lol at Trump not caring about media narratives....that's all that clown cares about. "Are they using flowery language on me? No, well they're my mortal enemies now!"
Interestingly, the more negative things the Left says about Trump, the stronger the evidence the Left really does not understand why many on the Right support Trump in spite of his significant flaws. What does that say about the perceptual awareness of the Left? Could it be there are some policies and events associated with the Left, such as excessive and apparently coordinated riots, unpopular Critical Race Theory in schools, false accusations, false flag operations, sexualization of children, political weaponization of the justice department, fear of political weaponization of the IRS, high crimes rates, inflation, geopolitical incompetence involving Saudi Arabia, Iran, and China, wide open borders, acceleration of corpocracy, weak energy policies, and lack of transparency on monies spent in corrupt Ukraine are keeping Trump relevant? In other words, by some perspectives, the Left has created an environment where someone like Trump can get a foothold, if not thrive? Sort of like Putin effectively causing the expansion of NATO by invading Ukraine? We can argue about 2nd Amendment rights, abortion rights, trading a dangerous arms dealer for a convicted basketball player, alternative gender/sexual preference exceptionalism in the media, but the list in the preceding paragraph, probably incomplete as it is top of mind, seems pretty undeniably damning for the Left. If the Left seems toxic and the alternative seems less so, is it really that surprising to you that Trump and the Republican Party is able to retain some popularity? Who really are the ones duped? At least someone has expressed a desire to MAGA. A desire to make America great, again. That someone is Trump. Care to answer the following questions? 1. Is America great right now, why or why not? 2. Is improving the quality of live in America and her standing in the world a worthwhile goal? 3. What have Democrats done specifically to improve question #2?
Ok, you agree the media has narratives and even seem supportive of the media having narratives. What about the concept of We, the People deciding on our own what is real and who better represents our interests? Who should the media represent versus who does the media represent? For a healthy Democracy should not the media represent the interests of the people? All the people, regardless of political affiliation by allowing similar access? Does not the media actually support their advertisers? Advertisers representing large corporate interests and other politically powerful cabals who also have strong lobbying power? Is it not reasonable to conclude our media has a structural conflict of interest against the public and cannot be relied upon by us for unbiased coverage of information that can affect the interests of their advertisers? No matter how often a media characterization or narrative is repeated does not make it true, although it can increase the public acceptance of an idea, regardless. Further, deliberate omission of pertinent information by the media can be even more insidious in guiding public perception against their own interests. Yet we, myself included, still quote mainstream media as sources. Shame on us. Pissed off, yet?
The media has no right to represent anything but itself...that has been true since the founding of this country when newspapers were started that were Federalist and Anti-Federalist and published articles criticizing or supporting George Washington. That is the side effect of a free press. Anyone with an opinion can express it. Anyone with average intelligence can see the different between news reporting (3 killed in car wreck in I-95) and opinion (CNN and FOX between 8PM and 11PM). However the public has become lazy and social media has taken over so people dont care to lift a finger and simply tune in to the opinion that matches theirs so they can be told what to think.
insofar that the media keeps trying to come across as "neutral" instead of objective/factual, sure that's their narrative. Can't fault them if Trump sees them exposing his dirty laundry as them having an agenda.
Pro-Trump bots "using online manipulation techniques pioneered by the Kremlin"? No way. Thousands of pro-Trump bots are attacking DeSantis, Haley https://apnews.com/article/trump-de...ial-election-4d61487294f9218855b8e6e89f0c8ccc
Florida’s culture warriors suit up for battle https://www.cnn.com/2023/03/05/opin...lican-rivals-opinion-column-galant/index.html It was 10 years ago that “Florida Man” emerged as a buzzy Twitter account documenting outlandish headlines from the Sunshine State, but the meme can be traced back to the 1500s, during the days of Spanish explorer Juan Ponce de León’s supposed quest for the fountain of youth in Florida. In the Washington Post last year, Julio Capó Jr. and Tyler Gillespie tracked the origins of the meme through centuries of colonial and state history, and concluded, “The internet turned Florida Man into a Southern Gothic figure of indulgence, decadence and questionable decisions.” With the 2024 presidential campaign about to ramp up, Republicans are facing the prospect of having two Florida men as frontrunners. One is the former president, Donald Trump, who despite two impeachments and a sea of legal troubles, still retains a strong hold on the party’s base from his Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach and vowed Saturday at the Conservative Political Action Conference to be the agent of “retribution” on behalf of aggrieved voters. The other is the state’s culture-warring governor, Ron DeSantis, the so-far undeclared candidate who grew up on Florida’s Gulf Coast. He