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Posts by NancySkinner
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Why I go on Fox News
Last night I got thrown into the latest round of spitballs between Jon Stewart and Fox News on the O’Reilly Factor. I first appeared on Fox News in 1999, on Neil Cavuto’s Show, and continued to make countless hundreds of appearances through the years on all the shows. Currently, I’m a regular on the Fox Business Network.
This whole time I’m asked: Why do you go on Fox News?
It’s a question I’ve been asked a thousand times. My answer may surprise you, and will hopefully spark a healthy debate.
First, I have to admit I have been ambivalent at times, when so many of my liberal friends badger me about going on. Liberal bloggers have beaten me up for it, saying I give them cover for the fair and balanced thing, etc. Trust me, it’s no picnic getting crazy hate mail from the right for being liberal, and hate mail from the left for not boycotting the right.
How did this predicament happen to me, anyway?
I helped pioneer progressive radio by actually landing a gig at WLS in Chicago in 1997 when more people had been to the moon than had been liberals on talk radio. One day I had a caller who said we need more Nancy Skinner’s on the radio. My guest in studio got their number, and Air America Radio was born. The caller was Shelly Drobny and his wife Anita who founded Air America, long before its misadventures.
Although I had signed a letter of intent to be a host upon launch, I had made another fateful decision: to throw my hat in the ring for the U.S. Senate primary in Illinois. I had been debating the big political topics (Impeachment, Iraq, Global Warming, NAFTA, Budgets) for eight years now on a 50,000 blow torch in Chicago, so crazier things have happened. The pollsters said there was a guy in the race who was pretty good, but had no chance of winning because his name sounded Middle Eastern. Yes, of course, I found myself running against Barack Obama, and I lost to POTUS – big time!
No worries. I liked him a lot during our race, and went on to cheerlead for him on the national cable channels during the race, and throughout his presidency, I’ve been a very strong voice for the economic policies that he was forced to implement upon taking over 1600 Trainwreck Ave. in DC.
Which brings me to my point. What have I learned moving in and out of conservative and liberal media venues. (I have also been on MSNBC through the years – filling in for Bill Press on Buchanan & Press and Ron Kuby on Curtis & Kuby and CNBC guest hosting, etc.)
Beliefs determine reality. Worldviews determine beliefs. There is actually a quantum physics term for this called memes. These belief genes are mostly inherited, but can be transmitted from person to person like a virus.
So, if someone has, say, a conservative worldview, with all that implies, then when they are confronted by someone with a progressive worldview, with all that implies, then the conservative says “you are out of touch with reality” because you are out of touch (with their reality), based on their beliefs and memes. And vice versa.
This is why I’m often asked if I think conservatives believe in what they are spouting. I think they do, because your beliefs form your reality. Are there objective facts? Yes, of course, but people glom onto the facts that support their beliefs. Do I think there is an overarching objective set of facts that support my worldview? Of course, that’s why I’m a liberal. But I know many fine conservative friends of mine who would say “of course, that’s why I’m conservative.”
The key difference is that I think I’ve seen through the glass darkly a bit here. If you have any chance of changing worldviews, then you have to actually converse with those who have a different worldview than you do. Don’t get me wrong, I love MSNBC and watch it religiously and love to be on the network. But am I really changing anyone’s mind there? Aren’t we the ya ya sisterhood amen club there? You may ask the same question about Fox. Are you really changing any minds over there? That is a debatable question, but I think I have. I think that people are only open to different ideas, or memes if you will, when they don’t despise the messenger out of the gate. That’s why I don’t do nasty. Look how well all the potshots and attitudes do for Sarah Palin. She is definitely not a meme-changer. She does reinforce existing worldviews; that’s why her crowd loves her. She tells them they are right. You don’t have to listen to those nasty liberals and their lies, or eat green vegetables, just chalk up the ticket fee darlin’.
Most of my e-mails are off the charts so creepy that they are quite fun. But occasionally I get a jewel. My favorite was from a self-described “white evangelical Christian, ex-military who works in the nuclear weapons industry.” He said that he probably was not my typical fan profile, but that I had persuaded him to change his mind on climate change, the need to address it and the opportunities therein. That feels really good to hear. And even last night, I got this:
Nancy,
I tend to be a conservative, but I must applaud your performance on the Factor tonight.
Not that you won or lost a debate with O’Reilly, that was not at issue – but that your “world view” was (I thought) spot on.
