FIGHTING AN UPHILL BATTLE...

...to set the record straight on any given day.

I was up in Lenox Mass. yesterday morning driving on a stretch of road I hadn't been on in a while, 7A. It had been widened and mostly repaved, so the ride was quicker, safer, and more efficient. There was a sign saying something about the "American Recovery Act" or something, but it had way too many words to comprehend as you drove by.

What it should have said was: "Obama and the Democrats made this happen." And that's what Obama and the Democrats should be saying too.

But the right not only gets more air time and has more influence on the messages we get these days (it would seem even on the comments on this blog, even from those on the left!, because we spend way too much time defending the president and his party or responding to rightwing ploys to change the subject or divert our attention etc. from what's really going on!) it also has mastered the art of propaganda, "The Big Lie," and other media manipulation tactics and the left is still back in the 1960s, or actually even further back, at least in the '60s we knew how to get the media's attention.

And for those on the right who would point out how short the section of route 7A is that I saw improvement on yesterday morning, or how elitist that neighborhood is compared to the supposed "real Americans" the right pretends to represent (but actually exploits for the benefit of the corporations they are in thrall to), I can point out that a much more complex use of a lot more manpower can be seen on a stretch of 78 and the Garden State Parkway in Newark and environs back in Jersey—urban, economically hurting, and much in need of jobs—also funded by Obama and the Dems' stimulus package.

But the right is still able to use the magician's trick of distracting with showmanship with one hand while doing the actual deed with the hidden other hand, as in convincing a lot of our fellow citizens that Obama bailed out the banks that Bush Jr. did, and that the stimulus hasn't done anything for the economy and jobs when it is doing just that every day.

Only not enough, which is the substance of Obama and the Dems' problem (beyond their problem with getting their story out to people and the media in a concise and clear way). The stimulus package should have been at least twice as big and the manpower projects twice as ambitious (not just improving some of our nation's infrastructure, but all of it and quickly, etc.).

But as we will see from comments here and elsewhere, and on most news shows and everywhere politics are debated or even just talked about, the right will try to dominate—and be successful at it most of the time—the discussion with misdirection, misinformation, and their distortion or outright lie of the day, and they'll all stay on message about it until their masters change the message for the next round of headlines and punditry.

[PS: For those who can't access the links on my second comment below, here and here they are.]