Over the past few months leading into these midterms there has been nothing but a nonstop litany from the mainstream media about how unenthused Democrats are, how the Tea Party is going to take over Congress, how Democrats are going to have to live with the fact that health reform and financial regulatory reform will be repealed by the New Generation of TeaBirchers, and so on.

It requires a daily reality check on my part, because I just don't see it. In my district, I see enthusiasm everywhere I go, as do others. President Obama is coming to USC this Friday for a GOTV rally, and they've already had to move the venue to USC alumni park due to overwhelming demand. (I plan to be there with my cameras, by the way). Last Sunday, 35,000 turned out for his rally in Boehner territory. The week before, 18,000 in Philadelphia. Yet, if you watched either of those two rallies on CSPAN, what you saw was a tight shot of the President's face with no pans of the crowd whatsoever. None. Zero. Not only that, they squelched the crowd response sound, so one was left with the distinct impression that the rallies had low attendance and enthusiasm.

These impressions and themes are not accidents. There are $200 million real benefits to our corporate media in the "Republican takeover" narrative, and so they will continue to tell their viewers, readers and listeners about this mythical enthusiasm gap. Take this CBS News report as an example. The frames are remarkable because they had to twist them up so much to make them fit the bill:

CBS News senior White House correspondent Bill Plante reports that, for the White House, keeping control of the House and Senate is all about getting Democrats and Independents who voted for the president in 2008 back to the polls, and on that score, the latest poll numbers show Mr. Obama hasn't closed the sale.

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As we've been witnessing, the democratic process is broken in America and movement conservatism has corrupted our ability to govern. In any party there usually are different factions within that party. Some might be more moderate than others, but when a party wins a mandate in a general election they are usually allowed to govern.

That doesn't apply when Republicans are out of power. Yes, we have terrible politicians manning the Democratic Congress, but it's almost unprecedented when one party just votes no, so that even if you have a strong majority in the Senate, one Senator from the other side has the power to stop all legislation. So even if you're in a huge minority, the filibuster can sink legislation or hold up personal appointments every time.

The media are feckless and ineffective. They love the fight game and are more interested in ratings and clashing personalities than they are in actually reporting the news. So they allow a minority party that was soundly trounced in two elections (2006,2008) to maintain their defiance to the American people. And then they blame it on the party differences within the Democratic Party.

And we can't forget the conservative media that drives their narratives to millions of people a day. Fox News and AM talk radio do have a huge influence on the American people and the politicians in Congress, and they should never be ignored.

Our old pal Steve Benen writes a nice lengthy post on this, and his solutions are ideas that the blogosphere has been touting the entire time to break the logjam.

* Start using the phrase "up-or-down vote" all the time.

* Take advantage of every opportunity. Using reconciliation as much as humanly possible should be a no-brainer. The "nuclear option" should be put on the table, too. Endorse Harkin/Shaheen. Scour the rules and procedural minutiae and figure out if Republicans who want to filibuster can't be forced to literally do so. Search for GOP statesmen -- Lugar? -- and ask if they're really willing to destroy the workings of the United States Senate.

* Go on the offensive. Organize rallies in Maine and explain that Olympia Snowe, by endorsing her party's obstructionism, is single-handedly responsible for the fact that Congress can't function, and it's within her power to put things right and let key bills get up-or-down votes.

* Give voters who elected Democrats something to be excited about. Voters will be impressed with accomplishments, so maybe it'd be wise to give them some. Dems can start by passing the damn health care reform package.

It's not too late. Finish health care. Pass a jobs bill. Go after irresponsible banks. Bring some safeguards to Wall Street. Fix student loans. Pass an energy bill. Repeal "Don't Ask, Don't Tell." This not a fanciful wish-list; it's all entirely feasible.

Digby posts an idea from one of here commenters:

A reader writes in to Talking Points Memo with this observation:

Why do you think Congressional Democrats have had such a hard time dealing with Republican obstructionism? It's been apparent for months that Republicans are unwilling to compromise on legislative initiatives, unless by compromise you mean that they will allow Democrats to agree with their proposals. In such an environment, it is pointless for Democratic lawmakers to ask themselves whether there is a way they can craft legislation so that some Republicans will be willing to vote for their proposal - there is simply no provision that Democrats can add or remove from a bill that will make Republicans want to vote for a Democratic proposal. And yet we keep seeing efforts - like the Baucus jobs bill - in which leading Democrats tinker with or even gut their own proposals in a fruitless effort to get Republicans to sign on to the legislation.

If Democrats in Congress behaved like the Republicans have after being trounced for the last four years, the media and the Village would be screaming bloody murder at them. The Washington Post led by David Broder would be lashing out every day: 'How dare they be such obstructionists," Broder would say, and all of his colleagues would follow suit.

And like clockwork, the Dems would be afraid of a backlash from voters and would once again pass legislation like Medicare Part D, the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy and the bankruptcy bill, to name a few.

They must pass health care to get the ball rolling on their side. You want a commission? I got one. They should put together a Procedure Commission to investigate every nook and cranny that is available to them to pass legislation.

