Intellectuals have long expressed concern about the media’s potential for diminishing the quality of our culture. We should be more concerned by the ability of a ‘sound bite’ to diminish the quality of our political debate.

An election is looming – thankfully – and the quality of main stream media coverage has deteriorated sharply, driven by the press releases of the main contenders.

We are invited to discuss whether David Cameron has been air-brushed or not, ala the archetypal Cosmopolitan article.It is not his wrinkles, acne, boils, pustules, or hairy ears that we will be electing, but his fiscal and social priorities, yet we are steered in the direction of his appearance.

We are invited to view the latest episode of Aliens – is Gordon ‘ my children aren’t props, they’re people’ Brown human or not? Piers Morgan, his old friend, is given the scoop opportunity to show that Gordon is human, yeah, he has emotions, watch him cry, watch his wife cry, (and a tip of the Raccoon tail to Will Sturgeon’s perfect sound bite ‘tears for Piers’) and then press the red interactive button to vote him out of the house. It’s not whether he can cry over his dead child that we should be electing, but whether he reduces us to tears or not with his policies.

Alistair Campbell is wheeled out of rehab onto the Marr show, not to discuss the influence of the spinmeisters on political debate, which could have been relevant, but to display his emotions at being accused of having ‘sexed up’ the evidence that has sent so many men to the graves. Yeah, he stopped talking for a full minute and the media are submerged in a paroxysm of delight as they discuss the reason why the great communicator might have shut up for a full minute.

Let it all hang out emotion everywhere – yet little serious coverage of the announcement that there will be a March budget – beyond the fear mongering ‘Rich will bear the cost’; who else do they imagine could put back into the economy the money that ‘escaped’ into the hands of – the rich? It is beyond infantile reporting, its is scandalous dereliction of duty on the part of the media. They are happily reducing this election to the level of an episode of the Jeremy Kyle show.

Ministers now refer to ‘white enclaves‘ in a phrases that reeks of fear that perhaps there are some small isolated patches of Britain that think beyond sound bites and cartoon style reporting that all is well and Nanny will protect you from the big band wolves out there. The desire of those ‘enclaves’ to retain something of their existing way of life is seen as ‘extremeism’ and in need of £12 million pounds worth of ‘re-education’.

In other areas, Ministers are keen to engage with ‘community leaders’, in the white enclaves they only want to re-educate. Yet 12 long, almost unendurable, years ago, those ‘enclaves’ were the bed rock of Labour support.

The much heralded television debate between the main contenders is discussed in terms of who is demanding that their best profile be side lit, how many cheer leaders they can pack the audience with to boo and cheer as directed. Will they employ a warm up artiste to put the audience in a suitable frame of mind?

The right to vote is discussed in terms of making it easier to vote – not by giving us the real facts that would enable informed choice, but by giving us a fancy button on our computers, so that it needn’t take too much effort on our part. The learning disabled are to be encouraged to vote – by means of someone showing them how to put a cross on the ballot peper, not by someone educating them as to the difference in political beliefs. Postal votes are available for your community leader to collect your vote – you don’t even need to walk down to the polling station.

Does anybody doubt that if Katie ‘Jordon’ Price was on the ballot paper, she would be Prime Minister by the end of the week? If all that counts is being able to cry on Piers Morgan, no wrinkles and the ability to keep your name, and other assets, in the mind of the most intellectually challenged for as long as it takes to press a button on your computer, I’ll put my money on Katie.

1
Kenny
February 13, 2010 at 09:47

“Does anybody doubt that if Katie

2
Saul
February 13, 2010 at 10:03

Phwoaaarrr!!!!

3
Rog
February 13, 2010 at 10:04

I know of no-one that gives a tinkers cuss for the tears of Brown or Campbell.
After 13 years of lies and deceit even the simplest soul has hardened.

4
Saul
February 13, 2010 at 10:10

I’ve just realised there was a post there as well as the picture!

We are going through a transition in the way they vie for our vote. It is becoming like the US where it is all about individuals and personalities.
Historically people vote for the rosette and not for the candidate. If they can get us to vote on the image of the person rather than policies, then they have got it made.

Whoever has the best spin will win.

5
Anna Raccoon
February 13, 2010 at 10:43

Diminishing eyesight Saul?

6
sickofit
February 13, 2010 at 10:27

The truth is Katie Price would be a better Prime Minister than the man playing his dead kid card to try and hang on!
Wouldn’t a caring wife prevent her husband from trawling their families deepest sadness across a television special with an arse like Morgan?
I would argue yes she would so it follows Sarah Brown is as mad and bad as Gordon so bring on Katie Price.

7
Furor Teutonicus
February 13, 2010 at 10:42

Katie Price?

More silicon in that than Bill Gates could DREAM of owning.

8
Blink
February 13, 2010 at 10:50

I’ve just thrown up on my keyboard

9
The Slogger
February 13, 2010 at 10:51

Sarah, Sarah off the wall
who is the foulest spouse of all?

I have dealt with Piers Morgan the Romping Arse. He is an unpleasant, stupid reptile who – offered by my good self the Brown-on-pills story on a plate – wrote back a vile email demanding I ‘stop wasting his time’.

