U.S. Senate
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(D) J. Hickenlooper*
(R) Somebody
80%
20%
Governor
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(D) Joe Neguse
(D) Phil Weiser
(D) Jena Griswold
60%
60%
40%↓
Att. General
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(D) M. Dougherty
(D) Alexis King
(D) Brian Mason
40%
40%
30%
Sec. of State
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(D) George Stern
(D) A. Gonzalez
(R) Sheri Davis
40%
40%
30%
State Treasurer
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(D) Brianna Titone
(R) Kevin Grantham
(D) Jerry DiTullio
60%
30%
20%
CO-01 (Denver)
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(D) Diana DeGette*
(R) Somebody
90%
2%
CO-02 (Boulder-ish)
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(D) Joe Neguse*
(R) Somebody
90%
2%
CO-03 (West & Southern CO)
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(R) Jeff Hurd*
(D) Somebody
80%
40%
CO-04 (Northeast-ish Colorado)
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(R) Lauren Boebert*
(D) Somebody
90%
10%
CO-05 (Colorado Springs)
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(R) Jeff Crank*
(D) Somebody
80%
20%
CO-06 (Aurora)
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(D) Jason Crow*
(R) Somebody
90%
10%
CO-07 (Jefferson County)
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(D) B. Pettersen*
(R) Somebody
90%
10%
CO-08 (Northern Colo.)
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(R) Gabe Evans*
(D) Yadira Caraveo
(D) Joe Salazar
50%
40%
40%
State Senate Majority
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DEMOCRATS
REPUBLICANS
80%
20%
State House Majority
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DEMOCRATS
REPUBLICANS
95%
5%
July 24, 2007 04:05 AM UTC
35 Comments
Look at what we have on the Dem side. Any of the 2nd tier candidates could beat any Repub. And the first tier? WOW!
Clinton/Obama – it’s a done deal. Very very impressive.
I wasn’t listening to an infomercial for Nerfballs? CNN should report this as a campaign contribution to the Democratic Party.
Except Fox
The Repubs are so used to having the networks parrot their talking points that they confuse independence with being pro-Democratic.
It was a good debate, there were some interesting questions, and AC did a good job of keeping the candidates on topic.
Face it, the Democratic candidates rock!
It sounds to me that any reporting of a conservative view point is considered “conservative slant”. Just how much does the media need to shut out Republicans to be “fair” enough in your book?
I just want their opinions labeled opinions and their lies labeled lies. Same for the Democrats. And roughly even time for both with the same treatment for both.
The media still leans Republican, mostly by repeating lies as facts. But they’re heading back toward the center.
The media are deeply conservative (and superficially liberal). They are owned and sponsored by capital interests, and driven by a pursuit of profit. The profit-motive is a highly conservative force for two reasons: 1) it creates a hunger for inexpensive “legitimate” information, which comes in the form of “information subsidies” from official sources. Since anything that comes out of the mouths of those already in power has a high degree of instant credibility (and is often objectified as “unnamed sources”), and whatever their critics have to say has to be legitimated by spectacular feats of organinzation before it is reported, the media appetitite for information subsidies is a highly conservative force. 2) Just as the traditional rush-to-the-center of two party politics is a conservative force (radical ideas are left off the table), a mass media trying to win as large an audience as possible is a conservative force. Particularly in the reporting of international affairs, and our role in them, the media’s need not to offend their customers means that they pander to nationalistic tendencies: Our media are a lot more like those nationalistically biased foreign media, whose transparent bias we clearly see and ridicule, than we realize. The american media tries, in effect, to offend as few of its customers as possible, reinforcing our own national biases in the process. In other words, the ethos of “objectivity” becomes, in practice, a search for the center of the american political spectrum, in order to appear as objective as possible, and to offend as few consumers of information as possible. But the center of any nation’s political spectrum is a conservative position from a global perspective, since nationalism is the cornerstone of conservative ideologies everywhere. And the center is a literally conservative position domestically in that it, by defintion, excludes radical ideas on both ends of the political spectrum.
Overlaying these deeply conservative (and well-documented) forces is the thin veneer of liberalism brushed on by the fact that the majority of journalists have liberal leanings themselves. However, they have bosses to whom they answer, and their liberal leanings are far outweighed by the conservative ownership, sponsorship, and market-processes that constrain them.
