SwiftVets.com

[fortdixlover]

SwiftVets friends,

NewsHour with Jim Lehrer on PBS was a spectacle tonight.

Correspondent Kwame Holman "examined the debate" over ads questioning John Kerry's actions during and after the Vietnam War, and the impact that they are having on the presidential campaign. Gwen Ifill followed up in a discussion with David Gergen, an advisor to four presidents, now at Harvard, and Kathleen Hall Jamieson, dean of the Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Pennsylvania.

Folks, I am going to skip the standard left-wing responses about "the risk to the Bush campaign" (!!), the "distortions" of the SwiftVets, etc. from these latter two "guests", and jump right to a truly astonishing observation.

Both Gergen and Jamieson held that the reason the SwiftVets ads had such a high penetration into the public were due to their being talked about on "cable" and on "talk radio" (their words). Neither mentioned the Internet.

When specifically asked about the effect of the Internet, Kathleen Hall Jamieson, dean of the Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Pennsylvania did not even answer the question. She basically changed the subject as I recall.

This is a stunning observation. I do not believe she dismissed the question maliciously. I believe these media and academic "giants" truly do not comprehend the impact of Internet blogs and boards (such as this one). I believe what we are seeing is the effect of technologic backwardness and "computer blockheadism" among members of the "elite" MSM darlings.

In much of my biomedical work, I have made many observations of incompetence regarding information technology and its impact, including in (and perhaps especially in) academic and quasi-academic environments.

I believe this incompetence regarding the impact of IT is the achilles' heel of the Democrats. The Dean of the Annenberg School of Communication at far-left Ivy League school U. Of Pennsylvania was clearly clueless about the impact of the 'net. I can bet that she is one of those executive "technology blockhead" types so clumsy with computers, her secretary has to do her email. Kerry's advisors are also likely to be of the same ilk.

This is a personal opinion, but I think these folks are not mentally flexible enough to grasp the rapid change, and the power of a tool that has been built over a mere decade from university curiousity to something that challenges the supremacy of the conventional MSM itself. The fact that blogging is only two or three years old makes them even less able to grasp the fact that their paradigms are crumbling.

FDL

[jwb7605]

fortdixlover:

That is one of the more astute observations I've seen lately.

I'm going to have to print the page out, and read it a few times.

[4moreyears]

Just goes to prove you can't teach an old dog new tricks...but you can have the Vet put him down!
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kerry returned to the United States on July 22, 1971, held a press conference publicly calling on President Nixon... for the surrender of the United States to North Vietnam.

[Polaris]

Agreed. We saw it last year and very early this year with Howard Dean and his Deaniacs. Well we are the same (except our cause is a lot more noble).
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-Polaris

Truth is Beauty

[DavidS]

I just finished watching the program and you have given excellent observations.on the "Guests" approach.

It's unfortunate that Gergen mouthed the standard media approach to this controversy ie; the SBVT acusations have been investigated by the press and found to be false, the ads are a smear campaign orchestrated by the Republicans and paid for largely by a rich Republican donor, etc.

I say it's unfortunate because, as my wife who supports Kerry told me, you have in the past respected Gergen and I do, so I beleive what he is saying.
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Keep A Zero Bubble!

[Chuck54]

[BC]

I bet ol' Al wishes he never invinted the internet.
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Remember United Flight 93, "Are you guys ready? Let's roll."
Duty Honor Country

[4moreyears]

Al invented hanging chads too
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kerry returned to the United States on July 22, 1971, held a press conference publicly calling on President Nixon... for the surrender of the United States to North Vietnam.

[fortdixlover]

I was really struck by the inability of the hifalootin' guests to articulate the impact the Blogs and the Internet are having on Kerry's current political troubles.

I would venture to say that more people saw the ads via the Internet than via "cable" and "talk radio" combined. Yet, the guests only mentioned those latter two outlets as the reason why so many people now say they have seen, or have heard about, the SwiftVets and their ads.

For an example of the computer incompetence common in the "elite" crowd, in this case management, see the near half-billion dollar ($500,000,000) computer debacle in the VA Medical System at http://www.sptimes.com/2004/02/19/Tampabay/Senator_hears_out_Bay.shtml . This money has gone down the drain, literally.

(Vets, you may not like it when IT incompetence affects your healthcare, but when it hinders Kerry's ability to obfuscate his record, I guess it's not as terrible a thing.)

FDL

[cipher]

[DavidS]

[Dimsdale]

It was definitely the internet. The media blackout was almost all encompassing, including many of the so-called conservative talk shows, until the story reached critical mass on the internet discussion sites, blogs etc.

The media was dragged kicking and screaming into this story, and they are still resisting it, at least when they aren't humping for Kerry.

But Kerry and the Dems are getting so ridiculous in their claims and defenses, and O'Neill and other are so forthright and calm in his, that the Kerryites are looking like fools, and most people are starting to wonder about Kerry's veracity.

Kerry has to be sweating harder now than he did during his speech at the DNC convention.
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Everytime he had a choice, Kerry chose to side with communists rather than the United States.