Fox Agitprop Perfection.
Fox's resident pompous lite news-reading anchor Chris Wallace, son of pompous pop Mike Wallace, travels to Palm Beach and what appears the Limbaugh de Medici manque mansion to chat with Rush Limbaugh on his diet, himself, the weather, himself, and also the election and Afghanistan. No surprises but a deal of iconoclastic joy when an archly casual Limbaugh, wearing loafers but no socks, leaps into declaring that POTUS "doesn't care about Afghanistan." Son of Mike Wallace is non-plussed. Recall, this is TV; there are no surprises, just a script. Witness the file film on Afghanistan to illustrate the surprise. Limbaugh proceeds to rationalize his tritness. None of this is debatable, since it is not news that Limbaugh needs attention and the only avenue he has, from his Palm Beach hang-out, is to continue ad hominem on Barrack Obama. The formula is routine. It works.
Why Now Afghanistan?
Limbaugh and FNC are momentarily out of new scripts, so they are going over what worked last summer. Until the election Tuesday, there are no new stories, just loops of the banter and shibboleths and agitprop of the campaigns. Limbaugh goes shopping in Afghanistan, a subject he looks at entirely from the point of view of a burlesque act regard Ike's decisions on Korea, that is, always asking the question, "What's in it for my act?" What is in Afghanistan for Limbaugh is not much. He can score the same debating point with a buffet table of subject lines. "...doesn't care about me, my diet, my radio show or even the 57 states of unemployment," would all suit the performance. I mention the Limbaugh act on Afghanistan today just because this is a new low for the right-wing of the Republican party. There is no more a policy on Afghanistan in the GOP than there is in the White House. George Bush ignored Afghanistan for six years while he labored to buy off Iraq with cash and muscle. The success in Iraq is a credit to the US military and the facts of major powers in Iraq, the Arab Shias and the Kurds. Kabul today is a powderkeg. The Taliban has determined to murder the foreigners with belts and VBIED. This is a nightmare of Pashtun savagery and Wahhabist fantasy. There is no best solution; there is management. The jihadists worldwide are sitting around waiting to win in Afghanistan in order to launch their schemes elsewhere. Pakistan cannot survive a loss in Kabul, nor can several broken capitals in Africa and Asia. Limbaugh? He speaks for his diet and his interior decorator (if it is his Palm Beach House) with more caution than he speaks about the fate of the Afghans and the genuinely heroic ISAF and UN forces now at war with the Taliban. Fox? Doing its job, always ready for its close-up, always DeMille Lite.
Uh, John. This was taped on Friday. Edited on Saturday. Your envy is dripping John.
Disagree. Bush Administration did not ignore Afghanistan, that's a preposterous premise. They may have misinterpreted the quick "victory" in 2001, but they did not ignore Afghanistan. They played footsie with Pakistan because they had to. They set the table so that current POTUS can launch thrice as many Predator attacks as prior POTUS did.
Limbaugh's points, perhaps made awkwardly, (didn't see the Fox piece), center around the notion that current POTUS seems to be more interested in his agenda than he is in currently emerging issues that directly affect his constituents, both civilian and military. To say that Bush ignored Afghanistan falls right in line with POTUS blaming everything on Bush....I'm not buying it.
Big fan of the show, just not buying this premise.
Especially for a POTUS with no military experience whatsoever....If General McChrystal says I need 40K troops to turn this thing around, I'm going with the recommendation. I know POTUS is being deliberate in his decision-making, but this has been an open request for about 3 months now, if I'm not mistaken....I don't know, but with no military experience whatsoever, I'm going with the General, for my first major deployment call. But that's just me. And if "my base" doesn't like it, they'll get over it.
John--take a trip to Palm Beach. I recognize the front of The Breakers, a famous, old resort hotel--not Rush's house!
that was a low, populist and petty insinuation. Like the man said, he makes a lot bec he brings in so much for his advertisers. CLass warfare, John??
RL is a pundit--did you expect a fully done doctoral dissertation? Your criticism shallow.
What's more, he correct in virtually everything he says. John, consider for yourself to rebut what he says--just a suggestion.
