Published July 20, 2011 in the Naples (FL) Daily News:

From Teddy Roosevelt’s Bully Pulpit to President Barack Obama’s embrace of social media, presidential communication tends to define communication as a cultural phenomenon.

The public — and policymakers from Capitol Hill to nearly every other level of government and society — tend to listen when a president of the United States communicates. The way in which a president communicates has also become nearly as important as the words written or spoken.

Former presidents George Washington and Thomas Jefferson set a tone for our early days with their letters — hand-written and usually hand-delivered. Abraham Lincoln’s speeches defined our nation in its most troubled times.
The first telephone was installed in the White House in 1877 by Rutherford B. Hayes, a single line running only to the Treasury Department next door.

Regular and frequent telephone calls into and out of the White House would have to wait another 50 years until Herbert Hoover installed the first telephone into the Oval Office.

The age of mass communication between the White House and the American public began famously with Franklin D. Roosevelt’s Fireside Chats on the radio. Embracing the earliest form of mass communication, Roosevelt’s effectiveness and success is legendary.

Both FDR and, later, presidents John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson knew how to work the phones effectively and all three effectively used off-the-record conversations with journalists as part of a mass media strategy.

President Johnson famously had three televisions set up in the Oval Office to monitor all three — at the time — major television news organizations.

Perhaps no form of presidential mass communications compares in its effect on the body politic as greatly as the 1960 televised debates between John F. Kennedy and Richard Nixon. The medium became the message and helped determine the outcome of the election.

Live televised speeches directly to the American public have become almost routine for presidents from Kennedy to Obama. And the annual State of the Union address to Congress has become an evening of great television theatre.

Obama’s uses of the “new” forms of social media in 2008 are widely credited with propelling a relatively unknown senator from Illinois to the White House. (Lincoln used trains and debates with Stephen Douglas.)

The Obama administration continues to employ many forms of social media in its daily communications. With a few quick keystrokes, millions of Americans are able to occupy front-row seats in the White House and Eisenhower Executive Office Building.

From its primary Internet portal at www.whitehouse.gov/engage, visitors can subscribe to a wide range of electronic newsletters and blogs, can visit and engage with other Obama administration initiatives like “Let’s Move” or “Joining Forces” or the new “Champions of Change” initiative.

From its Facebook page and Twitter account to its presence on LinkedIN to its White House channel on YouTube and Vimeo, constant uploading of photos to its Flickr account and podcasts on iTunes, the Obama White House is communicating online constantly to millions of Americans just about every aspect of this historic presidency.

“This White House is committed to being the most open and transparent in history,” said Katelyn Sabochik, director of online engagement for the White House Office of Digital Strategy.

Her title and office pretty much says it all. Social media is the message for the Obama administration.

These guys are a laugh a minute! Better ‘n a barrel of monkeys, these Republicans.

Just as President Obama is holding a summit – the largest gathering of world leaders since the 1940s – on the dangers of loose nukes, the loose knuckleheads over GOP HQ put out a new ad for the TeeVee Box and the Innertubes.

You gotta see this on the YouTubes .

“Many think April 15^th is tax day,” said the serious announcer. “Wrong.”

“For President Obama, every day is tax day.”

“Your money isn’t safe. He knows where you keep it.”

Seriously, they put this out, expect people to believe it.

“Obama’s new health care bill contains $570 billion in new taxes.”

“Wheelchairs: taxed. Sneezing: taxed. Breathing: taxed.”

Okay, so here’s what we’re gonna do. We’re gonna take it to the streets! Grab your wheelchairs; we’re headed downtown to protest by breathing and sneezing on people!!

“And if you don’t buy healthcare, the tax man will come for you.”

“You can’t run. There is no place to hide!”

“Over next few years IRS agents will begin to multiply.”

Well, at least we haven’t taxed multiplication…not yet, anyway. But we’re not finished!

“The government wants your money and President Obama knows where to get it.”

I’m tellin’ ya, this couldn’t be funnier if it was on Saturday Night Live…or the new Palin Network.

Oh yea, and this comes as a Democrat wins the first congressional race of 2010 in Florida District 19 running against a teabagger who tried to make the race a rejection of health care reforms. Not so much in Boca.

Meanwhile, over in Rome the Pope has finally figured out how to deal with the worldwide and continuing spread of priests diddlin’ the alter boys. Blame it on the queers! Yea, that’s the ticket!!

Cardinal Tarcisco Bertone, the Vatican’s No. 2 dude, the assistant Pope (and only God knows what else) explained it all in Chile on Monday.

“There is a relation between homosexuality and pedophilia,” said the Holy Second See. “That is true. That is the problem.”

Holy Wankin’ It Under the Robes, Batman!! Problem solved!!

Gee, and the rest of the world – including most learned shrinks – thought it all had to do with years and years of sexual repression caused by the insanity of celibacy. Let me ‘splain sumpthin to you, boys. Gay people don’t need children ’cause there’s lots of other gay people around. Get used to it.

It’s the rednecks, themselves! (‘Cause, Lord knows, ain’t nobody else gonna.)

Some of ‘em, anyway, put down their beers long enough to turn off the Fox News Channel and emerge from their double-wides to start a campaign to bring justice to this most persecuted minority.

“There’s no identifiable group more persecuted, humiliated, embarrassed, singled out for ridicule, fired from jobs, kids suspended from school, civic groups represented being denied parades than the confederate southern Americans of the United, States,” says Kirk D. Lyons, chief trial counsel of the Southern Legal Resource Center.

Okay, Okay…I know, I know. Stop laughing now.

These guys are, unfortunately, quite serious.

Kirk D. Lyons and the boys want all – seriously, not making this up – they want all “confederate southern Americans” to so self-identify on U.S. Census forms in the 2010 Census.

Heck fire, they got movies on the YouTube and a page on the Facebook talkin’ about this very thing!

Here’s the logic: the Census asks us to identify ourselves by race or national origin. The Southern Legal Resource Center says “national origin” can include anyone who’s ancestors lived in or fought for the Confederate States of America for the almost four years it existed – um, in rebellion against the real United States of America.

So, you see, because of what Lyons and his buddies like to refer to as the “Wo-ah of No’thun Aggression,” these descendents have long been persecuted and embarrassed.

And here’s the kicker. He cites the 1964 Civil Rights Act as justification for this Census declaration because it established the “national origin” distinction in the Census forms.

That’s rich, ain’t it?

Seriously, Kirk…buddy…come here a minute. Let me explain something to you: there’s a REASON you feel so embarrassed and put-upon.

You might recall a little something about 400 YEARS OF SLAVERY…followed by another 100 YEARS OF OUTRIGHT VIOLENCE AND PERSECUTION of FORMER SLAVES and THEIR descendants.

Just sayin’.

One of the most shameful chapters is all of human history and you want to continue to celebrate it? Really?

And while you’re at it, take down that damned confederate flag! It’s never been anything but a symbol of hate and it will never be anything but a symbol of hate.

Those of us fortunate enough to be born in the southern U.S. have many ways to truly celebrate our region’s “heritage.” We celebrate in our manner of speech. We celebrate in our food. We celebrate in our rich literature and music. We celebrate in our oft-fabled hospitality and friendliness. We celebrate in our diversity, in our human coat of many colors. We have an unparalleled opportunity today to embrace the speech, food and music of many different cultures and celebrate our combined cultural splendor.

Oh, and by the way, don’t confuse the Southern Legal Resources Center with the Southern Poverty Law Center, which has for years and years fought the good fight against racism, ignorance and hate – as southerners!