I’ve heard that line about corporate interest before-that can’t be the best defense against liberal biased you’ve got! So any business is inherently conservative because of corporate interests? Liberals automatically become conservatives when they run a business? That’s such bull, I don’t even know where to begin! Name me one major newpaper or network, other than the ones that are known to be conservative (like Fox or Wallstreet Journal) that have a conservative editor. Just name one.
There’s a reason why the fairness doctorine targets talk radio-because liberals already own most of the major news networks and newspapers. It’s because y’all already have them! There’s a reason why Fox and talk radio have an audience! Because y’all already have everything else, and people got tired of it.
Please tell me you have a better argument that the media ISN’T liberal other than corporate interests!
….are beyond absurd, Haners. You know that I respect a lot of your opinions, but this is beyond the pale of reality. All you have to do is look at our own RMN and Vincenet Caroll, knee jerk ideologue and corporatist. (To his credit, he has always taken time to respond to my critiques.)
The NYT and Wapo fully supported going to war in Iraq. Virtually every radio and TV station is owned by corporate interests. There is a direct correlation between, say, GE owning a station and the slant on the news. Don’t forget, slant is also done when news is not reported. Like a scene from an old Jimmy Durante movie, “Elephant? What elephant? I don’t see no elephant?”
The reason outfits like FAIR and Media Matters have so much fodder to report, is simply that it is there. Even if you lop off the weakest concerns, there is still a HUGE base of conservative misreporting and not reporting.
Even NPR has swung decidely rightward since 2003.
Sorry it seems so absurd, but from what I’ve seen it holds true. But I’ll let ya slide, you don’t have to respect me on this one. 🙂
Re-read my original post and you’ll find it: They’re called “information subsidies” (the preference for cheap information from official sources, as opposed to expensive investigative reporting), and pandering to your customers in a profit-driven business. Corporate ownership, as the emphasis in my original post should have made clear, is a peripheral contributor to media conservativism, not the central cause. But, the fact is, media scholarship is loaded with documented cases of corporate censorship of materials under their control, and overwhelmingly with a “capitalist” and nationalist bias (traditionally considered a conservative positions). For instance, the CEO of Simon and Schuster refused to publish a book by Noam Chomsky that was critical of American intervention in Central America, though his editor for that division had okayed the book, and the editor had been promised that his decisions would not be overruled by corporate headquarters. The editor resigned as a result. (I could look up the names of the CEO and editor, but the scenario itself is precisely accurate). This is just one of many examples.
Corporate sponsorship is even more important. When sponsors threaten to pull their ads, they are threatening the bread and butter of the industry. When it comes to ideological content, which end of the spectrum would you imagine is more offensive more often to more corporate sponsors? Again, the reality is well-documented.
How do I know that it is well documented? Media bias was the topic of my masters thesis, which had a 17 page bibliography.
There is a problem with the ambiguity of the words “conservative” and “liberal,” as my original post implied: The American political center is globally conservative, because America is a relatively conservative country (in comparison to other developed nations), and the center is literally conservative in a domestic sense, because it chokes out the non-main-stream ideologies (school voucher programs, for instance, are ideologically conservative, but literally non-conservative, because they are innovative and break from the tradition that would be “conserved” by conservativism). We use the words “conservative” and “liberal” primarily to delineate the domestic political ideological spectrum (which puts our use of the terms out of sinc with, say, European use of the same terms, though referring to the same spectrum: Their “conservatives” align more or less with our “liberals,” and their liberals occupy our radical left fringe). I have to admit that I’ve committed the cardinal sin of using the same terms in multiple ways in the same post, though I have tried to distinguish between them a bit by the adjectives “politically” and “literally”. In the case of the media, the bias favors both types of conservativism, often by the same mechanisms (the legitimacy gained by reinforcing status quo assumptions).
But, back to the argument: I did not just say “corporate ownership,” as your response pretends. Rather, I laid out the actual dynamics by which the deep conservative bias of the media plays out. But, hey, why place any stock in a detailed, documented analysis, when you can indignantly defend an arbitrary opinion instead?
Actually, that was a good response. I can at least see your point, which has been made better than others who have claimed the same thing. In all honesty and absent of all sarcasim, I would be interested in reading your thesis, if you wouldn’t mind.
