Last week a bunch of “journalists” got really pissy because some other “journalists” were named in a WikiLeek. Apparently the gournos had gotten pretty “cozy” with the Clinton campaign, inasmuch as that they were on… a conference call with Hillary? And then said they were going to be pro-Hillary and anti-Bernie and maybe write columns based on that stance (several of the journos named have denied any such collusion). Who knows, this is all coming from John Podesta’s One-Sided Emails, a never-ending one-act play by Julian Assange, Ecuador’s top cultural warrior/accused rapist and probably the next Bachelor, this winter on ABC.
I’ve addressed the fact that men are really bad at writing about Hillary. This remains to be true and it probably has to do with deep-seated mother issues and the prevailing narcissism that plagues men, both of which should be addressed in a therapeutic setting rather than in a Leah Letter. But the sanctioning of Donald “He’s so much like Hitler! (ed note: he’s really not, Hitler was so much worse)” Trump in this election seems to have made many journos wary of questioning Hillary at all, to the public’s detriment. But the Podesta emails, as vague as they are, show at least a hint of campaign-side coordinated boosterism. This is depressing on many levels.
Journalism and politics. Politics and journalism. The Great American Circle Jerk, played out in email inboxes across the golden waving wheat shafts of our nation. I have a question: When did it become cool to kowtow to power? Here is a simple adage I know to be true: People in power suck balls. This goes for Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, Mark Zuckerberg, Lin-Manuel Miranda, Kanye West, Kim Kardashian, Kaley Cuoco, Colin Powell, Colin Powell’s second cousin Pete Wentz, Pete Wentz’s ex-wife Ashlee Simpson, Jessica Simpson, O.J. Simpson, Homer Simpson, and especially Joe Biden.
Journalism and politics. Politics and journalism. The Great American Circle Jerk.
Let me be explicitly clear. Power is NOT cool. Celebrities are NOT cool. Being verified on Twitter is NOT cool. I'm using power and celebrity interchangeably because they have, more or less, become interchangeable, and also to honor Barack Obama, our first celeb president. People in power do the oddest things, like order drone strikes, oversee coups, oppress women, deplete land of natural resources, go on Jimmy Kimmel and read "mean tweets," guest-edit Wired magazine, destroy cities, do stupid shit with large sums of money, and name their baby Bronx Mowgli. With rare exceptions like Michelle Obama, you have to be really lame to want power and/or fame, and also not have a soul or a conscience. Power and fame are childish desires that children want when they play pretend, and when an average child ages out of playing pretend she realizes that what she really wants is a quiet life in an attic with one small window and no internet connection and a lifetime supply of Clif bars and maybe a notepad. Well, such was the dream of one child I knew...
Here is what is cool: Questioning power. Some example questions. Why does Chelsea Clinton’s husband have such a sickly pallor? Why did he move to Wyoming right after their wedding (yeah, I know, “to ski,” but also?)? Why do feminists continue to conflate Hillary Clinton’s gender with her record as a politician, as if she isn’t actually a sexless neoliberal Westworld host who derives great pleasure from the machinations of capitalism? Tim Kaine is bad I hate him???? Another way to be cool: Instead of wasting time trying to shimmy up to the perceived power of others, find your own power within (you don't even necessarily have to do yoga to do this). As I once read in a dating book called “Why Men Love Bitches”: Power is the control you have over yourself. I still don’t know how this relates to dating.
An important note. If you question power, you run the risk of not being liked by the power. We all remember when George W. Bush called that reporter a “major-league asshole,” haha, good insult George, you love baseball. This is right though, this is how it should be. If a person in power likes you, and you work in the media, you are doing a bad job. You are a failure because you are definitely letting the power get away with shady shit in exchange for being liked. If you are not liked, you are probably asking good questions. You are almost definitely horrible and annoying, as the best journalists are. And you have to deal with the ramifications that come with those things (no one likes you), which takes maturity and deep personal strength. But it is fucking punk as hell.
Anyway, the media has lost me. What is its purpose? To speak sparkles to power? To prove that Hillary Clinton is indeed our abuela? Does anyone, besides the cast of the Intercept, have disdain for the government anymore? Have we any faithful adversaries in the fourth estate? Or is the media just a big orgy of sycophantic virgins? There I go again, asking the difficult questions that will remain unanswered by this humble newsletter writer. Well, I wish I could type about this forever, but I have to go feed my bats.
Addendum
One journalist went on a rather lengthy "tweetstorm" (never forget: tweetstorms are the manspreading of the internet) in response to WikiLeaks and "the disconnect about what journalism is and entails" (his phrasing). "I don't blame people for being suspicious, either [about the journalistic process]. Journalists have a lot of power, even now. Most people don't," he tweeted.
First of all, it took me a good seven minutes to break through the cloud of condescension surrounding this tweet, with a break for a snack. Secondly, one of the first rules of power is that as soon as you brag about having it on a public microblogging forum, you lose it. You can find a citation for this fact on pg. 14 of Machiavelli's "The Prince." Third of all, 99.6 percent of journalists have no measurable power. They might think they do, but they have no idea (MTV True Life: I'm a Journalist Who Thinks I Have Power Because I Have a Lot of Twitter Followers But I Actually Have No Power Because Only Journalists Use Twitter So It's a Giant Empty Content Vacuum).
It deserves to be reiterated that despite the critical success of Spotlight, journalism is among the least respected professions on earth, after professional newsletter writers. Their product is used as hamster-cage lining. But I'm sure the hamsters are very well informed, and respect the work of journalists very much.
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