from the new west blog: shouldn't we expect better?

The Politics of Spin: Situation Normal

By Jill Kuraitis, 7-03-08

Politicians on both teams are so busy hollering at each other and issuing dueling blame-game press releases about the price of gas and energy policy, other issues are drowning in the noise.

Last week, after the Senate failed to pass the the Energy Markets Emergency Act Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-NV said, “For the fifth time in less than a month, Senate Republicans have run away from an opportunity to help Americans suffering from record-high gas prices at the height of the summer driving season.  Today, the Republicans who feign such great concern about energy prices blocked a Democratic bill that would help rein in rampant speculation in the energy futures markets, even though the House overwhelmingly and passed the bill in a bipartisan fashion yesterday by a 402-19 vote.”

But Idaho Rep. Bill Sali, who voted no on the measure when it passed the House, said, “Regrettably, the Democrats’ solution is to distract everyone with bills that just reiterate current law. Specifically, their bill to reign in speculators just gives powers to the Commodity Futures Trading Commission that the Federal Trade Commission already has. Also, the Democrat’s fixation on ‘use it or lose it’ is merely rhetoric as this is already the law.”

An inexhaustible supply of put-down quotes are standard fare at the Senate Republican website as well as the Senate Democrats’, not to mention in media reports worldwide.

In another example of an arrested-development approach to communication, Sen. Reid is now using the term “Bush-McCain Republicans” some and Republicans use Barack Obama’s middle name whenever possible.

During what many Americans would call an economic crisis, we can expect more of the same playground tactics. Worse, political spin is so transparent that many people now expect it, and accept it as normal. We shouldn’t.

There’s a difference between a relatively straight-up public relations ploy - “I did this, isn’t that great?” and impossibly convoluted spin - “Republicans voted No on the energy bill, which obviously means they bite babies, hate families, and want to kill polar bears.”

Wouldn’t it be refreshing if a politician said, “I don’t think HR 6377 is the answer, but there are parts of it which could be combined with our proposal which to produce a great bill.  We’re all trying to get this done” ?

Somehow, I don’t think the founders meant swipe-and-snipe when they talked about checks and balances.  We should expect more, and deserve better.

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