is talking up his new book and winning the support of many wealthy donors as early polls show he is the strongest Republican challenger to Trump. Trump has road-tested a variety of derogatory nicknames for DeSantis, while the governor has only pushed back obliquely. Yet within their party, Trump and DeSantis are aligned — and at the opposite end of the ideological spectrum from yet another Florida man, former Gov. Jeb Bush, who was the early leader of the Republican field for 2016. “In this environment, old-guard corporate Republicanism is not up to the task at hand,” DeSantis declares in his book, sounding a note that Trump could well agree with. The governor, fresh from his battle with Disney, implied that he is best suited to oppose “large, publicly traded corporations lining up behind leftist causes.” At CPAC, Trump said, the GOP is “never going back to the party of Paul Ryan, Karl Rove and Jeb Bush.” How did DeSantis rise to potentially challenge Trump? Justin Sayfie, a former adviser to Jeb Bush and partner at a lobbying firm, attributes “his rapid national ascent” to “the early pandemic in 2020 when he became a hero to millions for filling a vacuum of leadership at a time of global crisis and uncertainty.” “Vulnerable older adults in Florida witnessed how he prioritized their health and safety by prohibiting transfers of patients infected with the coronavirus from hospitals into long-term care facilities, unlike in New York,” Sayfie wrote. “Parents of Florida schoolchildren witnessed how he focused on keeping schools open, so students wouldn’t fall behind in their learning. Small-business owners witnessed how he battled to get and keep businesses open, so they and their employees could continue to feed their families during the pandemic.” And the flood of tourists to Florida took note. Moreover, DeSantis has a knack for picking issues that unite Republicans and divide Democrats, Sayfie observed. Reading the governor’s new book, Jay Parini noted that “everywhere … one senses his rage against political correctness. He rails, on nearly every page, about ‘the woke agenda’ that he sees permeating almost every level of life in America…” “The title of this book must surely be ironic: ‘The Courage to Be Free.’ DeSantis is all about the restriction of freedoms wherever possible. He wants to cancel librarians who allow kids to read certain Black or LGBTQ writers and to fire tenured professors in the state university system who teach ‘woke’ ideas. He wants to restrict the rights of women seeking abortions and those of LGBTQ people seeking to live their lives. He hopes to punish corporations, such as the Walt Disney Company, for criticizing his policies.” In Parini’s view, DeSantis is “a chilly man, with a heart of ice and — like so many politicians on both the right and left these days — full of resentments, grudges and the urge to destroy anyone who doesn’t agree with him. … I shudder to think what he might do if handed the presidential bully pulpit.” The first primaries won’t start until early next year, so there’s still plenty of time for GOP contenders from states other than Florida to jostle for the nomination.
Actually, it has only been the past decade or so the radical Left has been pushing alternative identities and sexual orientation upon minors through public schools in an apparent attempt at self-validation. The small, vocal, Radical Leftist group comprised of transsexuals and extremist homosexuals has been pushing the sexualization of children has been emboldened by the likes of CNN giving them a platform. CNN gives this group of degenerates a platform while under-covering masses of concerned mothers with children in public schools. Many of these mothers apparently feel they are more qualified as to content and timing of conversations related to sexuality than a gay and or transgender teacher. Anyone, including any member of the Biden Administration, the House, the Senate, the media, you gwb-trading, who does not speak out against the sexualization of children has lost their moral compass and is a willing enabler of an ideology than can lead from short to long term harm either through self-harm after post gender reassignment depression or through greater alternative lifestyle risks of drug addition and STDs. The intellectual prostitution of those who are willing to trade our children's health and happiness in hopes for political gain will continue as long as it remains viable to do so. It comes down to two simple questions: Are your children more important than a radical political ideology or not? Are you willing to speak out against those who are known to put their self-gratification ahead of their own safety over our children?
This is a classic example of a straw man argument to re-direct the topic. The overall topic of this thread is the battle between two culture war pundits who are likely to be the front runners in the 2024 Republican primary. Both Trump and DeSantis have a lot in common -- they both lie continuously, cover up government information outlining their misdeeds, put policies in place which kill tens of thousands of people (DeSantis' Covid policies in Florida are responsible for at least 40,000 of the 80,000 Covid deaths in the state), use tax dollars to push culture-war narratives for their base while failing to effectively govern, abuse the press/media, put unqualified cronies in government positions, publicly abuse anyone who attempts to hold them accountable, waste endless piles of government/donor money defending against justified lawsuits (which they lose), attack businesses (so much for limited government), despise education, plus an entire list of other common actions & traits. DeSantis is effectively Trump-light with a little less ranting and charisma.