Also, I apologize that I mis-understood your view to be framed around corporate ownership
I’ll see if I can dig the thesis up: I don’t have it stored electronically (I wrote it over 20 years ago), and actually would consider it an “immature” analysis at this point (as often happens after 20 years!). In it, I neglected a whole category of biases resulting from the demand for sensationalism that I would include if I wrote it now.
Oh yes, the media has been oh so good at asking Bush the hard questions, following up with tough investigations, doubting what comes out of the WH as the skeptical ‘fourth branch’ whoops ‘fifth branch’ of government.
Who was looking to win the dems primary in late 2003/early 2004? It was not Kerry. And with some relatively minor mistakes, the man who would be president tumbled.
As it is, I think that the dems will have to pay for the fact that they have not taken on the republicans. In fact, if I were the dems, I would fear the far liberal side of your house. I would not be surprised to see them do to the dems, what the neo-cons did to Poppa Bush in 1992 for having increased taxes to help balance the budget.
In the case of Bush I the wingnuts had clear control and were not open to discussing it. So he was their hostage.
In the case of us Dems there has been major open discussion across the board over the last 6 years. It’s been intense and we have our share of wingnuts.
But the moderate support is not hold your nose and accept Hillary because she can win. In fact, Kerrey taught us that we need to think through who we want and not go for the “most likely to win.”
There is not total agreement – we’re Democrats. But there is acceptance that we are going to disagree and work out compromises and find solutions between all of those opinions.
I think it makes us a very strong and healthy party.
So yep, starting to count the eggs 🙂
It’s just too early to assume that current trends will hold.
I’m beginning to come around to the idea that the Dems *are* going after the Republicans; they’re just doing it “by the book”. Tomorrow is Gonzo back before the Senate Judiciary Committee – and this time he had the most important questions delivered to him in advance so he couldn’t claim non-remembrance. Wednesday is contempt for White House Chief of Staff Josh Bolton and former White House Counsel Harriet Miers – statutory contempt in all likelihood, but that way no-one can claim that the Dems are shortcutting the process; they also might catch Bush, Gonzales, or the interim DC US Attorney in their net.
We also have the USFWS person in charge of endangered species caught manipulating data to deny protection, FEMA trying to hide from formaldehyde in trailers, most of the departments caught doing Hatch Act violations, the VA scandal, and so much more… It’s all coming out, and we’ve only had Democrats in the majority for 6 months.
The quick road to impeachment might be satisfying for as long as it doesn’t go to the Senate; the longer road might actually lead to an unprecedented impeachment conviction, assuming Bush doesn’t run away to Paraguay.
I think Pelosi & Reid will go down in History as brilliant politicians who saved the country. They’re doing an amazing job.
what does your mom think of all this? Surely she can not be too happy about it. Hopefully, she is not caught up in anything. And if you are uncomfortable saying anything, that is cool.
As I watch this, they are making it so that they clean house, but it appears to be cleaning it in such a way that the finale occurs in about 9 months :). However, they will still have to answer for a number of items. Throwing out the trash is easy, unless you are part of the trash:
Not only has the dems not cleaned house, but they are back to their old tricks. I noticed that when CNN asked for everybodies pet projects, that the dems were just as adept as the pubs at hiding it. In fact, a number of pubs had the balls to say no, while more pubs gave up their information. The dems were busy hiding universally by saying that they would send the info, but do not. The pubs will have more than their fair share of ammo to use on the dems because they did not uphold their word.
As to W. there are avenues that the dems do not seem to go after that WILL put W and his ilk in prison for a long time (Sibel Edmund’s and illegal wiretapping). I am guessing that this would also catch some dems so they are afraid to burn their own. But it needs to happen. The dems would truly clean house, if they would ungag Mrs. Edmund’s.
http://www.criticalm…
frank luntz is the best polster in the GOP IMO.
I think that African American support for Hillary has been solid because many do not “believe” obama can win because of the endemic soft racisism endemic in some politics. Luntz’s focus group seems to indicate that African Americans are starting to believe, that means trouble for Hillary.
CNN’s focus was also pro Obama, but not quite so much.
