Containing Dissenting Speech

I recently wrote a paper which included, in part, protest pits.  In case you don’t know (I didn’t) protesters are kept in designated areas in the name of security when there are political events.  This is also a big issue for abortion demonstrators and was first implemented here in Atlanta in 1988 during the Democratic National Convention which happened to coincide with abortion protests. 

Since that time demonstration zones have consistently been used during political events and took on a much more prominent and oppressive role after 9/11. 

The first big political event after 9/11 was the Democratic National Convention, 2004 in Boston.  During that event protestors were housed under a railroad track, behind a double fence, with barbed wire at the top of the enclosure, yes enclosure, there was a fenced top

In order for this structures to be considered constitutional the government only has to show that their interest is advanced, they do not have to show that it is the least restrictive means available to advance their security interests. 

 

In 2004 the DNC was held at the Fleet center, which was barely visible from the demonstration zone (DZ).  Aside from limiting access to the delegates the DZ limited access to the media, thereby limiting, if not silencing dissenting speech.

When covering the Republican or Democratic conventions, or other political events where there are protestors, the media covers the political event and the politician’s.  They do not take measures to cover the protestors in the designated free speech zones. 

Perhaps this is one of the reasons that people are unaware of the political issues at hand and another indication of the spoon feeding done by the media on behalf of the candidates. 

 

 

 

Where's my doctor

Over the recent past there has been a lot of attention paid to the sentence “if you like your plan you can keep it” which was a statement repeatedly made by President Obama which many are now just realizing was inaccurate.  However, something that has largely escaped scrutiny has been the second part of that promise which was “if you like your doctor, you will be able to keep your doctor.” Speech to the AMA 2009.

Forbes and the Wall Street Journal have reported that doctors in ten states are receiving termination notices as part of a cost saving measure in which doctors and hospitals must accept a decrease in their fees.  The hardest hit group in this regard are providers who participate in the Medicare Advantage Plans Forbes, WSJ.

Not only is your doctor at risk of being cut for funding reasons, but because of the insurance plan debacle it is possible that your doctor will not be an in-network provider of your new plan.

Last month Kathleen Sebelius went on the Jon Stewart show and tried to convince the American people that the healthcare marketplace was revolutionary in that it provided a market where people could go and shop for plans and prices and check to see if their doctors and hospitals were in the plan that they want and went on to say that “you have never been able to do that before” at which time Jon Stewart questioned her on the point that people are not able to do that under the current system and Ms. Sebelius clearly replied that people would never know what was there Stewart & Sebelius. 

I visited the websites of Aetna, Blue Cross Blue Shield, and Healthcare.gov.  Is it a surprise to anybody that I was able to do a doctor search from the home pages of Aetna and BCBS but not healthcare.gov.  It was surprising to me that there is no mention of doctors anywhere on the home page of healthcare.gov.  I also watched a video on the website touting the benefits of having insurance and the marketplace Healtcare Marketplace which again made no mention of comparing networks or finding your doctor. 

There are times that world and domestic events are relatively stable, no big news stories to be found.  In this case with the healthcare rollout fiasco there is so much that is being thrown at the people that is inaccurate that it is impossible for the press to keep up with every one of the inconsistencies. 

It is clearly not true that you can keep your plan if you were happy with it, the grandfather clause was always a misnomer because anyone who has ever had insurance knows that your plan changes every year.  It was also misleading to tell people and the AMA that their patient doctor relationships would not be terminated.  Provider networks are effected through changes within the insurance plans themselves, as such there is no guarantee that you can you can keep your doctor, even without doctors being dropped from plans because of funding.  Furthermore, this is not a revolutionary concept, not only because Flo is already doing it through Progressive in the auto insurance industry but because insurers have been providing plan, premium, benefit and in network provider information to potential customers, pretty much since they developed their own websites. 

 

 

Broken Promises

As adults we become desensitized to the ideal of a promise, we use the term flippantly at times without any real consideration to the meaning. 

Children on the other hand understand a promise in its most absolute sense.

How did we lose respect for the promise?  Was it all of the broken promises that we encountered throughout our childhood?  Think of the heartbreak in a child’s eyes when they remind a trusted grown up of a promise made and forgotten or simply disregarded.

This is a typical conversation between a trusted grown up, we’ll call “dad” and his four year old son “Little Johnny” 

L.J.:        Dad, dad tomorrow’s boy’s day and ice cream day, remember?

Dad:       Ooohh hey bud, I’m not going to be able to take you for ice cream tomorrow afternoon something came up at work and I won’t be able to get off early after all.

L.J.:        But you promised that we would have boy’s day and ice cream.