Why stick with "Meatball Ron" when "High Heel Ron" is so readily available? Or maybe we should just call Ron "Shorty". Ron DeSantis Embraces the High Heel Don’t fall for the false boot binary. https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2023/03/ron-desantis-shoes-boots-high-heels.html One of the few reliable truths in electoral politics is that voters like tall presidents. The average U.S. president is about two inches taller than the average U.S. man, who is 5’9”. Recent presidents have skewed even larger: Every president since Jimmy Carter (5’9.5”) has been 5’11.5” or taller. We haven’t elected a president smaller than the average man in nearly 130 years, when short king William McKinley won his election. “We are a species that equates larger size with maturity, leadership and sex appeal,” wrote Jay Mathews in the Washington Post in 1999. “If we were like some insects, where adults are smaller than larvae, we might not think this way. But we do.” So it stands to reason that Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who is thirstily gunning for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination, would want to, let’s say, amplify his stature. Rumor has it that the governor is around 5’9”. His expected closest competitor in the GOP primary, Donald Trump, was, at 6’3”, our third-tallest president, a fact he repeats to himself five times in the mirror every morning before taking a deep, restorative breath and going on to face the day. And the man DeSantis would have to face in the general election, Joe Biden, clocked in at 6-foot-even at his 2023 physical. (Biden measured just 5 feet 11.65 inches in 2021, an enduring mystery that suggests either some kind of supernatural yoga practice or a White House physician with poor attention to detail.) Any height is a great height to be—there’s no wrong way to have a body, et cetera. But Republican primary voters are not exactly known for their body positivity. Knowing this, DeSantis has adopted a signature wardrobe trick to juice his stats: cowboy boots. Though Florida is not closely associated with rancher culture in our national mythology—and out of respect for Floridians, I will not attempt to name the things it is associated with—DeSantis has paired his suits with black cowboy boots for years. At Vanity Fair, Gabriel Sherman reports that DeSantis’ wife, Casey, bears responsibility for the accessory, which she recommended as a part of a broader glow-up after he won a seat in Congress. “She bought him these dumbass cowboy boots,” a former staffer told Sherman, “because she thought it was part of the image.” The image, one imagines, is that of a man 2 or so inches taller than DeSantis. Now, as DeSantis travels the country in preparation for his presidential bid and wages war on books and Disney in Florida, his leg-lengthening footwear is drawing greater scrutiny. The Lincoln Project recently tweeted a quip about the boots. Ron Filipkowski, a never-Trump Republican and former DeSantis appointee who resigned in protest after a state data scientist was allegedly fired for refusing to distort Florida’s COVID numbers, pointed out that DeSantis “must have had a growth spurt” to wind up looking the same size as 6’1” Tiger Woods in a February photo. Last week, a viral tweet wondered whether DeSantis’ shoes qualified as “high heels.” And a few weeks before that, the president of a Democratic Party–affiliated PAC that produces opposition research on Republicans tweeted a series of photos of DeSantis, writing that he “consistently wears high-heeled boots in order to appear taller.” Republican commentators mocked the tweet, accusing the Democrat of being out of touch with everyday American working-class footwear. “Tell me you’ve never seen cowboy boots without telling me,” read one such response. This line of argument establishes a false binary, with “high-heeled” boots on one side and “cowboy” boots on the other, when they are actually overlapping categories. The height of a cowboy boot heel can vary from shoe to shoe, but the existence of a heel is non-negotiable: It’s the thing that would hold one’s foot in the stirrup of the saddle, the raison d’être of the boot. (A cowboy boot would never cop to having a French-kissy raison d’être, so let’s call it a big-boy purpose.) Of course, not every cowboy boot is as high-heeled as the ones DeSantis wears. There are plenty of options with lower, squared-off heels, but DeSantis prefers a higher, slanted heel—the kind that’s better suited to riding horses. Since DeSantis was not riding a horse at any of the political events at which he was photographed wearing these boots, there is only one reason why he would choose them: because he likes the way it makes him look. The main thing it makes him look is taller. But conservatives are unwilling to admit that DeSantis’ shoes are both cowboy boots and high-heeled boots. Why? Because to do so would concede the blurred boundaries of gender presentation within this genre of footwear. For people invested in the militant regulation of gender norms, heels are a fraught territory. If a 2-inch heel is attached to a cowboy boot, it’s Big Mac, Super Bowl, troops. If it’s attached to any other kind of boot, it’s green juice, chick lit, drag queen. DeSantis would rather sign the Green New Deal in the front row of a Dixie Chicks concert than admit that the blocky thing on the bottom of his shoe is a “heel,” and he’ll hyperventilate into his bag of decommissioned MAGA hats if you try to convince him otherwise. Two presidential cycles ago, another conservative Floridian, Sen. Marco Rubio, stepped onto the wrong side of this divide. While campaigning for the Republican presidential nomination in January 2016, the senator, whom the Washington Post’s “well-informed Florida sources” peg at 5’8”, wore a pair of shiny heeled boots on a visit to New Hampshire. His GOP primary competitors ridiculed the femininity of the look and all had a good laugh at his expense. Rubio’s heels were no higher than a cowboy boot’s, and they even had a similarly slanted heel. (His were technically Cuban heels, but to the untrained eye, they’re cowboy heels.) But because they lacked the stitching and shape of cowboy boots, they were cupcakes, Ke$ha, body glitter. Got it? DeSantis and his supporters are determined to inoculate him from such associations. To admit that he cares enough about his appearance to deliberately alter it would reveal a side of him that is insecure, and thus vulnerable. There are not many socially acceptable ways for men devoted to classic American machismo to enhance their appearance (think: makeup) without compromising on their gender expression. The cowboy boot is one of them, nestled in the slender Venn diagram center of masculinizing footwear and height-augmenting footwear. But the recent focus among DeSantis critics on his heeled footwear may do more to boost his image than to make him look desperate and vain. The more people talk about DeSantis’ cowboy boots, the less likely a Google search for “DeSantis boots” will turn up that photo of him wearing white, knee-high rubber boots in the aftermath of Hurricane Ian—one of the least flattering images of a politician in recent history. In contemporary politics, it’s not just the shoes that make the man. It’s the SEO.