Leadership Vs. The Separation of Powers

The CNN headline today reads “Obama gets an ‘A’ for effort from Schwarzenegger“. I had a good laugh at this one.

When Swarzenegger was running for Governator, I was of the opinion that he had a good environmental and fiscal platform and that he had a large multi-partisan base. I found myself at odds with others on the right who were voting for him because of his ‘character’, and because he was going to go in there and clean house, squeeze some pencil-neck bureaucrats, etc. Clearly, this wasn’t the case.

Swarzenegger found out in short order that the legislature was dug in and had no obligation to do what he wished. He has turned out to be a slightly better than average governor on the sense that he has done little harm; done little of anything in fact. It’s not for lack of trying, but the way our government is set up.

One branch of government can do very little without the cooperation of at least one other branch. I had higher hopes for Obama. He went into  this with an extremely strong mandate and a knack for finding common ground between opposing groups. Thus far, his failings have been the opposite of those of the Governator; he has been too trusting and willing to compromise. He has passed some of the most massive legislations in history, but only after all that is good in them has been sucked out and replaced with corporate welfare, and done so by his own supposed allies.

I found the above headline funny because I get the feeling both of them are looking at each other and saying, “wow, this isn’t as easy as it looks”.

How Dumb Should the Media Be?

The question of how to report to an often ignorant audience is a serious one. Each network has their own style, and as Jon Stewart illustrates in the above clip, they tend to set their sights on the lowest common denominator. This does the people a disservice. It gives viewers the impression that their ignorance is ok, the norm, or even desirable.

From a ratings standpoint, this makes sense. People who are more afraid of appearing ignorant than being ignorant flock to such shows. They are easily directed and stirred to action. This spreads not only the ignorance, but the desire in other media to appeal to this audience. The result is a saturation of media with dumb content, while creating a divide between between itself and the more intellectual providers that becomes too intimidating to cross.

We should endeavor to provide content that is a bit beyond the average viewer, to encourage them to better themselves, and to give them what they came for: information they didn’t already know.