Dad:       Yeah I know bud, but this meeting is really important and my boss needs me to be there, I just can’t get out of it.  But I’ll tell you what I’ll make it up to you, we’ll have boy’s day the next day how about that?

L.J.:        Okaay dad.

L.J.:        (Walks off disappointed and let down, but tries to put on a big boy face and understand.) 

What will happen the day after tomorrow?  Will dad take L.J. for ice cream or will he be detained at work again?  I don’t know and neither does L.J.  Whether or not dad keeps his second promise, L.J. has already been primed that promises don’t mean much, so the next time someone breaks a promise he figures, he understands; promises are empty words, they don’t mean much.  In time L.J. starts making promises he doesn’t necessarily plan to keep because that’s what you do, right?

But what about politicians?  What about our trusted leaders?  When they make us promises should we expect them to honor their promises or do we just take for granted that they either willingly or inadvertently break them sometimes? 

We have come to accept and in fact expect broken promises from our politicians, yet their promises are largely the single most important factor in our support of them. 

So last week when the President said “then we would have broken an even more important promise” I was disturbed.  Regardless of the context, the statement implies that a promise was broken in order to fulfill, what has been determined to be “an even more important promise.”  I have waited and waited for the media to bring up this sentence, but they haven’t.  When we support our politicians based on promises they make to us is there fine print?  Do we give them free reign to determine what promises are more important than others and thereby give them the freedom to pick and choose which promises they deem worthy to keep? 

Does dad get to say you know Little Johnny that ice cream promise isn’t as big as my promise to make sure you don’t get any cavities, so we’re not going to have ice cream, that way I can keep my promise that you won’t develop dental health issues?  At that point should L.J. say oh thanks dad, you’re right that is a more important promise, we won’t worry about that whole ice cream thing anymore.

I don’t think so.

 

The Power of the Purse meets the Power of the Pen

A couple of weeks ago Senator John McCain (R-Ariz.) was the subject of an international media highlight when he announced that he would write an article to be published in Russia as a rebuttal to a NY Times Op Ed article written by Russian President Vladamir Putin.  Senator McCain did in fact write the article wherein he spoke of the dignity and the right to self-determination of Russian citizens.  Russian criticism aside, this was an exceptional (pardon the pun) use of the media by a member of Congress. 

During the course of the government shutdown, now on day 10, Representatives, Paul Ryan (R-Wisc.) and James Lankford (R-Okla.) have taken Senator McCain’s model to heart and have published articles of their own in the Wall Street Journal, and USA Today, respectively. 

Republican representatives are eager to share their views of the circumstances relating to the government shutdown and understandably so.  Clearly Republican Congressional representatives have taken the lions share of the blame for any negative impacts of the government shut down.  Actually, on that note, is there an up-side?  Is there an argument for the government shut down?  Is there any blame or fault on the part of the Democrats or the President?  I just don’t remember hearing any.  However, I have heard for many years that the government is continuing to incur unacceptable debt levels, and I have heard that the people do not like and never wanted Obamacare, and I have heard that people are afraid of the financial implications of mandatory insurance enrollment.  Why are there no news stories about these concerns or discussion in the main stream media of potential fixes.  I have, however, seen the story of a waitress in Virginia who is not making enough money in tips because the IRS workers are not there, and I even saw an interview with the President where he alluded to this “economic impact.”  These stories represent personalization in lieu of substantive discussion. 

It seems to me that there is an unimaginable level of stubbornness between Democrats and Republicans; and Boehner and Obama, which is unaided by the lack of actual information and insight dispersed to the people by the main stream media.  I do not want to hear any more about the poor waitress, or even the poor veterans (sorry) I want to hear substantive policy issue and debate from both sides, what are the issues and what are their long term / short term national implications?

A message to Boehner and Obama:  This grade school I want my way, he said, he won’t give me what I want childhood behavior has got to stop!  Do you grown men really need your mother to get involved and put you both in time out?  

These politicians need a reality check, their job is to do what is best for America and American’s.  Figure out what that is and do it.  It’s really not about you! 

 

Anyway, back to the point, the view of the Congressional Republican is not equally represented in the main stream media which has almost necessitated use of the pen to justify the use of the purse. 

Principles, Publicity, and Public Health

I started my work on this blog with the full intent of covering the media circus surrounding the government shutdown and Obamacare.  I was going to point out some of the illustrative language used by both sides of the debate such as “holding America hostage” and similar emotion inducing statements.  But then I read the headlines about Ted Cruz’s marathon speech from the senate floor.  Ted Cruz had control of the senate floor since 2:41 pm on Tuesday afternoon and maintained the floor until 12:00 pm today. 