JB - Assuming that everything you say is true, does beg the question: compared to what? I always find it curious when one is able to substitute other names for the names mentioned in any given article and it still continues to make total sense.
It's with too much ease that the antagonists of the PotUS mark their messages of
"The President is purposely taking the country's economy down; everything he has tried or done has proven futile; he doesn't care about America; he despises America; etc, etc, ad infinitum." They know it strikes at the susceptible ditto-headers that want to believe everything they say is true and will pay out the bucks to be able to keep reinforcing their already entrained beliefs.
These people that profit from their weak minded constituents' loyalties to the generalities they employ and present as facts are, in reality, more like carnival barkers than anything else. Carnies tell their prey that their show is unbelievable and it is. When they are found to be scoundrels, they are able to say "I told you, you should not believe little ol' me and to come see for yourself and be the judge!"
These cons are more sophisticated... when they are found out they might say "Well, it may not be fact, but, believe me, it's true. And you know it is!"
And some people fall for it. Step right up!!
John - You're a good talk show host - interviewing is something your good at. But you are a liberal Republican. We see in McCain where liberal Republicans get us. Rush is correct that conservatives need to take back the Republican Party and move America back to the principles of the founding fathers, back to a more literal following of the Constitution. With things like socialized health care we are rapidly loosing our liberty. Don't envy Rush, support him.
John,
Your comments are unworthy of your class and style. Other comments made by one other commenter are also typical of pigeonholing Rush listeners, nothing but lemings. Such characterizations are made by those who care not to look around objectively, and w.r.t the political class, at their own peril. People accross this country are not happy, and dare I say looking for an opportunity to take out their frustration. These are those who vote, like me, every single election. I speak with broad spectrum of people here in California and there is payback coming for the politicos.
Other than that, continue to enjoy the show on weekend nights.
I'm sure Mr B appreciates you all telling him what he should think and how he should construct his analysis and observations...
Truth is, what is wrong with the Republican Party is this very example that the trending of conservative thought is toward an exclusionary and monochromatic viewpoint dictated by a few that do not have a firm grasp of reality.
Funny, pompous is a word I would never think of to describe Chris Wallace. I'm not a huge fan or anything. I'd describe him as a little bland, actually. He's just as afraid to ask the really tough questions as the overtly liberal media are.
As time goes on, my suspicions grow that Limbaugh is actually right, that we are being deliberately set up to fail. How could Obama actually be so naive as to think that putting more regulations and mandates on business, threatening higher taxes for health care and CO2, sucking capital out of the economy with massive government borrowing, Porkulus efforts to jump start the economy, would ever result in a return to growth? No, it has to be deliberate? Or not. I don't know anymore. Neither does Rush, of course, but he may be right.
In one version of the conspiracy theory, Obama seems to be acting like Goldman Sachs' b****. How GS going to profit from the next round of collapse, I'm not sure, but they've no doubt got it covered, now that we've fronted them loans and that $12 billion gift funneled through AIG (via TARP, via the US taxpayer) to set it all up.
Limbaugh probably thinks that if the economy tanks further, we will in desperation support more socialism and income redistribution. That's the alternate conspiracy theory. With Geithner and Summers and all the other Gold Men at the Fed and Treasury, I suspect the financiers have their escape routes dug for that eventuality as well.
In the end it doesn't matter. The middle class is going to get skewered by the ObamAgenda, if he can squeeze any of it through. And it doesn't matter if he's doing it deliberately or through ignorance. The wreckage and rubble left behind is the same.
Yeh, and there wasn't a global economic crisis, either.
I'm not saying anyone who wants to listen to Rush shouldn't do it. I am saying that there is a certain profile that some people fit in to who do not distinguish between the falsehoods which are adeptly presented in generalities and the facts which predominantly do not exist in the diatribes. We see the same phenom happening here in this comment section... total devotion to someone who says he loves America so much and that he knows everything that is wrong with America, yet, cowers behind a microphone and won't come to the fore in order to form a more perfect Union. It's called propaganda.
Rush admits he is just a personality and not someone who would actually be willing to present himself as something other than a personality. He's a dog that pisses on the leg of anyone that he doesn't like the smell of and there's always been a few who think it's funny and will make the connection that the dog must have had had a good reason.
