Political Consultants assume Americans are totally depoliticized, and they seem to be correct

[arendt]

The two primary features of the post political age are a politics completely drained of all its contents and ability or willingness to be used as an agent of change in social or economic policy, and its full integrations into the world of American popular, consumer and entertainment culture. To such an extent that there exists today a seamless web between our political, economic, media and consumer cultures wherein the modes and values of one are completely integrated and compatible with the others...

In such a setting our political choices like our consumer choices, regardless of the product, are primarily about what makes us more fulfilled and feel better about ourselves.

Senator Obama's campaign understood much better the impact of these changes on our electoral system than any of his opponents' campaigns. In the post political world, the campaign that is less political and less issue-based but is savvier in using new modes of communication technology will be the campaign to win the greatest market share of the electorate. The candidate in this case, Obama, was not a political entity but, in essence a product, an ornament that made his supporters feel better about themselves...

John Edwards campaign on the other hand was dead on arrival. His theme and emphasis was America's ever widening class differences, a platform as truthful as it was irrelevant. The use of the word "class" will end any political career in America. That truth violates the primary narrative that our elite use to justify their legitimacy, which is the supposed meritocratic nature of America society. The post political constituencies have absolutely no interest in class, whose very acknowledgment are the bases of all real politics and whose acknowledgement would only lead to an existential crisis in its ranks. In the post political period the only differences allowed can be in style and modes of consumption.

- Joe Bageant, "Life In the Post Political Age"

http://www.smirkingchimp.com/print/16042/

I read this article, and found nothing to disagree with. It is merely a restatement of what Thomas Frank covered in the 1990s in a brilliant series of essays, collected by Lewis Lapham , with titles like "Commodify Your Dissent", and "The Rebel Consumer".

All that remained was for the political operatives to turn Mr. Frank's insight into their SOP. That's been done. All the candidates are, more than ever, packaged and sold like energy drink. When Nixon did it, he came across phony. Today, its all an entire generation has ever seen. The new generation think politics was always about nothing more than personalities and gotcha. That media wasn't always nothing but pro-GOP spin and anti-Dem slander. They have no experience to the contrary.

I would love to believe that the majority of people vote because they understand the issues. But, based on what I have seen at DU, people vote, as the author says, for "what makes us more fulfilled and feel better about ourselves". They vote for celebrity images, not issues.

Even if Bush hadn't bludgeoned democracy to death from above, the corporatization of politics and media has poisoned it from below.

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This meaningless, but extremely well-delivered, speech in Berlin just convinces me that people have no clue what democracy is about. If they did, they would be spending their precious time screaming for Nancy Pelosi's head on a platter for appointing Porter (pal of Felix Rodriguez) Goss as ETHICS chair of the House, instead of yammering on about yet another vague, but uplifting, speech.

I'm not against Obama. I'm voting for him. No contest. I just have a different set of priorities. Namely saving meaningful popular democracy in this corporate-ruled hellhole of a country.

Goss is one more big shovel full of dirt onto the corpse of our democracy. (Why is the Democratic leadership APPOINTING known CIA/neocon operatives??? An "ethics" appointment for this slimeball is a slap in the face to every honest politician.) Obama's speech is merely a media event that changes nothing about Obama's policies. (And we already know his policies; so what's the news? The news is that he is "popular".)

Judge our priorities by the amount of coverage these two events get.

Then, tell me we are still a democracy, in the political sense of the word.

arendt

[NMDemDist2]

1. K&N, everything is based on it's 'entertainment' value rather than

anything that has depth or meaning

[Hippo_Tron]

2. Sorry, but this has been going on since Andrew Jackson

People in the south voted for Andrew Jackson because he was a redneck and a famous General who made people feel like he was one of them. People in the north voted for Andrew Jackson because Van Buren's political machine promised them homes and jobs if they did. Needless to say, I don't think too many people voting for him really understood the intricacies of how the Bank of the United States worked or any of his other major policy initiatives.

Jackson's time was also really when we first started to have popular elections for electors. Before then electors were chosen mostly by state legislatures. So really, it's a phenomenon as old as voting.

And after a decade of losing elections with people like John Quincy Adams, Henry Clay, and Daniel Webster the Whigs finally wised up and ran a redneck General named William Henry Harrison in 1840. Politics is all about marketing. And whichever party does better marketing wins the election. Fortunately if you win, you can at least do a few good things.

[stillcool]

3. We've been heading down this road..

for a long time. The Pentagon is the seat of government in this country. I can not imagine any one person who could possibly curb the never-ending over-reach of the United States empire, and how that impacts our daily lives. Nothing will change unless the American people can get it together..and obviously, that's not going to happen. So in the meantime let's talk about how fucked up Obama is.

[Marr]

4. I agree with much of it as well-- but we're just one one economic calamity away from

become an extremely political culture. Americans have been fat and happy and all too willing to watch passively from the sidelines while munching their Cheetos. But you take away those Cheetos and the spectators will quickly become angry-- and they'll want someone to blame.