Just hear those names celeb clanging to the floor….fear not: the unliving brain-death watching tomorrow night’s tearful tableau will not vote, as they melded into the sofa long ago.

Simon Cowell is planning (I’m told by media Johnnies) a game show based on questions about the ‘Hello’ side of politicians’ lives.

It’s Rome, AD 102 chaps. Berlin, 1931. Saigon, 1973. The Tsunami of Sodomites and Gommorralorra bollocks is upon us.

xx

10
Anna Raccoon
February 13, 2010 at 10:54

Never mind Slogger, the fragrant Anna Raccoon gave you wall space for your Brown-on-Pills story, Piers just doesn’t have my eye for a story does he…..

11
Saul
February 13, 2010 at 10:54

Not quite blind, yet.

12
T. P. Fuller
February 13, 2010 at 12:06

A most flattering pic of the old slapper.

Anna, I blame the telly. Chez Fuller there is no longer a telly and life is sweet. I recommend junking your set to anyone who still retains a few brain-cells. There is even evidence that the mere act of watching it produces chemical effects which eventually have a permanent effect on the ability to think.

Lookee here: http://www.cognitiveliberty.org/5jcl/5JCL59.htm

13
lenko
February 13, 2010 at 13:15

Katie Price… hmmm… quiet, retiring personality… doesn’t court publicity… huge bazooka’s…. Yes, I could go with that.

And with her as PM, and Sarah Palin the next US Prez — what could possibly go wrong?

14
Marchamont
February 13, 2010 at 14:47

She’s a repulsive chav slapper that I wouldn’t touch with a bargepole.

Couldn’t be a worse PM than the current one though.

15
Alan
February 13, 2010 at 16:40

The move towards politicians as celebrities is turning people off politics. Perhaps Katie Price could turn us on. I think she would have to have some weighty policies behind those magnificent mammaries to succeed though. Did Americans vote for Ronald Reagan because he was a movie actor or because his policies were that of small Government, personal responsibility, lower taxes, etc?

Given that differences in policy between the main parties is so slight differences in superficial matters are percieved to be the battleground. The cretins at the tops of parties are stuck within an ever decreasing universe of attention and are getting more desperate for it. Rather than the whole of the electorate being divvied up based on policies there is a vast lump they have abandoned and now want as much of the remainder as they can, and as they all sound and behave like politicians in the pejorative sense they cannot get it on policy. We are perhaps our own worst enemies though. Politicians are tending towards our expectation of politicians.

The least risky path for a party is to sound like the one already in Government. Labour got in because they did this but weren’t (then) tainted by sleaze.(but only because the media weren’t reporting it) The weird thing is that on a constituency level things can be very, very different with local issues being the cornerstone of some political campaigns. Stepping up to the national level everything becomes homogeonised. That is the deleterious effect Party politics has. The party gave you a hand up, you’ve now got to toe the party line. It is the Party that gets it’s name in lights across the nation. The point of consituencies has almost become defunct.

It needn’t be this way though. There is an increasing number of people who don’t vote let alone have a minority vote. No attempt is being made to attract those people, presumably because no mainstream party dare talk of the policies that would attract them and few constiuency candidates have the nouse or spine to represent their consituency more and their party less. Many of the issues stem from one thing – our membership of the EU. How much we are restrained by Brussels. How much we are directed by Brussels. How poorly Westminster protects us from Brussels. How little say we have had in that process.

16
Billy The Fish
February 13, 2010 at 18:05

I’d vote for the used and partially-deflated saline contents of Price’s last nork-op over any of the leaders of the three main parties…

17
Gloria Smudd
February 13, 2010 at 19:39

How strange! Just today I found something very similar to Ms Katie-Jordan’s outfit lurking at the bottom of my wardrobe! I wonder if it still fits ….

18
Ancient and Tattered Airman
February 13, 2010 at 19:57

Oh Gloria! Was it lurking or hiding? Be honest now.

19
Gloria Smudd
February 13, 2010 at 20:21

Good point, A&TA. Once I’d wrenched it from under some other unlikely garments, I have to admit it had a distinctly cowering air to it. And it was full of moth-holes. Imagine, if you will, the extent of the renting-assunder I have just experienced attempting to persuade a sexy number about my now over-ample form.

Thus humiliated, I shall now retire.

20
Gloria Smudd
February 13, 2010 at 20:29

Spare a thought for poor, unsuspecting Mr Smudd (now I’m in it, I can’t get it off).

21
Saul
February 13, 2010 at 21:42

Spare a thought for the local Fire Brigade.

Sounds like a job for the “Jaws of life”!

22
binlid
February 13, 2010 at 22:32

Just imagine…
Katie Price becomes Prime Minister.
Who do you think is Chancellor?
Kerry Katona!
Cripes.

23
Thaddeus J. Wilson
February 14, 2010 at 12:05

After admiring that photo for an unfeasibly long time, I can only say: “Cor!”

24
Saul
February 14, 2010 at 18:54

I’m just revisiting this Post to see if the Fire Brigade have managed to free Ms Smudd yet.

(honestly)