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SOMETHING SMELLS ROTTEN IN DENMARK….

With an even worse smell from US right wing nut country….

By now it should be pretty clear that Chicago had zero chance of being the winning city for the 2016 Olympics. Whatever political skills the Chicago contingent had, they fell far short of understanding the politics of the IOC and its relationship with the US Olympic committee After all, there’s more than a small difference between getting some local zoning changed to benefit a builder or some other clout heavy contractor and persuading Sergey Bubka of the Ukraine or Princess Haya Bin Al Hussein of the United Arab Emirates to vote for Chicago, even if the latter shares part of her name with that of the President of the United Sates. The decision was probably made before anyone from Chicago set foot in Copenhagen and the failure was in us not understanding that.

None of this however was of interest to the conservative nut case wing of the Republican party. For their membership, it was a time for great celebration and for blaming Chicago’s failure on Barrack Obama. No question about it. It was Obama’s inability to "close the deal" that bore the ultimate responsibility for Rio’s triumph and that was a good reason for the nut cases to celebrate. Just as the lefties cheered and danced in the streets when New York lost ITS bid for the 2012 Olympics, blaming it all on Gorge W Bush for only sending a videotape instead of making a personal appeal.. Except that of course it didn’t happen. The reaction from just about everyone was one of sympathy for New York’s losing bid - which of course was a USA bid. And after the loss, Bush expressed total support for Chicago’s bid for 2016. Except of course, no one knew that an African American would be president when the selection was made in 2009.

Liberals are quite capable of hypocrisy - but not at the level of Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck and Sean Hannity and the news room crew at the Weekly Standard. To them, anything that could be viewed as a setback for the United States is a victory in the battle to bring down the President of the United States, the legitimacy of whom they do not accept. It’s getting very close to the point where the question has to be asked, where is the line between free speech and sedition? But the blame for the non stop garbage being spilled by Obama hating write wing nuts is not theirs alone. Without radio station and network ownership willing to provide the opportunity for them to spread their messages of hatred and misinformation and sponsors to provide the financial revenues to keep them on the air, none of this would be happening - and you have to ask the second question - why? Why do radio stations and Fox Network and to a lesser extent CNN, keep these people on the air? And why do major corporations continue to sponsor them? And the answer of course is greed.

Sponsors know that there at a great many people who watch and listen to these right wing crazies and that they believe what they are told by Limbaugh et al. Large numbers of them believe that only through Fox News and the radio stations that carry the ‘LETALS ’ - Limbaugh et al crew - do they get the real - unfiltered news - as opposed to what they may hear from ABC, CBS and NBC. They really believe it - and I am relatively sure that the conclusion of ad agencies and ad people at major corporations is that if large numbers of people believe anything that Limbaugh or Beck or Savage says - then they are likely to believe any message that an advertiser places within the body of their programs.

I know that after Glenn Beck said that President Obama has a deep seated hatred for white people, dozens of sponsors withdrew from his program but the last time I checked, Fox still had plenty of companies advertising on its network and there was no sign of them canceling or even trying to restrain Mr. Beck - and I would be willing to bet that it won’t be that long before sponsors start to pick up availability’s in his program. There are responsible corporations out there that are not solely motivated by the almighty dollar and would not support someone as irresponsible as Beck with their advertising dollars - or if they did and then discovered what kind of garbage he spewed over the airways daily, would withdraw and not resume their support. But I fear that that kind of corporation is in the minority

People can boycott the sponsors of these irresponsible - and in my view downright dangerous right wing programs - but as long as the programs can demonstrate large audience numbers - numbers much larger than known or perceived boycotters, there’ll be plenty of sponsorship available - enough to enable Rush Limbaugh to make an offer to buy an NFL team!!

What do you think this all says about our wonderful capitalistic system? I think it says something on a par with the current stance of the Republican Party which is "party first and America last" - as witness their celebration over the loss of the 2016 Olympic games which they figure could reflect badly on Obama. I think our capitalists system is one that puts money first and people somewhere down the line. Witness the millions being spent by the country’s medical insurance companies in their efforts keep making the billions of profits they rake in every year and even increase those profits if they are successful in their support of legislation that would force every American to buy health insurance - instead of supporting efforts to create a system that would guarantee every American access to health care without the ever looming threat of financial ruin. Something akin to what every other industrial country in the world has had for decades - systems that our health care corporations, with the aid of bought and paid for politicians - demonize in their insatiable quest for the almighty dollar.

So the next time you’re thinking of buying a Select Comfort bed or booking a flight through Hotwire.com, remember that you’re endorsing the hatred of "Barrack the Magic Negro" as Rush Limbaugh calls the President of the United States.
posted by Jeff Smith at 10/08/2009 04:39:00 PM