visits.
Consequently, Fox has had to fabricate their own version of Democrats and they have created them in their own image. They start by wrangling has-beens who are probably desperate for attention and then promise them airtime and the respect of Fox viewers who love to hear bad things about Democrats, especially from reputed Democrats.
Tonight’s analysis of the primary in Pennsylvania provides a good example of this. On Greta Van Susteren’s show, “Democratic” pollster Doug Schoen appeared to offer this cretinous take on Joe Sestak’s victory over Arlen Specter:
Van Susteren: This Specter loss is a huge shift, is it not?
Schoen: Absolutely Greta. This is an anti-Washington, probably anti-Obama vote that makes clear that incumbency and being a Washington insider or a political insider is just not good.
Van Susteren: So what does it mean? I mean you have Sen.Bennett losing a few weeks ago. So is it anti-Washington or anti-Democrat?
Schoen: It’s both. I mean there’s clearly anti-Washington sentiment. On the Republican side it’s the Tea Party movement. On the Democratic side it’s more liberal anti-systemic sentiment. In November I think what we’re going to see is anti-Democratic sentiment because the Democrats control the executive branch and congress but there’s a lot of anger on both sides of the aisle, that’s for sure.
Where does Schoen get the idea that Sestak’s win is anti-Obama? The President and the Democratic establishment in Pennsylvania only backed Specter out of loyalty for his having switched parties. But Sestak ran as an Obama Democrat pledging to support health care, financial regulation, job creation, energy reform, and other White House initiatives. He was not against the President by any stretch of the imagination, and the White House will surely support him in the general election in November.
The vote for Sestak was an affirmation of Democratic principles, not a repudiation. Pennsylvanians were not interested in giving Specter, a Republican senator for over thirty years, another term based on his decades of support for the GOP. They had a real Democrat to vote for in Sestak, so they did. But somehow Schoen took that to be an anti-Obama, anti-Democrat position. And he added a warning that Democrats had better “move to the center” or they will “pay a huge, huge, price in the midterm election.” That advice is as bad as his election analysis.
Another Fox News Dem, Pat Caddell, delivered an opinion that was so harebrained that Rush Limbaugh quoted it:
“The Democratic Party is purging the Democrats. A lot of it is just anger, and this is anti-establishment. […] We have never had, in my experience of studying alienation – I started when I was 20 years old in polling, 19 in doing national politics, and I want to tell you: Never have I seen anger as great as it is.”
Wrong again. As I noted above, Spector’s loss was the purging of a Republican who had flipped to the Dems in a cynical attempt to retain his seat. And how can Caddell, who is 60 years old, say that he has never seen anger like this? If he was 20 when he started out, then he went through the Vietnam years and Watergate, as well as the Clinton impeachment. Does he really think that Tea Baggers are more angry than anti-war protesters or civil rights marchers were?
The truth is that Schoen and Caddell have been wrong for a long time. They co-authored an op-ed for the Washington Post in February that concluded with an ominous warning for Democrats:
“Unless the Democrats fundamentally change their approach, they will produce not just a march of folly but also run the risk of unmitigated disaster in November. “
Well, to the extent that the primaries held today represent a preview of November, Schoen and Caddell have completely missed the boat. Sestak’s win is a win for Democratic principles and gives Pennsylvania Dems a better chance at winning in November. And Jack Conway’s victory in Kentucky, and Bill Halter forcing Blanche Lincoln into a runoff in Arkansas, are further repudiations of the Schoen-Caddell cabal.
Schoen’s and Caddell’s careers consist almost entirely of repeated appearances on Fox. They frequently show up on Cavuto and Beck, and recently appeared together on Hannity’s show. They seem to have discovered that they can make a couple of bucks by pretending to be Democrats and advising the party to be more like Republicans. Their advice, however, has proven to be wrong time and time again. So the only thing stupider than the advice these phonies peddle would be for any Democrat to take it.
Just goes to show “if the money is good”…even the Vatican has hired a court Jew to validate the sainthood of Pius xii. Hitlers pope. The lesson on tonights voting is Murtha’s old seat the dem won by running on local issues whereas his goper opponent was going to right the wrongs of the userper leader. Yea guys, I’m shaking in my boots about November when the baggerites take over the earth.
