Pravda-ish

How far through the looking glass are we?

I thought I would live to see a lot of things.

One of them was never “Matt Taibb as a principled dissenter from the main stream media is narrative”.

And yet, here we are. In this case, discussing his collection of Cold War Soviet newspapers:

Reality in Soviet news was 100% binary, with all people either heroes or villains, and the villains all in league with one another (an SR was no better than a fascist or a “Right-Trotskyite Bandit,” a kind of proto-horseshoe theory). Other ideas were not represented, except to be attacked and deconstructed. Also, since anything good was all good, politicians were not described as people at all but paragons of limitless virtue — 95% of most issues of Pravda or Izvestia were just names of party leaders surrounded by lists of applause-words, like “glittering,” “full-hearted,” “wise,” “mighty,” “courageous,” “in complete moral-political union with the people,” etc.

Some of the headlines in the U.S. press lately sound suspiciously like this kind of work:

— Biden stimulus showers money on Americans, sharply cutting poverty

— Champion of the middle class comes to the aid of the poor

— Biden’s historic victory for America 

The most Soviet of the recent efforts didn’t have a classically Soviet headline. “Comedians are struggling to parody Biden. Let’s hope this doesn’t last,” read the Washington Post opinion piece by Richard Zoglin, arguing that Biden is the first president in generations who might be “impervious to impressionists.” Zoglin contended Biden is “impregnable” to parody, his voice being too “devoid of obvious quirks,” his manner too “muted and self-effacing” to offer comedians much to work with. He was talking about this person.

Forget that the “impregnable to parody” pol spent the last campaign year jamming fingers in the sternums of voters, challenging them to pushup contests, calling them “lying dog-faced pony soldiers,” and forgetting what state he was in. Biden, on the day Zoglin ran his piece, couldn’t remember the name of his Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, and referred to the Department of Defense as “that outfit over there”:

The whole thing is worth a read, unless you want to cling to any illusions that the “elite” media is anything like what you were taught in Journalism 101.

12 thoughts on “Pravda-ish

  1. Well, Greg, non-blacks are being told — by black people — that authentic male blackness is defined by drug addiction and violent criminality, and authentic female blackness is defined by arrogance and rudeness,

  2. Hmmm… was zoglin writing this while watching Dana Carvey’s awesome impersonation of the dimwitt? Talk about pravda-ish!

  3. “and authentic female blackness is defined by arrogance and rudeness”

    And knife fighting.

  4. The longer his handlers keep propping him up in office before Commala ascends to her rightful throne via the 25th amendment, the more subject material comedians will have. Whether or not they choose to use it, which will undoubtedly invoke the wrath of the sensitive, woke, SJW “Dementia is better than Trump” cancel culture mob, is up to them.

    Dave Chapelle could do it.

  5. Greg, I clicked on over to read that article (I haven’t been to CNNLOL in decades) and I was actually laughing out loud. Someone in the office said “hey send me that video, I could use a laugh”. Little did he know.

    It takes a LOT of college to say things like that. You see, Kommie Harris isn’t clueless, classless, and total incapable of the job she has. She’s just authentically black now. She’s just not going to do the minstrel show for whitey anymore. She’s brilliant!

  6. The truth is that Kamala is a terible politician. She literally slept her way to being the Dem senate nominee in a state where that guaranteed her election. She only got the VP post because she was the most interectional candidate.
    But she is smart enough to distance herself as much as she can from the shit show on the southern border.
    That’s the truth. It is what is really going on.
    And no democrat can admit it.

  7. #nevertrumper Charles Cooke on the journalist class:
    If I were to ask an average person what they thought of what happened on MSNBC or Fox last night, I would elicit a confused stare, followed by a muttered apology that they’d love to stand and talk but that they are late for the school concert or for church or for work or for doing anything other than talking about the crazed musings of Joy Reid or Sean Hannity. If I were to ask an average person whether they are “burned out” by American politics, I would likely be regarded as the sort of person to leave off the invite list next time a child has a birthday party. And if I were to suggest to someone that they might think about quitting their job because of the events of January 6, I would run the risk of being put into an asylum. There are more things in heaven and Earth than are dreamt of in our philosophy. We deserve better “big pictures” than these.

    https://www.nationalreview.com/2021/06/have-journalists-ever-met-the-people-they-write-about/

    It is worth remebering that on a typical night, Hannity — who we are assured by the Left is leading Americans around by the nose — has about 3.5 million viewers. That is 1% of the population of the United States. Trump got nearly 75,000,000 votes last November 3rd. I would bet most of his voters wouldn’t recognize the name “Hannity.” Or “Tucker Carlson.”

  8. It’s just typical left wing hypocrisy that the San Francisco Ho’s family owned slaves and she all but called Joey Demento a racissss during the debates, but gets a pass. But then, all Democrats get a pass.

  9. Regarding Ms.Harris, it strikes me as a bad thing that she’s so “good” at deflecting responsibility for the job she arguably isn’t doing. Um, you’re the border czar, you’ve yet to have a press conference, yet to announce a plan, yet to go to the border, and it’s “only” day 80 or so?

    Oops, better blame somebody else. Hopefully voters are getting wise to it.

  10. I have two or three dozen friends and relatives I know well enough to know whether or not they have twitter or FB accounts.
    None of them have twitter or FB accounts, other than one relative who uses twitter and FB to promote her graphic arts business. No politics.
    Yet from what I read, including from R wing sources, not having a viable presence on FB and twitter is the kiss of death, commercially.
    Few of the people I know spend more than a few minutes a week at a computer, and then, when they use it, they use it to accomplish specific tasks or play games.
    Phones are used mostly to listen to music or send & receive messages from people they know personally.
    Something is rotten. The tiny percentage of people who work in advertising, politics, and the media seem to think that because their lives and careers are oriented towards social media, so too are the lives of ordinary Americans who do not work in politics, media, and advertizing.

  11. I’m on my computer most of the day and night. I work from home, with folks all over the world, and I keep a Facebook tab open even though a large number of my friends don’t post much anymore. I’d say 75% of my FB feed comes from the Crap Wildlife Photography page. I may post something half a dozen times a week, but it’s never about any “important” issues of the day; I don’t want to read the same memes and chants over and over, even from people I agree with, so I don’t subject others to the same.

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