DRUM IT IN OUR HEADS ~ CHRIS WALLACE USING HIS BULLY PULPIT

MY OPINION
The United States of America MEDIA is spinning, not reporting. The cable "news" outlets have set the agenda this last week. It has not been a "service" to the election process, but a distorted view driven by claims that they know what we should know in order to judge Barack Obama as a man, as a Presidential candidate.

Drip, drip, drip of the same video is influential. The story wasn't just told, but drilled and then drilled some more into our consciousness. This drip, drip, drip pattern is crushing because it is so easy to tap into stereoptypes, so easy to tap into our unresolved issues or fears. We’ve seen this media control before. OJ Simpson, Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinsky, etc ~ until saturation is saturated. I was watching 3 hours a night of MSNBC during this campaign. But no more. I feel saturated and have lost faith in the media to be fair and see spin that is driving what is presented in a news "show".

When I was going into my freshman year of college in 1967 and I was required to read a book in the summer. The book was The Medium is the Message by Marshall McLuhan.

"’The medium is the message’ is a phrase coined by Marshall McLuhan meaning that the form of a medium imbeds itself in the message, creating a symbiotic relationship by which the medium influences how the message is perceived, creating subtle change over time. The phrase was introduced in his most widely known book, Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man, published in 1964. McLuhan proposes that media themselves, not the content they carry, should be the focus of study; he said that a medium affects the society in which it plays a role not only by the content delivered over the medium, but by the characteristics of the medium itself.

He pointed to the light bulb as a clear demonstration of this concept. A light bulb does not have content in the way that a newspaper has articles or a television has programs, yet it is a medium that has a social effect; that is, a light bulb enables people to create spaces during nighttime that would otherwise be enveloped by darkness. He describes the light bulb as a medium without any content. McLuhan states that ‘a light bulb creates an environment by its mere presence.’ Likewise, the message of a newscast about a heinous crime may be less the individual news story itself — the content — and more the change in public attitude towards crime that the newscast engenders by the fact that such crimes are in effect being brought into the home to watch over dinner…”
Link: The medium is the message

I have friends who think the Jews should stop talking about the holocaust because it is "in the past". It is easy for some segments of white people in the United States of America to say that there should be no more talk about bigotry because they say it is over. Only a white person could say that. Only a white person from some mentalities of a lack of understanding and lack of knowledge of the comprehensive history of this country. Comprehensive means including all peoples' stories. Not just the European history. But also the blacks, including the slavery history. Also, the indigenous peoples who had their lands and culture stolen from them. Also, the Mexicans. Also, Asians.

My history books in my formal education never mentioned the stories of the blacks, the indigenous, the Mexicans, Asians. To this day, we don't hold the importance of stories and history of the blacks, indigenous, Mexicans, Asians ~ EQUAL to the European immigrants' stories.

The Declaration of Independence's fourth paragraph from the end speaks of the indigenous peoples with disdain and untruthfully. No attempt was evident to see the story from the indigenous peoples' viewpoint. Foreigners took over their land, forbade them to speak their own language and wear their hair as culturally accepted, removed their children from their families and communities and apparently this was okay to the signers of the document. Imagine if some group of people did it to us today.

We haven't begun to address our bigotry. What is going on now is proof of that. Scratch the surface of what is thought to be so RIGHT that there is no other view that can be right and you have the roots of bigotry. What Pastor Jeremiah Wright said may sound wrong to your ears. But to someone else the perception may be:
* allowed to at least be seen
* acknowledged where he is coming from
* why he would have his opinions

I was raised with firey sermons in the white fundamental Church of God based in Anderson, Indiana. And what I heard, at times, would not have played well on Fox news either. Even what I heard in the Presbyterian Church where I was the Youth Choir Director, in Huntington, Indiana, the minister quietly said things that were very offensive to me as a female.

I stand with Barack Obama as my candidate for President because I believe he is authentically who his behavior says he is, who he says he is, who his campaigning behavior and style has shown he is.

Reverend Wright is not Barack Obama. And Barack Obama is not Reverend Wright.

Separation of Church and State
We can hope that State is separate from Church. But it seems it has been drummed into our heads by the media, that what a pastor says must be used to judge Senator Obama. And it has been drummed into our heads that Pastor Wright is totally wrong on all counts. My drum is rebelling.

Chris Wallace of Fox “news” proved to me on this past Sunday when he interviewed Chris Dodd (Obama supporter) and Charles Schumer (Clinton supporter) that he believes that his opinoin is the standard. And America has had it's collective drum beat and beat. After he couldn’t get either Senator to agree with him about Senator Obama and Reverend Wright, he ignored them, went on to tell why he believed they were both wrong and gave us his view of how awful Senator Obama is. This proves Marshall McLuhan’s “the medium is the message” ~ Chris Wallace became the story in my mind. He thought his truth was THE Truth. For me, this was wrong. Chris Wallace was the bully pulpit.

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Barack Obama’s speech March 18, 2008
This was a historical speech, whether or not Senator Barack Obama becomes the Democratic Presidential candidate in 2008.

The World is Watching.

My post below is the text of Barack Obama's speech as prepared for delivery.

P.S. Sometimes We Are Wrong, But
Wrong to criticize the United States of Amercia no matter what

THIS IS OPINION

OBAMA FOR PRESIDENT