Hypocrisy? You're soaking in it

PAUL JAY, SENIOR EDITOR: Do you distinguish between the three leading candidates coming out of Iowa and going into New Hampshire, in terms of the polling? You know, Obama and Edwards and Clinton. Do you distinguish between them in any way?

MIKE GRAVEL: No. I think that they're the product of the celebrity nature of American communication. And that's the sadness of it all. You know. They have the same level of celebrity attention as Britney Spears has.

JAY: When you get down to the policy level, there are some differences between them. Are they significant differences?

GRAVEL: No, not at all. They're not significant. All three of them want the health care paid for through business enterprise, which cripples business enterprise. What's the difference? And as far as education, they're all three endorsed by the NEA [National Education Association]. You're not going to see any changes in our educational system. What else? Education, health care. Two vital ones. The rest is just rinky-dinking around.

JAY: Edwards has certainly been talking more aggressively about taking on corporate America.

GRAVEL: Oh, yeah. Tell me how you're going to do that. No. I mean, how do you do that? I don't know how to do that. I know, if I can empower the American people, that they can sustain some policies, that I would do that.

JAY: Certainly there are laws Congress could pass. I mean, a president working with Congress—.

GRAVEL: Oh, Congress could do a good job, theoretically, but it can't. Why? Its owned lock, stock, and barrel by corporate America. So you think you're going to become president and you're going to turn to the Congress and say, “Let's really straighten out corporate America.” This is foolishness. It's fantasy. But it sounds good on the stump. I could make that kind of speech. Oh, man. Just listen to me. What am I going to do to corporate America? You can't believe. And I know a lot about corporate personhood and POCLAD and all of that. But so what?

JAY: But in a campaign like this, if someone has the potential of winning and makes some kind of promises, in theory they can mean something.

GRAVEL: In theory what it means is you're a hypocrite. That's what it means in theory, because if you're smart enough to know you can't deliver, and you tell them you can deliver, what are you doing? You're raising expectations and you're lying to the people. Or you're too dumb to know you're lying to the people.

-- Mike Gravel interview, The Real News

But the lying is so slick. And don't you love the way it's such a concerted effort across the media landscape, all the way from CNN to NPR?

Today's lie du jour is called "change." The oldest political ploy in the book. Change! After seven years of the Chimperor, people want change. Yathink?

Maybe it's so interesting because for a change (heh), a black man is talking about it with such eloquence. Get out there and put lipstick on this pig of an election, young man. And Barak does it, which doesn't exactly earn my respect.

But, of course, there's a new story now, even as "change" is flogged a bit longer. The new story is a simple and heartwarming tale staring Hillary Clinton. Since Obama's Iowa victory, the media got behind poor Hil and her , "I, too, am a human being!" moment in New Hampshire. "Change" took a backseat to this new spectacle.

Did emotion help Hillary win in New Hampshire? Just found this headline on Google News. Top story at 11 a.m. on January 9. Just shooting fish in a barrel here. I've got the echo chamber figured out. And Hillary is so bad, you can easily see it straining to prop her up when she gets in trouble.

Gravel, Kucinich, Paul and The Real News can see it too. It's easy when you are on the outside looking in.