| BIG LIES The Right-Wing Propaganda Machine and How It Distorts the Truth Joe Conason New York: Thomas Dunne Books, 2003 |
Rating: 5.0 High |
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| ISBN-13 978-0-312-31560-3 | ||||
| ISBN-10 0-312-31560-0 | 245p. | HC | $24.95 | |
First and foremost among these lies is the one repeated with wearisome regularity by self-described conservatives: the claim that the media have an overwhelmingly liberal bias. The right claim these media purposely suppress or ignore their point of view. Conason debunks that one handily in Chapter 1, which includes this research by Stanford's Geoffrey Nunberg:
"In the newspapers I looked at," he wrote in The American Prospect, "the word 'media' appears within seven words of 'liberal bias' 469 times and within seven words of 'conservative bias' just 17 times—a twenty-seven-fold discrepancy. Now there's a difference that truly deserves to be called staggering . . . Certainly critics on the left haven't been silent about what they take to be conservative bias in the media, whether in the pages of political reviews or in dozens of recent books. But the press has given their charges virtually no attention, while giving huge play to complaints from the right about liberal bias." – Pages 33-34 |
Not a case in the Supreme Court, but the court of public opinion. Here's how Bush and the late Paul Wellstone, Senator from Minnesota, handled the issue of mine safety.
Bush visited Somerset County, PA on 5 August 2002. Nine coal-miners had just been rescued from the Quecreek Mine. Bush posed with them for a "photo op" that made the evening news. What the news did not cover was that several months earlier, Bush had proposed cutting the already scanty budget for the Mine Safety and Health Administration.
Paul Wellstone's wife hailed from Kentucky and he had traveled widely in Appalachia. He understood the miners' situation well. As a Senator he held hearings on coal-mining regulation, hoping to stave off more cuts to the MSHA budget. Those hearings did not make the evening news. They are just one more example of the difference between Bush conservatives and public servants.
Whether it's economics, patriotism, the rule of law, "family values," or simple honesty, the most of conservatives are competent at only one thing: talking a good game. They say, for example, that the way to insure prosperity is to cut taxes on the rich, who will then invest in businesses, creating new jobs and more wealth that will then "trickle down" to the middle class and the poor.1 But it was Bill Clinton, who increased taxes on the rich by 2%, cut taxes on the middle class, and raised the minimum wage, who created 22 million jobs and erased the federal budget deficit he inherited.2 Joe Conason shows in this wide-ranging and well-researched book how they cannot help themselves — or the country they claim to love and defend.
During his presidential administration, George W. Bush closely followed the conservative playbook. Conason devotes considerable attention to him, examining his record as president in detail, and delving into some aspects of his previous history, including his time in the Air National Guard. But this is not a Bush-bashing book; Conason merely shows how Bush follows the right-wing pattern of rewarding privilege and punishing poverty.3
Conason's topic by topic dissection of the conservative record over the past three decades is required reading for anyone who thinks the quality of governance in this country is important. It comes with chapter-by-chapter endnotes and an excellent index.
If there is any defect in the book, it is that Conason goes overboard at times, indignantly reprising all the slurs used by Republicans in past campaigns, and all they hokum they spew daily, in order that the reader may share in his revulsion. But that is a small defect indeed, considering the targets.4 Highly recommended.
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