One of Kos’ observations in the below quote is of interest to me— read it , then I’ll continue on below…
Daily Kos || Political Analysis and other daily rants on the state of the nation.
Kos:When I first heard Trippi was writing a book, I asked him if it would be a tell-all. He said it wouldn’t. But there is enough campaign dirt to satiate those looking for that sort of information. His feud with Dean’s most trusted aide, Kate O’Connor, is mentioned. So is Dean’s fatal refusal to adhere to any message discipline. And Chris Lehane’s oppo folder over at the Clark campaign. And the disaster that was the Gore endorsement (it forced Dean’s other opponents to train their guns solely on him, a full month from the Iowa caucuses).
But Trippi was clearly not interested in the dirt. (Nor was he interested in crapping on the media work of his former partners at Trippi, McMahon & Squires, which was god-awful.)
Rather, he was interested in the revolution he helped foster.
It’s the “Dean’s fatal refusal to adhere to any message discipline”……which I am applying to another area, the Church. I’m even a bit miffed by the fact that political campaigns really have to do this, but it’s the “nuance” thing again, that bites campaigns. It’s the sound bite and the “selling” of the package. “Message discipline” as a “Church growth” strategy faces similar problems. There, the most glaring problem for me is in the matter of response to war, willingness to call all of this into question; even to bring it up at all. The approach is usually avoid it (discussion; recognition) at all cost (except for the conservative Churches, that simply back it and talk as if this is all just fine, and that Bush is really hearing from God on it — well, I’d say God is probably talking and trying to get through, but…..—–)
Kos goes on:
The campaign failed. But make no mistake — the netroots helped turn Dean from a nobody to the best-funded primary campaign in history, and propelled him to front-runner status in the process. Don’t blame the Internet because the campaign couldn’t close the deal.
I’m not even so sure of all that; I think the media had quite a bit to do with the implosion; the dirty, lying, deceptive slam they did on him with the “screaming thing”; not bothering to explain why he was yelling with such gusto (that the crowd, filtered by the mike, which you didn’t hear, was so loud he couldn’t hear himself). Things like that are so widely circulated (the networks saw to that) , plus the fact that Iowa, which had just disappointed them, is not exactly the Democratic, connected capital of the country. So a poor showing, and lethally damaging negative, cheap PR, and yes, the Gore endorsment waking up the other candidates. Still, I thnk that more of us ought to know better, and lower our trust in the accuracy of the mainstream media. Their aim is MONEY, not liberal, not conservative, MONEY. The Dean Scream was played over and over and over.
I sometimes feel like I’m screaming, or perceived as such, since it seems one has to yell to drown out the “God Bless America” hype; the participation by Church people in the nationalistic fervor which carries with it a requirement of support and “support our President” and “God’s on our side”. Kerry said in his acceptance speech that “We should humbly ask if we are on God’s side”, and that is absolutely right. For the majority of Christians, it seems that the nation comes first. They don’t see it that way, of course. Their theology has been shaped and molded by accomodating a few quid pro quos, a few “scribal edits” and “lifting out of context” and “conveneient contextualization”; maybe a little “selective canon” (emphasizing some areas while ignoring others). It’s what Jim Wallis has often referred to as “The American Bible”
Wallis, from this speech: One member of our group was a very zealous young seminary student and he thought he would try something just to see what might happen. He took an old Bible and a pair of scissors. He cut every single reference to the poor out of the Bible. It took him a very long time.
When he was through, the Bible was very different, because when he came to Amos and read the words, “Let justice roll down like waters and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream,” he just cut it out. When he got to Isaiah and heard the prophet say, “Is not this the fast that I choose: to bring the homeless poor into your home, to break the yoke and let the oppressed go free?” he just cut it right out. All those Psalms that see God as a deliverer of the oppressed, they disappeared.
In the gospels, he came to Mary’s wonderful song where she says, “The mighty will be put down from their thrones, the lowly exalted, the poor filled with good things and the rich sent empty away.” Of course, you can guess what happened to that. In Matthew 25, the section about the least of these, that was gone. Luke 4, Jesus’ very first sermon, what I call his Nazareth manifesto, where he said, “The spirit of the Lord is upon me because he has anointed me to preach good news to poor people” — that was gone, too. “Blessed are the poor,” that was gone.
So much of the Bible was cut out; so much so that when he was through, that old Bible literally was in shreds. It wouldn’t hold together. I held it in my hand and it was falling apart. It was a Bible full of holes. I would often take that Bible out with me to preach. I would hold it high in the air above American congregations and say, “Brothers and sister, this is the American Bible, full of holes from all we have cut out.” We might as well have taken that pair of scissors and just cut out all that we have ignored for such a long time. In America the Bible that we read is full of holes. Video (Real Video)