You are so right here. And it kills me. My grandmother was actually saying that Fox news was so fair and balanced as it always had Democrats, and my response was, yea I have seen those Democrats. Nothing on Fox news is balanced!
Fox News balances the right with the far-right. They are constantly on the lookout for Dems who will bash Dems. That really blew up in their face when Glenn Beck booked former Congressman Eric Massa for the full hour. That was a hoot.
As I recall Mr. Beck did indeed admitt and apoligize for wasting our time once he realized Mr. Massa was not genuine. The question that now must be asked as this is about FAIR and BALANCED is why didn’t you mention that fact also?
Beck should apologize for wasting our time every day.
The reason I didn’t mention it is because it is irrelevant to my point, which was that Beck ran as fast as he could to snag a Democrat that he thought would bash other Dems. That was his goal. Just because he was stupid enough to have gotten it completely wrong doesn’t change what his intention was.
If you really think Beck wastes your time everyday, you’re quite simply, a moron. I can categorically state you do not posses an understanding of the primary principles of this country beyond 3rd grade indoctrination and whatever you think you may have gotten from your demonstrably wasted time in education, you didn’t learn to “think” nor did you gain an education. But as Dr. and Professor Diane Ravitch states,
“Professors complain about students who arrive at college with strong convictions but not enough knowledge to argue persuasively for their beliefs…. Having opinions without knowledge is not of much value; not knowing the difference between them is a positive indicator of ignorance.”
Nice to see Ravitch’s comments proven true in the real world.
Wake up, learn your history, pull your head out of your ass before its handed to you. Find the real scholarship in these subjects and read and study rather than continuing to propagate the child’s view you were given by the most ignorant among us, our public school teachers. YOU must do the homework yourself, one cannot intuit these things. But you must start by learning to think, to think critically, with reason and intelligence, rather than conviction, passion and emotion; the dividing line between ignorance and stupidity.
Yes, your comment on Beck is but a clue to your childish ignorance and worldview. We’re all ignorant in one way or another; to the degree you refuse to fix this is but a “positive indicator” of simple stupidity.
Beck is the poster child for stupidity. His so-called lessons are filled with falsehoods. He perverts history to make his ridiculous points.
But thanks for including that quote by Prof. Ravitch regarding having the “knowledge to argue persuasively.” It perfectly defines the ignorance of Beck and comments like yours that don’t bother to address substantively a single point that I made. You just want to throw around insults about intelligence without any basis. That says more about you than me.
Your grandmother is far wiser than you dear child she is able to see beyound the political hype of the far left who are the true deceivers dressed up in opinion which is hardly fact!
With Democrats like these, who needs Republicans? Wait a minute ..
The analysis of this reporter is also slanted biased and without merit except that it is his own opinion that he has drawn from the events. I live in PA and Sestak’s win over Spector was a repudiation against Obama’s agenda as well. Remember who was supporting Spector, unions, local newspapers and the administration. Having said that will Sestak fall in democratic line. Yep no doubt about it. (Should he win).
I notice that you totally failed to support you claim with any facts. Sestak has always been a supporter of Obama. The Democratic establishment threw their support to Spector as a reward for switching parties. But the President is fully behind Sestak now that the primary is over.
I fail to understand how people ever really thought that Democratic voters would line up to vote for Spector. Liberals have long memories. We remember, for instance, what a schmuck Phil was during the Anita Hill hearings, and before that his bogus “magic bullet” theory advanced by the Warren Commission on the JFK assassination. If you ask me, Spector’s extended vacation is long over-due.
“Phil!”
I don’t care who you are-that’s funny!
LOL
If Specter had won the primary and then the general, he most likely would have gone back to his Joe LIEberman roots and stabbed the Dems in the back. Sestak, the real Democrat, won.
And with the economy coming around, thanks to Pres. Obama, things are improving for the Dems chances in November and beyond.
Constantly rooting for America to fail is your Constitutional right, but don’t be surprised when the rest of us “fair minded” folks rejoice in America’s ascention!