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Okay, I’m just going to do this and maybe it will relieve some of this “congestion of the brain.” (I learned yesterday that apparently this was a commonly-cited medical condition in the Victorian Age; along the same lines of Alan Moore’s musings in Voice of the Fire I suspect it may be due for a comeback.)

I’m a little weirded-out, since Christmas. Those days between Christmas and the New Year are always kind of an odd limbo, IMO, mind you; it’s like we’re left with this vexing stub at the end of every year as a result of the historical accidents which see the actual Solstice, our beginning-of-winter festival of light, and the change of the calendar year on three different days.

I still don’t feel quite right, though, even per what usually passes for “normal” with me. Everything just seems awfully depressing. What’s the point, how can anyone really be hopeful for the future?

People can, obviously, and I do marvel at it. Today, The Economist front page had a story from its print edition, from back in November, which I’d not seen before. In which the remarkable Arianna Huffington manages to look around American and note the plentiful evidence of a slide toward “third world” status… and then suggest that “2011 is going to be all about hope 2.0.” Seriously? You’re older and wiser than me, good woman, so I would be happy to believe you’re right, but, wow. I don’t know how one can stare into the abyss and see redemption in the darkness, like that. (more…)

If I see one more of these various stories about the incoming Republican congress’ pledge to “repeal health care reform,” I think my eyes may roll out of my head entirely. I mean, what’s the point, right? Reactionaries’ assaults via the legal system (and where are the schoolmarmish types who are always clucking with disapproval over liberals‘ alleged use of the courts as an end-run around legislative action, by the way?) may lead to something of significance, but House Republicans’ huffing and puffing and threatening to blow our health care reform down?

Yeah: absolutely meaningless. They can pass whatever they want; guess what? Killed in the Senate! (Welcome to our world, fuckers.) And if it weren’t, guess what? Vetoed by the President. (He’s still The Decider, remember?) So who the fuck cares that Freddie the Freshman Congressman from Teaparty, Indiana is wetting his pants with excitement about the opportunity to repeal that evil ol’ socialist Obamacare?

Honestly, our media is normally so literally reactionary… and when they make an exception and attempt to anticipate something for once? It’s completely irrelevant. Pulitzer’s ghost, what a lot of ninnies.

This sound and fury hasn’t been entirely without benefit, at least for me, though. Because in reflecting further on the prospects for what happens to health care reform, in the months and years ahead, I’ve realized that for once, Democrats may actually have achieved a pretty confounding strategic victory over their opponents. (more…)

I do not get mainstream anglophone news media’s sudden decision to report that “liberals/Democrats are unhappy with President Barack Obama” since the announcement of the recent tax-cuts-for-unemployment extension deal. Everywhere this latter development is mentioned, there is at least one story on the former; in some cases libdem discontent actually seems to be treated with more importance.

Can someone explain this to me, please? Liberal Democrats are nearly always unhappy. Where is the news? If it’s because discontent with Obama is causing a “rupture” between the president and “his base of support,” we’ve been dissatisfied with him for quite a while, also. Again, where is the news?

And why is it considered relevant to anything, since as political journalists and talking heads constantly remind us, liberals/Democrats are all a bunch of congenitally-ineffective pussies? If these stories are meant to imply that our ire may actually have consequences… how? If not, what’s the point? One big collective Nelson Mundt “HA ha?”

Frankly, I’m not even so much out to criticize here, for once, as I am terribly curious about the mechanics of how this works. If we assume that 75% of these stories are being written simply because it’s now an established story, and everyone feels obligated to cover it, how did it get started? How did this suddenly get enough attention in the first place to reach that magic tipping point?

Is it that, now, the important people are complaining volubly for the first time? Members of congress, Hill staffers, people with big checkbooks, people who actually count within Beltway journalists’ tiny horizon of awareness, is that it?

I’m just curious about how something goes from being beneath the notice of the national conversation one day to front-page news the next. Maybe some enterprising Wikileaker could help him or herself to a list of these Important People and share it with us for Christmas, complete with e-mail addresses, phone numbers, Twitter accounts, etc.? If you really want to stir up some shit, after all…