Poliblogging
You know you've been reading too many political blogs when you mis-read Ben's
A kid coming past on a bike said the fire was in Ngahaire Street, which puts it pretty close to Dean's Bush. Here's hoping that no-one is hurt and it's all under control.as a reference to two American persidential candidates. [Oh, and I do believe it's Ngahere Street, which was always a bit of a joke].
I spent large parts of Wednesday following up on the
New Hampshire Primary. I wasn't too pleased with the result, although the strange support for the Democrat candidates in the Republican primary was rather amusing. (GWB did gather a few votes in the Democratic one too).
Now I'm pretty much a complete political neophyte. So I don't really know how it all goes down, furthermore I''m isolated back here in little old NZ, so we don't really get the full media treatment, so I have to follow it all on the internet, where it become a little bit like an addiction because there's always, something more to read about some one, or another analysis of what's happening.
Mediocracy
Anyway, the one conclusion I can reach out of all this is that it sucks. I was going to say the american political system was broken, but I guess that isn't really true, what is wrong is that the media in a american has gone from reporting on events, to shaping them. In a strange and twisted way, it no longer matters what you say it, or even how you say it, but rather on how the TV networks spin what you say, and what agenda they're trying to push. Now that scares me, because there is already too much pandering to Special Interests Groups in american politiics wiith out the public becoming the unwitting tool of the media moguls.
Of course, there is a way out of all this. People could switch off there TVs, or just watch the actual debates. They could go and find out what the candidates actually stand for, and what they've actually done in the past. They could wake up and actively participate in the discussion. Now I know that's hard to do, I rarely do it myself, but perhaps it needs doing to save the world from another four dreary years of BushCo.
Now part of this, is a reaction to the extraordinary campaign of Howard Dean, which has tried to revolutionise the political process. I'd like to make more comments on this, but tat the moment the campaign's spinning out of control, and it appears that there is no consensus on the net, on what's quite up with it. In any case, it would have been an uphill battle for them to win the Democratic nomination. Now that's a shame because Dean appeared to be the only candidate perpared to make real change to the way things are in America.
For more, check these articles
Right, I was going to talk about some other stuff. But I really should do some work.