Skip to main content

Who is Howard Dean's media trainer?

flashvars="'config="http://www.comedycentral.com/motherload/xml/data_synd.jhtml?vid="87101%26myspace="false'" src="'http://www.comedycentral.com/motherload/syndicated_player/index.jhtml'" quality="'high'" bgcolor="'#006699'" width="'340'" height="'325'" name="'comedy_player'" align="'middle'" allowscriptaccess="'always'" allownetworking="'external'" type="'application/x-shockwave-flash'" pluginspage="'http://www.macromedia.com/go/getflashplayer'">

Because that person deserves a pat on the back. Dean nailed his appearance on The Colbert Report last night. Okay, it wasn't Face the Nation, but I would argue that makes it even more impressive--it would have been so easy for Dean to just take the lines Colbert was feeding him, but he actually turned them around into key messages. I particularly liked when Colbert asked Dean if he thought the midterm elections were a referendum on the administration--Dean said yes, then Colbert asked if he thought the 2008 elections would be a referendum on the administration. The rhythm of the questions was exactly the same, basically set up for Dean to say "Yes" to the second question--easy answer, easy laugh--but instead Dean said the 2008 elections would show Democrats to have the better candidates. Small point, but hey, that's the major message pitfall of Democrats and Unitarians: defining ourselves as "not the other guy". Is it sad I got so excited about this? Considering studies show that Daily Show and Colbert Report viewers are more informed than Fox News viewers, I think not.

p.s. What is sad is that every time I tried typing "Colbert Report" I typed "Colber Repor" instead. This is what happens to your brain when it crashes after finishing a 45 page thesis.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

This post was a whole long longer and more emotional an hour ago...

First off: It's sad that I get better wireless reception in my backyard than in my apartment, right? Sigh. I normally try to stay out of the quagmire that is the abortion debate, but as usually, elyzabethe wrote something insightful about feminist issues that I had to comment on. Actually, I had to comment on the framing war that was going on in the comments section between elyzabethe and another friend. Then I ended up emailing back and forth with her for awhile. Then someone at work mentioned how the "choice" frame is starting to lose ground, even though advocates don't want to admit it. I started scribbling notes, sighed, and thought, "well, I'm gonna have to blog about this." Elyzabeth rants often against anti-choice organizations and legislation, as is her wont as a libertarian feminist. She’s particularly good at teasing out how anti-choice (A, if you’re reading this, bear with me, I’m referring to ‘anti-choice’ as more than just the abortion issu...

I'll show you my danelions if you show me your industry credentials

Okay, kids, we're going to talk about breast feeding versus bottle feeding again in framing class today, so no giggling (you know who you are). I was looking over someone's shoulder on the Metro today and reading an article titled " HHS Toned Down Breast-Feeding Ads ", which reads like a continuation of the administration's meddling in public health : In an attempt to raise the nation's historically low rate of breast-feeding, federal health officials commissioned an attention-grabbing advertising campaign a few years ago to convince mothers that their babies faced real health risks if they did not breast-feed. It featured striking photos of insulin syringes and asthma inhalers topped with rubber nipples. -snip- The ads ran instead with more friendly images of dandelions and cherry-topped ice cream scoops, to dramatize how breast-feeding could help avert respiratory problems and obesity. According to the article, the formula industry didn't block the ads ...

"Cows rise up!" Spokecow proclaims.

At noon on Monday, the Environmental Working Group launched a new farm subsidies database profiling the 358,070 people who've gotten over $34.75 billion in federal subsidies. Twenty-four hours later, the database was already getting 7,000 hits per hour on the new database. Two days later, the website still took five minutes to load. Why all the interest? Well, why did Microsoft's Paul Allen get $30,687 in farm subsidies between 2003-2005? Right here would be a great place for a pun about something smelling like manure, but I don't want to offend any cows, especially since they're organizing .