Bravo!
We need to return to disagreements w/o extreme disagreeableness.
Now, I’m still a conservative – but also fan of yours.
Is that an oxy-something or other? A conservative Nancy Skinner fan?
Sincerely,
Eddie Herron
No, Eddie, it’s not an oxymoron. It’s called one meme at a time.
A Brave New World
Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
Do you feel different this morning? You should. Something special happened yesterday. I’m not just talking about the historic vote on healthcare reform. I spent the entire weekend watching the debate on all the cable channels.
I watched as the tea partiers got nasty. I’m not just referring to the racist and homophobic slurs, but the majority of the crowds with signs talking about communism, socialism and-the-end-of-freedom-as-we-know-it types. I saw Dems on TV trying to answer why they were proceeding in the face of poll numbers that showed the American public opposed the bill by a small margin, whilst John Boehner and the gang insisted that it was in violation of the consent of the governed. Nevermind that the GOP wasn’t too concerned about consent of the governed when they impeached Clinton. All polls showed only between 17% and 25% support for that option, yet they persisted.
Nevermind that the bill has been demonized for months on end and every scare tactic in the book was used to alter the polls from the widespread support for the plan in June 2009, even among Republicans and especially Independents. Never mind that the GOP has used a big scary boogeyman called November 2010 elections to frighten Democratic lawmakers in swing districts.
Something strange happened. The Dems came together and pulled the trigger regardless, and today, not only are they OK, they are stronger than they have ever been.
Republican calls for repeal are tantamount to a football team who just got scored on trying to take 7 points off the board instead of scoring their own touchdown. It ain’t gonna happen!
Guess what else ain’t gonna happen? Losing control of Congress. The American public, who has been confused by the debate and the deliberate mischaracterization of it, will now get to choose between the “problem solvers” and the “ranters and ravers.” The list of immediate benefits will be the referee in the rhetorical battle. The death panels will be revealed as fable.
But most importantly, I feel that the Democrats have finally developed the confidence they need to act on even more pressing issues. To take on huge special interests and their proxies in congress who have up to this point been so successful in scaring Democrats and stopping action on healthcare, climate change, financial reform, deficit reduction, trade policy reform, immigration reform, etc.
Doing the right thing is good politics. Time reveals that. Just take the war in Iraq and the flip in the polls. The same is happening with the stimulus bill and the automaker bailouts. We took hard political steps, but they are working.
They were hard votes because the GOP could scare people or divide them into them and us camps. Democrats showed last night that American is not a zero sum game. The whole of this country is greater than its parts, its factions. Our founding fathers actually feared factions more than anything else. So despite their best shot at Obama’s Waterloo, manipulating the words of the founding fathers, those who sought to divide this country are all the weaker for it.
It’s a brave new world for progressives. I certainly hope we all feel it as move on to tackle climate change. The planet itself is certainly not a zero sum game. There are no winners and losers if we fail to act, we will all be losers. I hope that Democrats carry with them the moral of this story. Do the right thing, and you’ll be okay. More importantly, history will smile on your bravery.
Listen up Liberals: Progressive means Progress!
I lost my U.S. Senate primary race to Barack Obama six years ago today. I remember because it was my birthday. I also remember something that our President, then state senator, said in a light moment during the campaign after I impersonated him and he shot back one of me, “All we need is courage and big bold ideas,” he said in his best high-pitched Skinner voice. He was right on with that as I repeated that mantra at every chance. I was pleased to hear him say it yesterday in Cleveland on his last- minute pitch to pass healthcare reform.
“I don’t know about the politics, but I know what’s the right thing to do,” he said, nearly shouting as the crowd cheered. “And so I’m calling on Congress to pass these reforms — and I’m going to sign them into law. I want some courage. I want us to do the right thing.”
Well, Mr. President, I have also believed that doing the right thing is good politics. President Obama and I both opposed the war in Iraq at a time when the polls were hugely in favor of the war. Look what happened. With time, the truth came out. The public slowly assimilated it, the polls completely flipped, and we are withdrawing all troops.
The moderate and conservative Dems should heed this experience. Get some spine and pass the bill. The truth will come out. People will be happy. The polls will change, and we can move on to make it better and better.
