If the debate did anything the other night, it highlighted what is really happening in our political process. Instead of examining the policy positions of candidates, we judge their ability at manufacturing petty controversy that will push just the right emotional button on a certain demographic. Or we rate a candidate’s skill at defending himself against such an attack. The principle stands that if you can blanket the airwaves with enough nonsense, but cleverly edited nonsense, so that the right biases are enflamed in the uninformed, then you just may have a chance of defeating your opponent, honorably or not.

And the practice of this principle, as we saw Wednesday night, is not just found in desperate and unscrupulous political campaigns. The Fourth Estate has also embraced it. Or should I say the Corporate Estate? And it too has a campaign to win.

Why should ABC spend two hours of prime time focusing on issues that are detrimental to the interests of its major advertisers or its own conglomerate greed. The mainstream media, instead of acting as the unbiased observer, has a dog in this fight no different from the unemployed factory worker in rural Pennsylvania. Just the odds are a bit off balance.

But it’s probably best to let a wiser and more eloquent writer explain it:

“As a result of the war, corporations have been enthroned and an era of corruption in high places will follow, and the money power of the country will endeavor to prolong its reign by working upon the prejudices of the people until all wealth is aggregated in a few hands and the Republic is destroyed.”

 -Abraham Lincoln