The Mother Robin and the Democratic Convention

N.B. Many of my political prejudices show here and since I'm heading toward my dotage, I get to take many tangents to express them.

The Democratic Convention in Denver is well under way at this point, and I watched some of it last night with the same kind of concentration lots of people devote to the Olympics.

I watched the Olympics for a while - the first week - but got tired of the same sports being featured (Beach Volley Ball and the scantily clad athletes? Too gruesome for words. Ann pretended to be really disgusted that the women who played BVB wore next to nothing and no doubt ended up with sand in unspeakable places, but the men who played BVB wore long shirts that covered up their pecs, their abs and their deltoids, and long, floppy shorts that deprived her of the eye candy our President seemed to enjoy so much as he awarded the female players with pats on the ass. The thought makes me shudder.) I would have thought, at least from the network coverage, that about two hundred people total participated in the Olympics - in addition to the million plus Chinese volunteers who spent a year making sure the Olympics went well.

So I learned from the Olympics and watched the Democratic Convention on C-SPAN. It offered complete coverage with no comment from so-called experts, at least during the convention sessions themselves. Early this morning when I tuned in briefly, the commentators on C-SPAN were interviewing people from all over the country about whom they would vote for: Obama or McCain - and why - especially in regard to the Clinton supporters who are re-focusing their loyalty, sometimes to McCain.

I heartily endorse the idea that the "common people" should have a voice, but it seems to me that the primaries and state caucuses are the forum to express their support for candidates. In February I hobbled over to the local school to vote in the primary after I broke my ankle, and rather than break more bones, I asked the election officials to haul a voting machine up to the landing of the stairs in accordance with federal handicap guidelines. Anyway, it seems to me that too many slack jawed yokels have opinions based on their emotional reactions to McCain's POW status, or their one-issue litmus tests (Abortion, Immigration, Censorship, or the Briefs/Boxers/Depends debate) rather than a broad examination of the issues and the candidates' stands on them.

I recorded one of the network's prime time programs of the Convention on our DVR. I was appalled first that the networks made America's Got Talent and Two and A Half Men (both no doubt part of the current administration's diet of bread and circuses) a priority over the nomination of the candidates for president. I was taken aback that for the single hour the Convention was broadcast, the regular number of commercials reduced actual coverage to about 40 minutes.

I was more disgusted with the coverage itself, however. Rather than showing the Convention, the talking heads commented on it. This speech was to the point. That tribute covered all the bases.

I am sick to death of being treated by the media as if I am too stupid to do my own thinking. I can watch Michelle Obama's speech and make my own judgments about it without being told what to think by so-called experts who pretend to be smarter than I am. I can watch the tribute to Ted Kennedy and realize that it is a beautifully done propaganda piece, not that the network I watched showed more than a few highlights.

Propaganda is not bad, it merely puts the best face on things. I knew when I was being emotionally manipulated - and I permitted it because Ted Kennedy is dying of brain cancer. And because he has done more things I admire than things I don't. And because his family has made more sacrifices in the name of public service than most I can think of.

On C-SPAN I watched Emil Jones, Illinois Senate Democratic Leader, mouth platitudes and fail to mention that he is retiring and has slated his son to take over his seat in an act beyond nepotism and into primogeniture. On C-SPAN I watched the leaders of the National Education Association and American Federation of Teachers speak about education and agreed with most of what they had to say about involving teachers in educational goals - instead of lawyers who somehow get elected to office and then think all teachers have to do is stand in front of a group of students and talk off the cuff.

On C-SPAN I watched Jesse Jackson, Jr. speak about his association with Barack Obama. He's my federal Congressman, and I enjoyed noting that he's listed as from both Chicago and Homewood, the village where I live.

On the national network, those people got short shrift or none at all. Instead, the talking heads talked to other heads about the speeches - if they mentioned them at all - and filtered those comments through their own prejudices. Just as I filtered my analysis of Emil Jones in the earlier paragraph.

Barack Obama has been accused by the Republicans of elitism. And the media have given his "elitism" a lot of play, at the same time they report on how many houses McCain owns or thinks he owns. It is the media that are elitist, however. They seem to believe that they can take in all the information, all the nuances, all the events at the Democratic Convention - and I'm sure at the Republican Convention coming up - chew them up, digest them for me and 300 million other Americans, and then, like the mother robin, vomit them into my waiting mouth. They seem to believe that they are without bias and reporting straight. They aren't.

I'm smart enough to make up my own mind about candidates and the people who support them. And until the current administration started testing all students on facts instead of the ability to think, so were most Americans.

As always I welcome your comments. Click on comments below to express them.