It surprised me because I thought Obama did OK (I thougt Biden was great, but I am a bit curmugdeonly), but the focus group thought he did great. SURVEYUSA put Hillary as the winner at 39%
We as political activists don’t always watch debates with the same eyes as the people they bring in to focus groups. There’s a lot of candidate bias in the online political forums already, so it’s good to see how the focus groups react.
I think one thing is certain: this race hasn’t even begun, and even the 2nd tier candidates could surprise us on the Democratic side this cycle.
I thought Obama’s knee jerk responses on promising to meet with world dictators his first year and being pro-nuclear energy development showed he is just not ready for prime time.
You first meet and greet your friends, then you meet your advisories (some would say that is both friends and enemies). I think that it is a good thing for the pres to meet these ppl and see if they want to calm issues.
As to pro-nuc’s and his pro alternative energy, I would say that he is look at long term issues such as global warming. Keep in mind, that everybody blames America for this, and expects us to do the most to solve this. We can not only solve it, but we can use it to increase our business.
In particular, the IFR can be re-started. Sadly, nearly every nuke business in the world is wanting to buy that tech and the site, and finish it. Hopefully, W. does not screw us on this before an intelligent person can take over. It needs to go to an American nuke company before they are all sold off. By allowing GA or GE (westinghouse was sold) to partake, they can have a new generation IV+/V reactor while everybody else is still playing with generation IV.
but blindly promising to meet with all of them in his first year, which he did, is just dumb. Who knows what will be going on the world then or where we will be at. Yes I think the US should start talking with them but Hillary was right you don’t just promise a high level meeting like that without knowing what you are getting into.
Ask the people of Yucca Mountain what they think nuke power?
is partially their fault. They wanted the research dollars there, so they fought for that. IOW, be careful what you wish for, you may get it.
With that said, Yucca mountain is occurring because we are doing nukes wrong. Keep in mind, that the material started out as Uranium and then is changed to plutonium (and other nuclear by-products). The reason why they have such long half-lives is because they have LOADS of energy left. Our current approach to nukes uses 1-2 % of the available energy. OTH, if we move to a reactor called the fast reactor, it will breed and then burn up the fuel. That is, we will be left with 1-2% of available energy. Poppa Bush started a project called the IFR (integral fast reactor). It was within 3 years of being finished and tests starting. Clinton killed due to a deal with Kerry (but clinton did not want it dead). If the next president is bright enough, they will finish this up. It will allow us to stop mining uranium (for American needs), as well as quit burying all the “spent” fuel. Basically, if clinton had allowed the IFR to continue, we would currently be building our first production system. It would be loaded with the “spent” fuel (as well as plutonium). Once loaded, you would run the plant for 100 years. If we replaced ALL of the coal plants today, and went back to a high growth energy curve (i.e. adding more IFRs and all the alternative that we can), we would have enough fuel to last America 100 years. Most importantly, it would be the cheapest form of energy that we have ever had. We would have a fraction of the fuel left over and ALL of it would be safe within 150 years after that. Interestingly, the IFR is a fail-safe machine. The only way for it to fail (i.e. blow-up or melt down etc,) would be to have all of our physics laws be incorrect or to have them suspended. Even if we all died, the system would shutdown on its own, due to laws of physics. That is safe.
The problem is not nukes. The problem is that we stopped progress.
response to imply that he wouldn’t insist on good groundwork being laid first. Clinton is a good, quick on her feet debater, saw an opportunity to go Obama one better by creating a difference out of nothing much and jumped on it in order to look more “presidential”. Obama’s speech ticks ARE annoying and DO make him sound less decisive. He’s going to have to get some help cleaning that up.
Of course if winning debates guaranteed winning elections we wouldn’t have the present moron-in-chief, would we? The man proved you can be elected even if you are rarely capable of putting together so much as a single coherent sentence. We shouldn’t get too carried away with the importance of debates compared to other factors.
Last night’s debate showed Dems are in tune with America, and once the GOP candidates get grilled by Youtube video people, they’ll show how out of touch they are and how much they dance around the issues and reject the pleas of average everyday people in favor of the Joe Nacchios of the world.
if the GOP really were on the planet mars, I would be voting for them. Sadly, they just funnel money to their buddies and accomplish little.
The Repubs answering questions from an animated gay snowman couple. That will be classic.