“Suppose for a moment that a large swell had hit the USS Bainbridge just as the three Navy SEALs were squeezing off their shots at the Somali pirates’ heads, making one of the bullets go awry. The surviving pirate surely would have killed Capt. Richard Phillips. Back in the U.S., those with a dim view of Barack Obama would brand the attempted rescue a ‘fiasco,’ betraying Obama’s fecklessness and lack of inner steel. As it happens, the SEALs’ aim was true. So this week, some pundits are lauding Capt. Phillips’ rescue as a demonstration of the president’s competence and coolness.
…this spasm of instant judgment—this macroanalysis of micro events—is now standard operating procedure for a punditocracy that must reach definitive historical verdicts every four hours…Is the stock market down a few hundred points? Obviously, investors are taking a dim view of Obama’s economic rescue plan. What’s that—the market’s back up a few hundred points? Clearly, Obama’s brilliant plan is working.”
— William Falk, Editor-in-Chief, The Week
“…now standard operating procedure for a punditocracy that must reach definitive historical verdicts every four hours.”
…now standard operating procedure for a punditocracy that must reach definitive HYSTERICAL verdicts every four hours.
There, fixed it for ya!
Why do we pay any attention to these pundits? It doesn’t matter what they say or think. What matters? What one does, based on what one’s own experiences and insights, period. The pundits are out there to distract us, make us think that we can’t figure things out on our own. Things like the rich getting richer, the poor poorer, scapegoats invariably are used in order to distract us from going after the real culpirts, the powers that be. Change we can believe in? Yes we can.