John, I normally love your opinion but your envy and dislike for Fox and Rush got in the way here.
If I had an employment contract good for $400 million over the next 10 years I wouldn't wear socks either.
Rush Limbaugh makes his money by fulfilling a need. No one is forced to listen to him. It's not enough to a lot of people to be able to turn the radio dial if you don't like Rush's message, they must also actively seek to both discredit him and to remove him from my list of radio listening choices. I don't understand that.
The Republicans descent into irrelevance was their own doing... it was their attempt to enlarge the tent, to move to the middle, to stand for vote getting rather than for principles. It was not Rush, or Sean, or Glenn, or Laura, or G Gordon, or Ann, or any of the other actual principled conservatives. Voters who consider themselves principled conservatives will show up, will donate, will work, and will vote for candidates and a party which stands for the philosophy in which we believe. We will not show up, will not donate, will not work for, and will not vote for watered down moderate Republicans, because the moderates stand for nothing but vote getting. And it doesn't work.
John, I'm fascinated by the fact that you miss the point here, especially because you and Rush are so much alike. You're both excellent and entertaining story tellers. You're both in a business where ratings are everything. If people didn't like what you had to say, you'd both be in the ash-bin of history. You're both performers, and you both need the attention, you just go about it in different ways. Thank goodness for you both, thank goodness for variety. John, celebrate the man who by single handedly transforming talk radio made your own success possible.
Oh, and on Afghanistan? Rush is absolutely right. Obama (peace be upon him) cares far more about his domestic agenda to transform the United States of America into the Progressive States of Goldman Sachs than he does about our soldiers in Afghanistan or the people of that country. If Obama (peace be upon him) did care, he'd have sent the extra resources requested promptly, or he'd have brought everyone home. No decision = doesn't care, no decision = care a lot more about something else.
Best luck to you, John, keep up the good work, bring back the book and music lists on the website. Really enjoy the show. I consider both you and Rush my can't-miss radio.
I would like to hear Petraeus' unvarnished opinion on whether the plan can actually work, even with 40K more troops. At this point I am dubious.
As far as a thoughtful and fulfilling commentariat exercise and experience, Rush is just a slacker compared to John Batchelor. No contest
John invites a discussion from all viewpoints concerning the relative issues of the day... Rush discourages discourse in order to promote an ideology - it's simply called PROPAGANDA.
I would say that it's wrong to make distinctions in the character of men based on the size of their contracts.
Then again, maybe honor and integrity have been obsoleted and are no longer relevant to the "I, me, mine" practitioners of cynicism.
Spenc--
You're overwrought here--Rush is a "propagandist"? For what? His own view of things?
Seems vaguely familiar--like freedom of speech. It's the propaganda coming out of taxpayer funded efforts that scares me--ACORN, NEA, etc. That is propaganda!
Bachelor, to his credit, usually doesn't opine--only by innuendo perhaps. His is a variation on the Fox theme--"I'll arrange and facilitate the reporting, you decide." That is good and it also allows him to make fun of anyone who does speak straight out what they believe. And RL has believed in the same principles since (at least) he came on the radio. Quite explicit, reasoned and well grounded in the founding documents of the country.
He probably slips from analysis into what psychologists call "attribution"--ie, inferring negative, nefarious, and hidden agendas to the pieces of behavior, speech, and policy of, in this case, BO.
At least RL has an explicit and consistent and unapologetic platform from which he interprets reality, draws implications and makes judgments. Liberals are bit impaired in that department to my mind. They can't really say their worldview bec. they immediately sound like (what many are) socialists and mini-tyants (taxing my soft drinks, affirmative action, forced low income housing,forcing me to buy health ins, to name several rather minor examples.).
I'll take one John Batchelor over a hundred whimpering Limbaughs (or those of his ilk) any day.
It's fascinating to see you all castigating Mr Batchelor... kinda proves the point, does it not?
I agree that RL has relied on the same old drone for his attacks on America.
Sort of like the guy who says he votes in every election and then complains about how he doesn't have a representative government.
