At the mercy of the media...
So I have a healthy, or perhaps more than healthy, level of skepticism when it comes to what I see on TV and why I see it. I see Bill Clinton giving a speech at the point when Hillary's clearly lost South Carolina, and her campaign has just taken a hit.
The first thought is that Hillary's campaign has called in Bill to bail them out (and that this is a sign of weakness and it will backfire).
The next thought is that the news media love narratives, and that while Bill Clinton might have been making speeches at all of these events, it's only now convenient to show because it fits into the narrative that started a few weeks ago about Hillary's campaign being a referendum on Bill's presidency. (It started with the picture of the Clinton camp (featuring a version of Madeline Albright closer to the Crypt-Keeper than to the Secretary of State we knew in the Nineties) in New Hampshire (I think) and continued with Bill's rant right before the Nevada caucuses)
I don't blame the media for liking "stories". They do because we do. It's inherently human. It's just that those stories tend to neglect some facts and enhance others because they're entertaining. It's not exactly fictionalizing - it's just that the non-fiction is somewhat selective, and thus misleading in the direction of the interesting, regardless of whether the interesting story is the actual story.
So has Hillary Clinton's campaign pulled out the hammer and broken the "In Case of Emergency" pane covering Bill Clinton's protective case, or is that just how it seems because that's what I'm being shown?
I'm not really bothered by it either way (I've wanted Barack Obama as president since the 2004 Democratic convention speech, when I couldn't help but see Obama as a better potential president than the one selected that year), but I can't help but wonder.
The first thought is that Hillary's campaign has called in Bill to bail them out (and that this is a sign of weakness and it will backfire).
The next thought is that the news media love narratives, and that while Bill Clinton might have been making speeches at all of these events, it's only now convenient to show because it fits into the narrative that started a few weeks ago about Hillary's campaign being a referendum on Bill's presidency. (It started with the picture of the Clinton camp (featuring a version of Madeline Albright closer to the Crypt-Keeper than to the Secretary of State we knew in the Nineties) in New Hampshire (I think) and continued with Bill's rant right before the Nevada caucuses)
I don't blame the media for liking "stories". They do because we do. It's inherently human. It's just that those stories tend to neglect some facts and enhance others because they're entertaining. It's not exactly fictionalizing - it's just that the non-fiction is somewhat selective, and thus misleading in the direction of the interesting, regardless of whether the interesting story is the actual story.
So has Hillary Clinton's campaign pulled out the hammer and broken the "In Case of Emergency" pane covering Bill Clinton's protective case, or is that just how it seems because that's what I'm being shown?
I'm not really bothered by it either way (I've wanted Barack Obama as president since the 2004 Democratic convention speech, when I couldn't help but see Obama as a better potential president than the one selected that year), but I can't help but wonder.