Media Black-Out: Ben Carson
Ben Carson leads Trump in the Iowa polls. Here is how U.S. News & World Report covers this story.
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In 1952, a novel by a black ex-Communist appeared: Invisible Man. The author was Ralph Ellison. It won the National Book Award in 1953, and it has been in print ever since. The book's title is its main theme: the protagonist's social invisibility.
FRAMING THE DISCUSSION
Trump has blown his lead to Carson. The media's response: stories on Rubio.
A black physician, without $5 billion of his own money to tap into, is leading in the Iowa polls. This cannot be. It breaks with the MSM's Party Line on Republican racism. Democrats are color blind. They are liberal. They have Obama to prove it. But Republicans? It's still 1952 for them.
How is it possible for a Right-wing black to be leading in the Iowa poll? It is not possible. So, it isn't happening.
This is the oddest political story in this generation. Two men without any political background have over half of the Republican support in Iowa. The politicians -- Senators and Governors -- are also-rans. More to the point, this is why they are also-rans. They ran. They won. Now they are losing. This has never happened before in American politics.
A political party is allowed such a candidate, but only one per election. William Howard Taft was one in 1908. Teddy Roosevelt picked him to succeed him. Herbert Hoover was one in 1928. He was beloved of the media. He had been given newspaper coverage for almost a decade: "the man who fed Europe." He had been vetted by the Republican establishment. The Democrats had John W. Davis in 1924, a New York lawyer and a founding member of the Council on Foreign Relations, but he won the nomination only on the 103rd ballot -- the darkest dark-horse candidate in American history. (Note: lawyer Davis lost Brown v. Board of Education, 9 to 0, in 1954 -- the most famous reversal in Supreme Court history. He made the case for school segregation.)
NEVER ELECTED
What's this? A citizen candidate? Yes, yes -- in theory this was always supposed to be a possibility. It was part of the American dream. But not two of them in the same year. Not without vetting. Not without media support. No, no, no. This was not supposed to happen.
But it is happening.
Bush is not fading in the stretch. He is fading before the horses get to the first turn.
Now what? Cruz is too verbally skilled. He is openly and defiantly hostile to the media -- contemptuous. The media know this. The media frantically looked around. Paul has the wrong last name, and he may be a FED-hater. Christie? Bridgegate. Kasich? Who's Kasich? Fiorina? A failed CEO. Gilmore? Less famous than Kasich. Huckabee? An ex-Baptist pastor from Arkansas. Jindal? He thinks Willie Robertson would be a great running mate. What to do? Lo and behold, there's Marco Rubio, a junior Senator famous for nothing except his Hispanic last name and his Italian first name. "Let's substitute Rubio!"
The race is on. Is he Beetlebaum? They hope.
How to explain away Trump? His rhetoric. He is flamboyant. That has to be it!
Then how to explain away Carson? They can't explain away Carson. This is the elephant in the elephant's living room: a revolt against the status quo on a scale never before seen in a major political party. He is an unknown. A black unknown. An unknown without verbal fireworks. In short, he is that most feared political candidate: none of the above.
It just cannot be.
The media are trying to imitate David Copperfield. They are trying to make the elephant disappear from the living room. It isn't working.
ON THE OTHER HAND. . . .
Now let's look at the Democrats. Hillary, age 68. Sanders, age 74. Biden, age 72. (Scratched.) O'Malley. Who? Chaffee? The Democrats' Gilmore. Webb? Don't even think about it: a Scots-Irish Annapolis grad and ex-Secretary of the Navy who is a Hollywood screenwriter -- the loosest cannon in the Democratic Party. The establishment does not want him rattling around on the deck of the U.S.S. Bully Pulpit.
I think Hillary will be elected. So do the betting sites. She will be hit by a major recession. The Democrats will have to run her again in 2020 if she decides to run. (Try to imagine this: Hillary Clinton decides she is no longer interested in political power. Odds in favor?) She will lose. The Democrats will have to wait until 2024 to get another shot at the presidency, and they may have to wait until 2028 to get a serious shot.
A lot can happen between now and 2028.
Meanwhile, Carson is a statistically inescapable symbol of a deep distrust of elected politicians: "none of the above."
We have not seen anything like this before. We are in uncharted waters.
"What's that noise? It sounds like a waterfall."
"Nah!"