More on "digitalization" as a political buzzword

Jens Berger takes down a piece of horse-race journalism in Die Schulz-Story im SPIEGEL – postpolitischer Journalismus Nachdenkseiten 10.10.2017. The topic is a cover story on the disastrous candidacy of Martin Schultz as the Chancellor candidate of the Social Democratic party (SPD) in last month's German parliamentary elections. Berger brings in the "digitialization" concept in describing:

"... die Parallelwelt des SPIEGEL, in der es die wichtigste Aufgabe der Sozialdemokratie ist, „Antworten auf das Zeitalter der Digitalisierung“ zu finden und die Union unter Merkel zu einer sozialdemokratischen Partei geworden ist. In der Filterblase des Hauptstadtjournalismus werden solche Dinge wirklich geglaubt."

[... the parallel world of Der Spiegel, in which the most important task of the Social Democracy [the SPD] is to find "answers to the age of digitalization" and {in which} the Union [CDU] under Merkel has become a social democratic party. In the filter bubble of capital city [Berlin] journalism, such things are really believed."]

Berger complains that only one paragraph in the 17-page Spiegel cover story is devoted to policy matters. And that the controversial Hartz IV neoliber "reform" implemented during the red-green coalition government headed by SPD Chancellor Gerhard Schröder, isn't even mentioned.

Berger's judgment:

Das ist Journalismus aus einer postfaktischen Zeit – einer Zeit, in der Fakten und Inhalte gar keine Rolle mehr spielen und die Erzählung selbst im Mittelpunkt steht. Nicht der Star ist der Star, sondern die Story. So kann man dann auch über Politik schreiben, ohne über Politik zu schreiben. Nennen wir es postpolitischen Journalismus.

[That is journalism of a post-fact time - a time in which facts and content don't play any role at all and the telling of the story itself stands in the middle point. The star isn't the star, but rather the story. In the same way, one can write about politics without also writing about policy. Let's call it post-political journalism.]

There's a wordplay in the German that's hard to duplicate in Enlgish: "Politik" in German means both "politics" and "policy."

I wonder if "post-democracy" journalism is also a concept whose time has arrived.

Ya wanna see something really scary?

I said a while ago I would try to make a usuable image of this and I finally did. And, yes, I know it isn't Halloween until Oct. 31.

It's the cover of German news magazine Der Spiegel for Feb. 18, 2002, over a year before the Iraq War began. It features (l. to r.) Colin Powell as Batman, Rummy as Conan the Barbarian, Bush as Rambo, Dark Lord Cheney as a mob hit man and Condi-Condi as Xena the Warrior Princess. As appropriate as they all are, Cheney's is especially so. And this was years before he actually shot somebody in the face. The caption says, "The Bush Warriors: America's expedition against Evil".

The weirdest part about this is that all five of the subjects thought this was a flattering portrait. John Shelton Lawrence reported in Blood Brothers: Bush's Rambo Delusion San Francisco Chronicle 08/25/02:

That American policymakers share the pleasure of superheroic fantasy was revealed this past spring in an incident with German news magazine Der Spiegel.

To accompany a "Masters of the Universe" article on the Bush administration's crusade against evil, Der Spiegel created a satirical cover depicting each national security player in the role of a zealous destroyer from American popular culture. George W. Bush, surrounded by his advisers, received a muscular Rambo body holding an automatic weapon and ammunition belts.

Daniel Coats, U.S. ambassador to Germany, visited Der Spiegel's editorial offices - not to protest the caricature or the article's viewpoint about reckless unilateralism but to report that "the president was flattered," whereupon Coats ordered 33 poster-size renditions of the cover for the White House. Each policymaker on the cover reportedly wanted a copy. (my emphasis)

You just can't make stuff like this up. At least I can't. I just don't have the imagination.

Tags: authoritarianism, bush administration, bush doctrine, daniel coats, spiegel