Changed Times

I have been hoping to get the time to go back and do some research on editorials and articles from the early ‘90s when Republicans would threaten an occasional filibuster, or bottle some things up with Senate rules. The time isn’t happening, but the true value of a blog is that I don’t need to check my facts nearly so closely as say, Dan Rather and CBS. Can we all agree that one word that was rather common in the whole ’90s, and certainly when a filibuster was threatened, was “obstruction”? Why is it we don’t hear that word in the media anymore?

Another huge lament from the ‘90s was “partisan politics”, and “the politics of personal destruction”. Now in Clinton’s case we know he had a long history of grope the help, dropping his trousers in front of subordinates, and actually having sex at the office. Of course, he at a lot of trouble with the definition of “is”, let alone the definition of “sex”. In any case, the media spent a lot of time on “why are we wasting our time on these personal matters”? “Why can’t we focus on the issues”? “How horrible it is that our politics have become so mean, partisan, and personal”. While they didn’t always spell it out who the culprits were, it was obvious it was those evil Republicans. As Hillary pointed out on the Today Show, her husband was beset by “the vast right wing conspiracy”. Actually, lack of good dry cleaning was also a significant problem, but “conspiracy” seems much more reasoned.

How times have changed. The sacred right of filibuster is suddenly the most important protector of America. The term “obstruction” has been removed from the language. Gone is the media whining about “the President was elected, why do we have a MINORITY in the Senate trying to thwart the will of the voters?”. Both the NY Times and the Minneapolis Star Trib called for a change to the filibuster rules when it was Clinton appointees on the line. Now, any attempt to work around the sacred device is a constitutional shop of horrors.

I understand that the standards for Ambassador to the UN are MUCH higher than those for a President, but are we REALLY talking seriously about “he yelled at me”? “He was intimidating”? This is from high level government employees. Aside from the fact that it is hard to imagine the embarrassment of whining about a former boss years after the fact when you weren’t able to stand up to him then, the level of “personal destruction” seems to have “kicked up a notch”.

Paula Jones was considered WAY out of line to even bring up a charge that the then Governor had invited her up to his room, dropped his trousers, and asked for oral sex. The standard media line was “they were both adults” … in the Clinton case, that trumped the superior / subordinate factor. Today, we have have the same major media outlets that were willing to defend Clinton no matter what the charge, expecting us to see “he yelled at me” as being a disqualification for Ambassador to the UN. In the Clinton case, the world situation was so crucial, that ANY time taken away from the “work of the duly elected President” was unconscionable. Back then there were cruise missiles to be launched at camels, donations to be garnered, and felons to be pardoned … those kinds of key assignments were just too precious to interrupt. Today on the other hand, no charge is too small to slow or stop the business of Government … with Republicans in charge, not much the media likes is going to happen, so endless maneuvering and ethics dances are an excellent way to spend the time.

The sad thing about this is that even with Lexus/Nexus and 1000 quotes, those with a religious faith in the “no media bias” view would never see things this way. The left always finds the “faith” of the religious to be “scary / backward / closed minded”. The most conservative Christian out there is positively open minded compared to an average lefty on the subject of media bias.