I recently had a political conversation with a few friends and family members, most of whom are Republicans, and it was nothing short of exasperating. I thought that some of them had progressed over the past few years, but I now know they still have a long way to go.

After George W. Bush was installed in 2000, I told all of my Republican friends and family that not only would he be an abject failure, but that he would take us to war in Iraq and our economy would be in ruins by the time he left office. I was chastised for years after, but I never gloated as time went by and I was sadly proven right. Dubya and his party ran our country into the ground and I thought that many of those conservative friends and family had come around -- but as it turns out, not so much.

Just minutes into the aforementioned discussion, it became painfully clear that the right-leaning narratives put out by our corporate media had indeed sunk in and they had bought into them hook, line and sinker -- and most of these folks admitted they can no longer stomach Fox News so I knew they were getting their talking points from the likes of CNN and other non-Fox media outlets.

No matter what the topic, from health care reform to Wall Street, and no matter how many points we agreed on or how many facts I laid at their feet, someone would invariably turn to me and dismissively say "Yes, but you're so left wing that you..." or "This is a center-right country, and you're so far left that..." In each case I asked them to explain -- please give examples of what makes me, or anyone, "left wing." The only thing they could come up with was deficits! Pelosi and Reid! Beyond that, it was because I didn't hate people like Al Gore and Howard Dean and I watch Keith Olbermann and Rachel Maddow, and EVERYBODY knows they are really "far left."

Head. Smash. Desk.

The irony of it all is that in the end, we agreed on about 90% of everything we talked about. Old habits die hard and they couldn't let go of the old targets they were trained to hate by the right wing media. In their minds, any policy or legislation that comes from Democrats with no support from the right is just far left and that can't be good. We ended up agreeing to disagree ... on all the issues we agreed on! I'm sure I'm not the only one who has suffered through these kinds of skull-numbing experiences so if you've found yourself in the same position, please feel free to use this post to vent.

(Note: That's not me in the picture...at least on the outside.)

The last I heard, the right was feeling quite pleased with itself because there was some evidence to suggest the traffic for the top liberal blogs was trending down, while the traffic for the top conservative blogs was trending up. This item, relying on SiteMeter data from the end of December, argued, “It has long been understood that the largest liberal blogs have generally produced more web traffic than the largest conservative blogs.... After surveying the traffic stats of many major political blogs, I found that web traffic for several major liberal blogs either declined sharply or stayed the same while major conservative blogs saw a sharp increase in traffic.”

Now, apparently, the right is prepared to argue the opposite — liberal blogs are more popular — but with a rationalization to explain the phenomenon.

Erick Erickson, editor of the popular conservative megablog RedState, conceded that progressives currently enjoy an advantage over conservatives online — though he attributed it to an asymmetry in free time, since conservatives “have families because we don’t abort our kids, and we have jobs because we believe in capitalism.”

I’m not quite sure how best to respond to something like this — it’s unusually unhinged, even by the standards of the far-right blogosphere — though I think Matt Stoller is on the right track by relying on simple mockery: “Now, being a doctor who performs abortions is in fact a job, so one might find conflicting narratives in Erick’s quote. And if the way to use the internet well politically is to up the number of abortions, then the GOP is kind of fu**ed.”

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) is marking the International Day of the Disappeared on 30 August by calling on the international community to renew its commitment to addressing the plight of missing persons and their families.

The ICRC report includes personal accounts and narratives conveying the agony and great sense of loss that bereaved families endure over many years. “Even if there’s nothing but a skeleton, I don’t care – I just want my son back,” said Guliko Ekizashvili, a Georgian woman whose son is still missing 14 years after he disappeared during the armed conflict between Georgia and the breakaway region of Abkhazia.

[Pierre Krähenbühl, the ICRC’s director of operations] emphasized that “there are concrete measures that States and others can take to prevent such a tragedy from occurring in the first place. Often, what is lacking is the political will to tackle the problem.” He also welcomed the adoption in December 2006 of the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance, a legally binding document that prohibits enforced disappearance. “The ICRC urges States to sign, ratify and implement this important treaty as soon as possible,” he declared.

When a government or army engages in "forced disappearances," it is a war crime. Is anyone here surprised that the Bush Administration has refused to sign this treaty on the grounds that it "did not meet our expectations'?

Kathy G discusses the Republican framing of Democratic candidates and asks:

It leaves me with a question, though: why aren't Democrats doing more to aggressively discredit the Republican candidates? It's essential that we shape the negative narratives about those bozos right now, before it's too late. Yet none of the operatives on our side seem to be doing that. Why is it that the Republicans always seem to be thinking and planning at least three steps ahead of the Democrats?...read on

We're not talking about Swiftboating, just pointing out the obvious.

CNN's Jacki Schechner takes a look at the impact YouTube is having on politics and the campaign.

(h/t Scarce)Sam Seder waxes poetic on the importance of video

(h/t BraveNewFilms)I love this. For me, the "YouTube-ization" of politics has as much to do with empowering all citizens and dis-empowering the media from furthering their narratives as it does taking some of the tight control of candidates' messages from them.