Fascinating discourse
We all can recognize the road we currently speeding down, winding and twisting, a sheen of ice and bald tires to boot.
the back seat driver that is El Rushbo and entourage is as helpful as the up coming cliff we are rapidly advancing to unabated But let us all note no one is of particular use in the current situation we find ourselves in aside from the POTUS himself.
I have some skin in the game- my son is USMC Lance Corporal & all I want for Christmas is his safe return. We need a decision- fight on or scram and weighing that decision for several months does not aid a single thing.
Spencer, Limbaugh is not whimpering. He is bellowing, having a grand time of it, and is effective. The Dems would not spend every waking hour trying to discredit him if he was not effective. They would ignore him.
If I had a magic wand, JB would have an audience as large as Limbaugh. In our system, an audience must be earned. JB could add a little "burlesque" and not harm the overall thrust and tone of the show. If that would help build audience, so much the better. Don't anyone tell me that Barney Frank singing "Banking Queen" is not both great humor and great political commentary. Long live Rush Limbaugh. Long live John Batchelor.
I don't think they are castigating El Soltero, necessarily. They are disagreeing with him, calling him on some fairly provocative comments he's made. I think this is all healthy.
This is not the first time John's apparent views have been contradictory. The most salient example I can think of, and that I've pointed out here before, is that John, on the one hand, appears to be a big supporter of a stepped-up number of troops in Afghanistan in an attempt to finally gain control of the country; on the other hand, his most regular guest on the topic has been Michael Vlahos (usually on Saturday night), and Vlahos is the most outspoken person I've ever heard on the sheer hopelessness of the Afghanistan campaign. John doesn't just have Vlahos on enough to have him as an opposing viewpoint. He's the "Afghanistan desk" for the show as far as I can tell.
Another one: John seemed to adore Sarah Palin, yet was well aware that after the initial blip in the polls, she virtually assured that McCain would fail in his bid for the presidency.
I enjoy the inconsistencies and contradictions. It gives me something to do to reconcile them. We're all big enough boys and girls to be able to figure out our own opinions on these things. And I give John credit for letting people openly criticize his opinions on the blog. I'm sure you share this view as well, Spencer.
Agreed... but, I believe the point is that the Party Carnies are folding up the tent
*/_*
The bottom line is that JB is about 500 times as smart as Rush Limbaugh. Any comparison between the two is damning JB by faint praise.
Whimpering or bellowing? I believe he plays the victim very well and to a tee (at the finest country clubs, mind you)... FORE!!!
He's been screaming and crying the way things ought to have been for decades SOS. At least Perot offered himself up to substantiate his love and vision of the country and the indomitable American Spirit of the people.
Could he garner 10%? I doubt it... maybe 2% skim off the top. And he knows it.
Offer a dictatorship? Now, that's a different ball game!! Dittoditto
I can just here John Belushi screaming "FOODFIGHT !!" hahaha
It is funny that this piece evokes so many comments while Vietganistan is raging, the carry trade bubble is growing, a cupla 2010 elections are about to be played out, there is elevated Roubini chatter, and whatever other gloomy doomy things are going on. Black Friday is only a couple of weeks away... will White Christmas be the new Black Friday? Or will there be any profitability outside of WalMart?
Thank goodness for the JB Show.
vsk
So this is what passes for serious and mature analysis on this site (minus evidence, of course) that the POTUS "does not care about our soldiers"? Seriously, this is an intelligent argument? Conservatism has slid a long way, baby, from the glory days of WFB and down into the sewer.
Oh yeah, "dithering" is the word of choice from the has been incompetent war criminal Cheney.
I am all for a Hoffman victory in NY23 on Tuesday if it will embolden the Palin-Beck populist radicals (because you are not "Conservatives") and hasten the implosion of the GOP in 2012.
Keep telling yourself the utopian narrative that all America needs is a return to 1980 or 1994.
Some people are so damn blind and ignorant that they don't hear the train coming until it's 5 feet in front of them.
How could being blind prevent you from hearing the train? At least Clinton knew what his various body parts were for.
hi GT
POTUS doesn't care. He's given 120 speeches on health care, he's jetted off to Europe to get the Olympics for Chicago, he's inconvenienced Manhattanites so that he can go on a date... but he hasn't done a damn thing to help our military do the job in Afghanistan. He. Doesn't. Care.
