David Rothkopf: Media, the cost of gasoline isn't the story. The potential loss of democracy is.

[Nevilledog]

Link to tweet

Unrolled thread
https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1582350158649360384.html

If you're a reporter and you argue that the big election story is the price of gasoline and not the potential end to democracy, you're not doing your job. Here's why:

1.) You determine what the story is by covering it

2.) The end of democracy is profoundly more consequential

3.) The price of gasoline is not controlled by anyone in the US government (thank post COVID recovery, Putin, OPEC+ for the rise)

4.) The argument that this is or should be an election about price increases is a GOP talking point and deliberate distraction

5.) With "big lie" promoting candidates on the majority of ballots nationwide, the threat that this could be our last free and fair election is real

6.) The GOP has already said if they control House or Senate they will use their power to stop inquiries into coup, election fraud

7.) The GOP has regularly and nearly unanimously voted against every single proposed measure that could actually help with price pressures voters are feeling--which means they have not and will not and cannot do anything about these issues

8.) A GOP House &/or Senate will conduct sham impeachment investigations, block the progress of DoJ, & support efforts to undermine voting rights...and they will block Biden appointees to the court seeking to worsen judicial bias that is eliminating vital basic rights & freedoms

9.) GOP arguments that price increases have anything to do with Biden policies is not supported by economic analysis and is designed also to distract from the exceptionally good (historic) job creation and investment record of the Biden Admin

10.) The GOP econ track record is one of increasing deficits, creating economic crises, and aiding the rich at the expense of everyone else. (Do you think cutting social security and health benefits as they are proposing to do will help people deal w/economic pressure?)

The stakes are too high to fall for this GOP narrative. If you are a reporter and you do (or you are simply an individual using your social media platform to amplify these deceptions and distractions) you're not just getting it wrong.

If you miss the big story, the important story, the historically consequential story and allowing yourself to get lost in the MAGA smokescreen, you are making yourself an ally of the enemies of democracies, you are continuing the work of those who assaulted the Capitol on 1/6/21.

That's not an overstatement. That is the situation we face in the USA right now. History will look at the next three weeks as the moment we either lost the plot and in so doing undid the American experiment or whether saw the threat we face, framed it clearly & repelled it.
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[brooklynite]

1. Response: doesn't matter

The story is what voters care about; and specifically what the undecided. low information voters care about. They DO care about gas, mortgages and the cost of living. (They MAY blame those on external forces, but historically, the Party in power takes the blame). They DO NOT generally care about the future of democracy.

[Initech]

2. Conservatives vote with their wallets. Every. Fucking. Time.

Doesn't matter what we want. They only care about one issue - money, and that's about it. Maybe two if you count guns.

[wiggs]

3. Dems and pundits...See? Not so hard to frame accurately. nt

[BComplex]

4. The beginning premise of this post even starts out all wrong:

If you're a reporter and you argue that the big election story is the price of gasoline and not the potential end to democracy, you're not doing your job. Here's why:

1.) You determine what the story is by covering it

I'm not saying this is you, Nevilledog. Just saying that the oligarchs are hiring the reporters, and they are the ones who determine what the reporters can get away with. Not only are they hiring people who will lean more to the right, but even how the truly liberal pundits can present a story is part of the pressure that they deal with. I have a feeling that this is part of why Rachel Maddow has backed off some, but I don't know that for sure. I just know that the fish stinks from the head down, and all commercial media is doing this in spades, because they sense, rightfully, that the majority of the country is totally fed up with the bullshit.

What's needed is for people to organize against what the media is doing, and call it out somehow, with a loud and unified voice. They don't mind if we rail against the Dobbs decision, but they won't publicize us if we're railing against the extreme right twist of the media in general, and on such subtle, unfair levels.