Keith Olberman

Sunday, January 23, 2011

Keith Olberman is the last "Angry Man" of what I call "opinion journalism. Some of us "older folks' remember and read and seen the film from the book of the same title by Gerald Green. The book is a family doctor, Green's father, a good one, a cranky man because of the lies, corruption, and injustices that he saw all around him that outraged him. He was, above all, a moral man. You could be describing Keith Olberman.

There is no question that Keith acted "over the top" regarding his very strong opinions, in particular his feuds with former bosses and some of the most heinous right wing talk show hosts, notably Bill O'Reilly. Like Gerald Green's angry man, Keith shined his strong journalist light on "what is really doing", or, for the most moral of us it was as close to the "truth" as you can get. 

The standard response to Keith's aggressive search for what's really going on is that he is a "leftie". It is the standard tactic to scare the public away from a person, a kind of branding akin to the too often used political label "socialist". His reply to such charges is: "I am an American".

What has happened to "Americans" in the last two years is scandalous. Lies about the birth place of President Obama; a serious revival of racism; a different kind of ethnocentrism mainly directed a immigrants mostly "of color"; the cheating and profiteering of the banking and financing community that are largely responsible for the economic meltdown, that has used TARP funds to gamble some more and pay themselves bonuses; the pledge by the incoming Republican House majority to reverse Obamacare that already benefits its constituents; and the massive moral confusion so many people, faced with economic disaster or not, feel as to what is good and bad, right and wrong.

To many this defense, this disposition of our moral confusion, of what I have written is often termed "soft". What is "hard" is the need and exercise of hegemony that reflects America's strength, competitiveness that pushes out "the small people', the disregard of people in need because they can't pull themselves up by their bootstraps, and, lately, the assassination of a member of Congress whose democratic politics burn in the minds of Arizonans and may have contributed to the hate of the shooter, though the connection is weak. But the America of Keith Olberman is about "equity" and "fairness" that is far more inclusive than the tough behavior of those who want to silence him.

It is time to look aside from Keith's sometimes outrageous pursuit of "the truth", and visualize what he means by being "an American.

 

 

Comments

[vibram five fingers]

a different kind of ethnocentrism mainly directed a immigrants mostly "of color"

[vibram five fingers]

the need and exercise of hegemony that reflects America's strength, competitiveness that pushes out "the small people'

[Evering2010]

Thak you for sharing them with us , I think it's worth reading