Headlines captured the bias of the media organizations for example

·         Fox’s headline read “Cruz vows to speak against ObamaCare until unable ‘to stand,’ as vote looms” 

·         CNN said “Obamacare: not in a box. Not with a fox.”   “As shutdown looms, Cruz reads from Dr. Seuss.”

·         Washington Post – “Senator Cruz continues night-long attack on Obamacare

·         New York Times – “Senator persists battling health law, irking even many in his own party.”

Though it is true that Cruz did read from Dr. Seuss during his 21 hours at the podium there were many other issues that he addressed such as full time workers being transitioned to part-time employment, politicians who don’t listen to the people, and small business owners.  Mark Rubio answered questions posed by Cruz regarding how Obamacare would have adversely impacted his family when he was young and Cruz was also supported in his views by other senators since from the time that he maintained the floor. 

Now that the marathon speech of Cruz is over the headlines are no more helpful than they were during the more than 21 hours that captured the attention of the media.  Only now the headlines read after more than 21 hours on the floor Cruz votes with the democrats.  It is fascinating to me that the 100-0 vote is publicized all in of the mainstream news outlets and internet, but the idea that the senators voted for cloture is completely lost in translation.  The senators voted unanimously that the issue proceed to be debated in the House of Representative.  Another vote on the issues at large is expected to be held on Friday. 

P.R. and Politics

Last week the American people were faced with a political revelation not often given much consideration. 

The public relations firm Ketchum has been employed by Vladimir Putin, George W. Bush, and Barack Obama Putin, Bush, Obama & Ketchum.  This was brought to the fore after Putin published an op-ed piece in the New York Times which received far reaching notice, both here and abroad and led to government officials attributing feelings of nausea at the article.  This was met by a statement by Senator John McCain who expressed an interest in writing a rebuttal piece in a Russian newspaper the Pravda.  The access to a variety of information in Russia, however presents a stark contrast to the dissemination of ideas that McCain is more accustomed to in the U.S.  Pravda.ru http://english.pravda.ru/ is an extremely anti-American publication as such it is going to be very interesting to see just how badly this plays out for McCain and America once Pravda publishes their rebuttal to the rebuttal. 

Ketchum’s public affairs page opens with the heading “Thanks to social media and other “flattening” technologies, individual ideas can galvanize into movements. Heroes can become villains. And policy issues can capture international attention, travelling the globe practically overnight."  Ketchum has certainly successfully demonstrated that not only can heroes become villains overnight, but with the right P.R. firm a seemingly Russian villain like Putin can also be transformed into a global hero. 
 

War fatigue or too much CSI?

This week on my twitter feed I posted two very different views on Syria one critical and comedic view held by Jon Stewart and the other a very somber message presented by Samantha Powers.  I also included one political narrative in a video discussion with Scott Wilson of the Washington Post.  In reviewing this material I was reminded of one of our first posts wherein we attempted to answer the question “why is a society that is so rich in information populated with people who are so confused about and alienated from politics?”  The three posts illustrate some of the conflicts that arise out of journalism and access to information.  I would like to first point out that the Samantha Powers address is not widely disseminated, nor was the political discourse of Scott Wilson.  The only source of information that was probably viewed by upwards of 20,000 people was Jon Stewart’s, which was an entertaining and compelling view, if not a completely rounded view of the issues at large. 

The narrative of political events occurring in Washington was an example of objectivity in journalism, otherwise the subjectivity of personal opinion and the shaping of public opinion through media outlets can be clearly seen in both Stewart and Powers monologues.  In addition to the use of the media by Obama through presidential addresses. 

The most clearly blatant form of the media being used to influence public opinion with regard to American military involvement in Syria can be seen in the many images, and video montages of the children of Syria who were the victims of the chemical attacks, which has also been distributed by the American government.  It is interesting to me that these graphic images of the brutal realities and injuries of these young children are aired freely without displaying warnings of graphic content.  The display of the atrocities committed on children clearly results in widespread emotional and moral appeal to Americans.  However, it is also interesting to me that despite our collective moral outrage public opinion polls on US military intervention indicate a 36% favorability rating. 

 

 http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/wp/2013/09/07/samantha-powers-case-for-striking-syria/?Post+generic=%3Ftid%3Dsm_twitter_washingtonpost

http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/tue-september-3-2013/uncle-jonny-stew-s-good-time-syria-jamboree

http://www.washingtonpost.com/posttv/video/inplay/how-can-obama-change-minds-on-syria/2013/09/06/c9a43ea4-173a-11e3-be6e-dc6ae8a5b3a8_video.html

http://www.gallup.com/poll/164282/support-syria-action-lower-past-conflicts.aspx