Elizabeth Edwards: "The Cliff Notes of the news"

“Did you, for example, ever know a single fact about Joe Biden’s health care plan? … But let me guess, you know Barack Obama’s bowling score.”

Ouch!

You go there, Elizabeth, you go girl!

Man, something like this today has the thought creeping into your mind that, maybe, the wrong Edwards was running for President.

We speak of Elizabeth Edwards' NYT Op-Ed, "Bowling 1, Health Care 0"

Mrs. Edwards rips into the MSM, for covering the silly, the pap, and not being the beacon bulldogs of a robust democracy.

Why? Here’s my guess: The vigorous press that was deemed an essential part of democracy at our country’s inception is now consigned to smaller venues, to the Internet and, in the mainstream media, to occasional articles. I am not suggesting that every journalist for a mainstream media outlet is neglecting his or her duties to the public. And I know that serious newspapers and magazines run analytical articles, and public television broadcasts longer, more probing segments.

But I am saying that every analysis that is shortened, every corner that is cut, moves us further away from the truth until what is left is the Cliffs Notes of the news, or what I call strobe-light journalism, in which the outlines are accurate enough but we cannot really see the whole picture.

She laments that lack-of-coverage for all the candidates, people like Joe Biden and Chris Dodd, whose good policy plans went, virtually, unnoticed.

Or, as she questions "who decided that Fred Thompson was a serious candidate."

I’m not the only one who noticed this shallow news coverage. A report by the Project for Excellence in Journalism and the Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy found that during the early months of the 2008 presidential campaign, 63 percent of the campaign stories focused on political strategy while only 15 percent discussed the candidates’ ideas and proposals.

Watching the campaign unfold, I saw how the press gravitated toward a narrative template for the campaign, searching out characters as if for a novel: on one side, a self-described 9/11 hero with a colorful personal life, a former senator who had played a president in the movies, a genuine war hero with a stunning wife and an intriguing temperament, and a handsome governor with a beautiful family and a high school sweetheart as his bride. And on the other side, a senator who had been first lady, a young African-American senator with an Ivy League diploma, a Hispanic governor with a self-deprecating sense of humor and even a former senator from the South standing loyally beside his ill wife. Issues that could make a difference in the lives of Americans didn’t fit into the narrative template and, therefore, took a back seat to these superficialities.

The essay is on-the-money and a good read.

And it has generated (for the most part; There's a few in the RWFS out there dissing it) good kudos.

Kevin Hayden: Strobe-light journalism: the ADD of campaign 2008

Bang The Drum: Elizabeth Edwards, I’d Vote for YOU

Mark Halperin: Elizabeth Edwards Points Finger at News Media

Take some time and read Elizabeth Edwards' "Bowling 1, Health Care 0"

For The Congress Today, A New Song - Bush's Place (Or C-Jam Blues)

We tried to help them, when they took over back in January, pumping them up with an anthem.

However, it appears that our Congress, and in particular, the Democratic Leadership, is tone-deaf.

We had to strongly urge Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi to go table shopping... He had to attempt to wake them up from their nap... We came out and called like it was - Hypocrites, The Bunch of Them!

And yet, astoundingly, with a sitting president sitting down at Nixonian levels of popularity, the Congress, and, again as we pointed out, the Democrats, still are holding their regular meetings of The Blank Check Club.

Rather then make him sit there, in all his resplendent relevancy, they cave... They cower and shrink and cave.

The New York Times had an editorial about it today ...

We have to call on the First Lady of Jazz, Ms. Ella Fitzgerald, to take us out of the week

Snap your fingers and tap your toes (Well, musically, not that other way) to "Bush's Place (also known as C-Jam Blues - you decide what the "C" should be for).

Bush's Place

Baby! take me down to Bush’s Place,
Softest Congress in town is Bush’s Place
Love that crying sound in Bush’s Place.
Republican Minorities do their tricks in Bush’s Place,
Idaho Senators swing their dicks in Bush’s Place
Come on! Get your bills passed in Bush’s Place!

You find yourself a threat, and when you want to met,
you look around and yell, “Terrorist!”
They fill your bill chock full of amnesty and shrink up
You’re jetting along with your Condi
It’s late second term, but baby, it’s still early!
If you’ve never been to Bush’s Place,
Take your bills into Bush’s Place
You'll get what you want in Bush’s Place

Bonus Links

Listen To A Clip of Ella Fitzgerald, with Duke Ellington, Sing "Duke's Place"

Senator Chris Dodd: The Military Commissions Act. Warrantless wiretapping. Shredding of Habeas Corpus. Torture. Extraordinary Rendition. Secret Prisons. No more.

Glenn Greenwald: AT&T, other telecoms, buy victory in lawsuits

Digby: Five Card Dud