The "Palin-Beck" populist radicals are in fact just regular Americans from flyover country. We exist because the GOP has ALREADY imploded. No one takes Michael Steele seriously. If they did, they'd be trying to discredit him, not some used-to-be-fat talk show host.
A return to the governing philosophy of Reagan would give our country a fighting chance. As it is we seem to be preparing to repeat the mistakes of post-war Olde Europe. It's not Utopian... it worked. The late great writer Bartley wrote a book about it called the 7 Fat Years. Read and learn.
Thank you for helping me to understand my current blindness and ignorantness. That explains a lot. Like why I lost my job 5 days after the immaculation of Obama (peace be upon him) and have only been able to find daily temporary work since. Not the kind of change for which I had been hoping.
But you still, mercifully, get the point.
Gore Vidal never tires of quoting Vice President Agnew's immortal line, "The United States, for all its faults, is still the greatest nation in the country."
At least conservatives are aware that we have a problem, namely, how to package our product. Depending on how you count, we comprise about 40%-45% of the population. We don't make a lot of noise most of the time except when things get too bad and then we roar and the liberal media always acts surprised: "What was that noise? Did somebody break wind, perchance?" (Hand cupped to ear)....
The so-called progressives, OTOH, are oblivious to how out-of-touch they are.
A man's got to know his limitations, as Clint once said.
I came across a quote on RCP yesterday that completely sums up my attitude. To paraphrase: "People think I don't like change. Nothing could be further from the truth ... I embrace change, but only when the time is right. And the time is right only when change can no longer be resisted...."
You nailed it: Your former employer secretly timed your layoff with the Obama Inauguration.
The recession is Obama's fault -- yeah, that's it. And here I was thinking that perhaps you (and legions of Americans) got laid off because of the beloved "Invisible Hand" of Bartley-Limbaugh's infallible Free-Market Capitalism.
I have been following the attempts of some here to discern Mr. Batchelor's attitude re Limbaugh and related matters with interest and amusement, but trust me when I say that he is far too canny to be understood so easily. I hope that this fascinating--to me, anyhow--magazine profile of him as he neared the end of his literary phase will provide some useful illumination.
It certainly brings to mind fellow novelist Tom Wolfe's observation that all stories are about status.
I hate to admit it but you have a valid point here. For the most part it's a stretch to blame any one layoff (or credit any one job creation) on the actions of a government bureaucrat. But if they actually put people out of business by making the sale of individual health insurance illegal (as the House Bill now does, as of 1/1/2013) then, that's going to be pretty easy to pin the blame on the authors of the bill.
Speaking for myself, I'd rather be out of work in a free world than fully employed in a world run by the Nancy Pelosis and Steny Hoyers of the world. What I fear the most is being out of work in a world run by Pelosi and Hoyer.
I feel an Eagles' lyric coming on, which I dedicate to President Obama:
"Well I know it wasn't you who held me down,
Heaven knows it wasn't you who set me free."
It's very simple... if Obama (peace be upon him) is going to take credit for all of the good things which happen while he's president, then he's also got to take credit for all of the bad things which happen while he's president. Sauce for both the goose and the gander.
If he's going to take credit for jobs "created or saved", it seems fair to give him credit for jobs lost.
Where do you live, GT? NYC? LA? SF? DC? Chicago? Certainly not out here in flyover country with all us ignorant red-state bumpkins.
I watch with interest today's elections in NJ (from which I have escaped). It's been fun to watch the food fight between Corzine and Christie. NJ is busy caving in on itself, the public union parasites are killing the host, the rich and productive are moving out as fast as they can pack the cardboard boxes, and the major party candidates for governor are busy calling each other "fat" and "bald" in teevee commercials.
My conclusion? One cannot correlate intelligence or sophistication with a home address where one can receive home delivery of the NY Times, drink chlorinated/flouridated water, or pay property taxes higher than most people's mortgage payments.
I give in, GT, you smart me dumb. help me help me pleez help me. Tell me how to think and how to live. I need you I need you or I shall perish.