Salon: No One Listens to the President

[dennis4868]

Tonight, when the President speaks to the nation about Libya, let’s do something different. Let’s listen. Let’s listen, and then turn the television off and think about what he’s said. Mull it over in your mind, but only after having watched the thing and having imagined that the President was really talking to you.

You see, a lot of helpful people in the media think the viewing public is stupid. Well, a lot of them damned well know it. And the ones who don’t, have actually convinced the viewing public that, because they happen to be celebrity talking head on television, they know far more and far better what the President wants to say to you, and so they give you their interpretation and tell you that’s what he really, really, really meant to say. Then they start bitching about what he didn’t say and should have said, and how he should have said what he did say differently. They twist and turn and bend and break down and analyse and parse his every word, his every inflection and his general body language to the point that one half of what the pundits do say is in direct contradiction to the other half, and that only confuses everyone.

But maybe they want that too. You see, the pundits all say – Right and Left – that the President has a communication problem. Some say he’s too high-brow, too elitist. Others say he depends too much on a teleprompter. Still more wonder how he could communicate so effectively as a candidate, but not as President.

The entire article is here....http://open.salon.com/blog/enlightened_belle/2011/03/28/no_one_listens_to_the_president

[atreides1]

1. I plan to watch and listen

Don't know if what he says will change my mind...but I'll listen to what he has to say!

[Cali_Democrat]

2. It would be nice if it was question & answer session rather than a speech

People have a lot of questions about the US military intervention in Libya.

Frankly, I'm amazed it's taken him this long for him to address the nation regarding the war in Libya. Open communication with the American people is important when important decisions between war and peace are made.

Hopefully he'll hold an extensive press conference in the very near future. There are questions that need to be answered.

[Davis_X_Machina]

3. The notion..

...that no one listens to the President, or that if they listen, he doesn't change any minds, is borne out by pretty solid poli-sci research.

The locus classicus is George C. Edwards III's On Deaf Ears: The Limits of the Bully Pulpit.

There's precious little empirical evidence for even the Great Communicator's ability to change minds. Energize those who have already made their minds up, yes. Move public opinion where it wasn't, or wasn't going already, not so much.

[unblock]

4. indeed. it's quite ironic that we call such people "leaders"

most politicians are followers. their chief survival skill lies in identifying a popular theme and claiming identity with it.

you have to be very, VERY powerful to be able to say, "hey, entire country, you are wrong, we must move this way, not that way!"


the true leaders are actually not the politicians, but the public figures who actually move public opinion, something hard to do when you're begging for power. roger ailes is a leader, evil and misguided though he may be, THAT's leadership. herding the sheeple and pulling them into the corral you want them in instead of the one that's in their best interests. disgusting, but that's leadership. limbaugh is similarly a (thoroughly disgusting) leader. on the left, it's hard to find great leaders these days because we've got so little power, but there are probably some good names in hollywood or the music industry that could be considered leaders, in that they similarly mold public opinion instead of following it.

[JoePhilly]

5. He is doing exactly what he said he'd do.

Meanwhile, the media masturbates and pretends that they do not hear a single word he says.

[Clio the Leo]

6. lol this is asking TOO MUCH!

..... some in the press have been "telling" me what the President would say all day long. Or, what I love, what I should EXPECT him to say.