Here is the mistake we are making: we keep thinking that national politics in America is something other than a result of celebrity, charisma, and the incumbency and nepotism of elite power.

During the remaining 16 years the office was held by two centrist Democrats whose popular appeal was rooted in charisma; but their national name recognition and support would have been impossible without the support of media elites.

The fact that both celebrity presidents were converted Republicans is curious I think.

During 1/3 of those years the president was the former vice president or the son of a vice president, men whose name recognition stemmed from a coat tails effect: incumbency and legacy/nepotism.

You can read these words and agree or disagree, and argue all you want that “freedom of speech” exists. But this is the media equivalent of freedom of speech using one’s own telephone. Reaching a few thousand people with a debatable statement is nothing in a national media landscape.

And though the internet offered the promise of a new era of “free speech,” with expanded reach for the views of non-elite and local interests, again only a handful of national or even global interests control the platforms and algorithms, sculpting exposure and limiting access via search and feed.

This is just like the old days!

Pink Levi’s t-shirt and a sparkly fedora

And would you believe... that all "religious sounding language" is produced by "secular people"?

I mean… depends on what you mean by “nation.” The only thing the Stele proves is that the term was used by the Egyptians as an ethnonym for some group in the Levant.

yep its a bad scene... requires a complete retool of college teaching

Ahh the mythical three year Bachelor’s degree. Surely that will solve the problems