To the liberals in the party, I must say the same. I am strongly in favor of a public option, as you can see from untold TV food fight battles and my advocacy efforts. In fact, I first started talking about a public option during my Senate primary with Barack Obama in 2003. I didn’t call it that, I called it USA Choice for Healthcare, and described it as a government plan that will compete with the private sector to provide an affordable plan to Americans who could not find one in the private market. I was not a single-payer advocate because I knew that politically, a single-payer could never pass given that the vast majority of Americans were enrolled in an employer-based program. But, more importantly, the idea of “competition” was a keyword in GOP rhetoric. How could they win that spin battle?
They managed to twist “competition is a good thing” into “anything the government touches is a bad thing” and won the short-term rhetorical war. But they cannot win the battle.
Healthcare reform is too fundamental to our survival, as a nation, and as individuals. Americans know that. And just as they came around with Iraq, they will come around on healthcare. So listen up, liberals (and I don’t care which name you call me), but progressive means progress. Abolitionists didn’t tie their fate to women’s suffrage. They made progress with each movement.
The same is true with healthcare. You have to free Dennis Kucinich and the others who signed the pledge letter for the public option to do the right thing. It’s not perfect, no. But it’s traction. When people get used to having the government involved, even if for now it is to stop the worst abuses in insurance company behavior and end monopolistic premium increases, it is progress.
I believe that offering a public option in the next congress and the next one after that will get us closer to that goal. As people understand the cost structure, they will choose to have “government competition” over “repealing progress” and returning to the days where insurance companies are allowed to throw you off while you are sick and dying, when having a pre-existing condition means a very insecure future.
All or nothing is fine when we are playing poker with chips, not when it literally means life or death for untold thousands of Americans while we wait another decade to try it again.
Your exemplary efforts to push it this far and get it done deserves the highest of praise. I was with you in that. The other side says they will kill the bill at all costs. You can’t aid or abet that obstructionist behavior.
As President Obama said yesterday. Have the courage. Do the right thing. This week we can make more “progress” as progressives than anything we’ve done in literally decades.
It’s time to unite in the 11th hour and put something historic in the history books. Then let’s start writing the next chapter. Much work yet to be done.
Partisan Politics is the Real Pre-Existing Condition
I’ve been watching the autopsy reporting on the Massachusetts Senate race. It’s simply mind boggling. I was on CNBC and Fox Business Network the day of the election trying to predict “what a Brown win means” like everyone else. The next day, we heard it all. The right says it’s a revolt against Obama’s “big government” or his “government takeover of healthcare.” The left says that people were mad that the healthcare bill did not go far enough and should have included a public option or that Martha Coakley blew it by sunbathing in the Bahamas instead of shaking hands in Beantown.
Let’s fly above the whole situation at 40,000 feet and see what we learn.
Hold the Blue Dogs accountable at BlueDogHunt.com
Friends,
We are in the critical hours for healthcare reform. We all know that a few Democratic Senators are threatening to hold hostage true reform, which must include the public option in order to bring competition into the healthcare market place, reduce premiums and ultimately long-term budget deficits.
The only choice for “fiscally responsible” Senators is the public option because without it, federal spending on healthcare will skyrocket from one in six dollars to one in three. Longterm, our national debt would be close to 400% GDP. That is what we call meltdown.
Cash For Clunkers: (Not cars, I mean banks)
Two developments happened over the last two days.
The House of Representatives passed the oddly named, but very smart “Cash for Clunkers” bill, which will give cash vouchers to people who turn in their low mileage vehicles for higher mileage ones. According to the “Detroit Free Press,” the vouchers would be worth $3,500 if the mileage improvement is at least four miles per gallon for a car or two miles per gallon for a small truck, and $4,500 if the difference is 10 miles per gallon for a car or five miles per gallon for a small truck.
In both cases, the old vehicle must get less than 18 miles per gallon, and new cars must hit at least 22 miles per gallon for a car and at least 18 miles per gallon for a small truck.
My message to my listeners sent out 5-8-2009
Dear Listeners and Friends:
Whether you’ve written me, called into the show or just listened these past few months, I want to thank you from the bottom of my heart for giving me the opportunity to be a part of your lives. So many of you have shared your thoughts with me and made me feel like I touched you in some way — whether you agreed or disagreed with me, we were able to have a dialogue.
Today will be my last show for a while. We have decided to go on hiatus to regroup and spend some time building the Nancy Skinner brand through multiple media — my TV appearances, my blog and the book I’m going to be writing. But, I will be back on the air causing more trouble by the fall, and will keep you up-to-date during the time I’m gone — I will not disappear.
